Paid in Full Update – October

September 30, 2022 | Brian Dorini

Our Church Building cost ~$20M! We have occupied it since late 2013. By God’s grace, our mortgage at the beginning of 2022 was only ~$2M of that original cost! Currently, we pay ~$200,000 a year on the mortgage, and we would continue to do so for the next 13 years. The ~$200k each year is approximately 10% of our annual church budget. A generous donor approached the church leadership with an offer of up to $1M, as a dollar-for-dollar match, to pay off the ~$2M mortgage. After a season of prayer and due diligence, the church leadership agreed in early 2022 that God was leading us to launch the Paid in Full campaign.

Goals

Our goal is to raise $2M and have full church participation. We launched Paid in Full and ran the public phase of the campaign in May and June of this year. We have raised $880K, from 197 donors. With the matched donation, that’s ~$1.75M. This is a tremendous achievement, both in the level of church participation, and in the amount of money – thank you to everyone who has participated, whether your part is small or large in the world’s eyes!

We are very close to our $2M goal! With just $108k and the remaining match, we will be Paid in Full and able to devote the $200k/year toward expanded ministry! It would also be greatly encouraging to everyone to see our participation jump well past 200. From the outset, we planned to re-open the campaign in the fall to reach out to new congregants, and this will also provide a second opportunity for anyone who missed the short campaign earlier in the year.

The church leadership remains convinced that God wants us to use the ~$200k each year for additional ministry expansion. The principal areas in which the church plans to use that money are 3-fold:

Missions 

In Missions, we would look to acquire new GO Partners. We would look to expand toward funding our GO Partners toward at least 10% of their needs. Lastly, we would look to increase our short term Mission opportunities. 

Local Engagement

We would also love to grow our existing Arts Series and Science Series to provide more opportunities to connect with the community and our congregation. Another goal would be to fund the Mind The Gap program launching this year. This program will help provide critical skills to local high school graduating seniors to help them transition to productive adulthood. Thirdly, we would also look to provide funding for another church plant if our congregation size, and God’s leading, continue to move in this direction. 

Church Ministry

Another way we would expand is to provide funds for a full time worship and music coordinator. This is a position that has been recommended for quite some time by our talented and long-serving music volunteers.

Timeline

We are asking everyone to pray and, if you are led by the Lord, to provide a gift (or a pledge) by October 26. We will then announce the final result on Sunday, October 30.

Some may need to make part or all of their gift later in 2022, and that is fine too. The match will be available through December 31, 2022. For those who will make gifts after October, we ask that you fill out a pledge card by October 26 so that we can all see how God is answering prayer and leading the congregation, and also plan accordingly for the 2023 budget. 

What you can do

1. Please pray to see how God is calling you to participate. God calls us to give sacrificially, and our giving should be a source of joy (e.g. 2 Cor. 8-9).
2. Please give over and above your normal giving to the church. It is important that we maintain our ability to meet our normal budget obligations. Stone Hill Church is your church, your building, your ministry—we are doing this together as the local body of Christ. We take the Lord’s example of the widow’s offering seriously (e.g. Luke 21:1-4), and it informs how we operate—believe us when we say that no gift is too small (and all gifts, received before December 31, will be matched!).

Gifts toward this campaign should be designated to “Paid-in-Full” and can be brought to the office, dropped in the Sanctuary offering boxes, or made electronically.  Offering envelopes can be found in the pew racks and on the sides of the offering boxes if you wish to use one. Please note that gifts and the corresponding match will be applied to the mortgage on a rolling basis. We have already significantly reduced the mortgage!