Commentary by Rev. Luan-Vu “Lui” Tran, PhD.
Key Points:
- The United Methodist Church cannot simply cut its way out of the current financial crisis; it must decide what kind of smaller, more regional church it wants to be and then fund that vision realistically.
- Economic sustainability will depend on re-teaching United Methodists that apportionments are a covenantal way of supporting shared ministries—like bishops, pensions, schools, and disaster response—rather than just another bill from the annual conference.
- The denomination needs to treat its reserves and its real estate as seeds for future mission instead of static savings accounts or burdens, by investing ethically for long-term returns and using buildings more creatively in service to both community and church.
- Lasting financial health will require leaner, smarter structures, greater transparency, and honest conversations about money, so that the whole connection can rebuild its “house” in ways that are wiser, fairer across generations, and focused on what truly matters in God’s mission.
When Bishop David Graves was reported in a recent UM News article as saying that The United Methodist Church’s “financial house is on fire,” he wasn’t trying to be dramatic for its own sake. He was naming a reality: the denomination is smaller, its traditional revenue stream is weaker, and the old way of paying for a global structure no longer works the way it once did. Recent reporting shows that the general-church budget for 2025–2028 has been cut by about 40 percent, that giving through apportionments remains historically low even after those cuts, and that general agencies are leaning more heavily than before on hundreds of millions of dollars in reserves that were never meant to function as a permanent substitute for stable income.
The question now is not simply, “How do we put the fire out?” It is, “What kind of house are we going to rebuild, and how do we keep it livable for the long haul?”
What follows is an attempt to answer that question in plain language for ordinary United Methodists: pastors, lay leaders, and church members who care about the future of our connection.
Economic sustainability is not a technical problem for accountants to solve in a back room; it is a spiritual and practical challenge that belongs to the whole body.
Maintaining that house will require three big shifts: (1) teaching again what apportionments are for, (2) treating reserves as seeds rather than savings, and (3) using our buildings and structures more creatively and transparently.
1. Naming the moment we are in
To understand what is happening, imagine a household that has suddenly lost a significant portion of its income. That family might cut spending, dip into savings, downsize their living situation, and look for new sources of income. That is essentially where the UMC finds itself.
The church has fewer congregations in the United States after waves of disaffiliations. In response, the General Conference approved a much smaller budget for the next four years. But even that reduced budget still assumes a level of apportionment giving that some leaders worry may not materialize, given recent trends. At the same time, general agencies collectively hold around $860 million in reserves, which have been earning modest but not spectacular investment returns. There is growing pressure to “do more” with those assets, even as leaders warn that reserves cannot simply become a permanent replacement for faithful, ongoing support from local churches.
This is not a temporary hiccup. It is a sign that the old model—built on a larger, mostly U.S.-funded structure—is gone. We are slowly moving toward a more regional, more globally balanced church. Our financial life has to catch up.
Economic sustainability, then, means learning how to be a smaller, more diverse, more regionally organized church without giving up our shared commitments to bishops, pensions, mission, disaster response, education, and global partnership.
2. Remembering what apportionments are for
Many laypeople hear the word apportionment and immediately think: “That bill the conference sends us every year.” In reality, apportionments are more like a covenant: a way local churches pool a portion of their giving so that the whole body can support ministries no congregation could carry alone.
If our “financial house” is to be stable, that covenant has to be strengthened, not abandoned. That does not mean going back to unrealistic expectations. It does mean teaching, again and again, what apportionments actually do.
Most church members can name their local mission projects, but far fewer could describe how their apportionment dollars support a seminary in another country, pay a bishop’s salary, keep a pension promise to a retired pastor, or send rapid disaster relief when a hurricane hits. One practical move, therefore, is storytelling: every annual conference and every general agency needs simple, human-scale stories that show where this money goes and why it matters.
Pastors and lay leaders also need help talking about apportionments without shame or guilt. In difficult times, it is tempting to frame apportionments as an unwanted expense or to treat them as optional. That kind of talk becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. When apportionments are described instead as a shared offering—an expression of our connectional identity—people can at least see the why, even if they still struggle with the how much.
At the same time, the formulas that calculate what each conference is asked to pay need to be honest about different economic realities. A fair covenant is one that recognizes a church in rural Congo, a church in downtown Manila, and a church in suburban Texas do not live in the same economy. Regionalization gives us tools to address those differences more directly. Economic sustainability will mean using those tools well.
3. Treating reserves as seeds, not just savings
Much of the anxiety in the UM News article centers around reserves. On the one hand, agencies have significant assets; on the other hand, those assets are not infinite, and relying on them too heavily can mask deeper problems.
A household with savings has options. It can simply spend the money down to cover bills, or it can invest the savings in ways that generate ongoing income. For the church, reserves need to function more like seeds than like a stash of cash under the mattress.
This means several things:
First, reserves should be invested thoughtfully and ethically, in ways that reflect our Social Principles but also recognize that the church is in this for the long haul. Money that is not needed for immediate emergencies can be placed into long-term, diversified investment strategies designed to produce steady, sustainable returns year after year—not wild speculation, but careful, disciplined stewardship.
Second, a portion of those reserves can be treated like an endowment for core connectional ministries: the episcopacy, global mission, theological education, and support for under-resourced regions. If we set a clear policy—spending, for example, a fixed percentage of a multi-year average of investment gains—then reserves become a source of predictable annual support, not a piggy bank raided in moments of panic.
Third, the church must resist both extremes: the temptation to hoard reserves out of fear and the temptation to drain them quickly to avoid difficult conversations about giving and structure. Intergenerational fairness means remembering that the next generation will need bishops, schools, mission, and pensions too.
4. Redeeming bricks and mortar
Across the connection, we sit on one of the church’s largest assets: property. Sanctuaries, education buildings, fellowship halls, offices, camps, and retreat centers tell the story of past generations’ generosity. In many places, however, those spaces are now underused or in need of repairs that local churches can barely afford.
Economic sustainability calls us to look at buildings with fresh eyes. That does not mean turning every church into a commercial enterprise or ignoring the legal and tax complexities involved. It does mean asking: How can this physical space serve both the gospel and the community in ways that also help sustain the ministry?
Some congregations already host preschools, after-school programs, recovery groups, food pantries, or community clinics. Others lease space to nonprofits or share a campus with another congregation. With good legal guidance and careful attention to mission, these arrangements can both bless the neighborhood and provide steady income.
At the conference level, a more intentional approach is needed. Regular property reviews can help identify buildings that might be better used as community hubs, co-working spaces, affordable housing, or shared campuses. In some cases, selling an underutilized property and reinvesting the proceeds in a new or renovated, multi-purpose facility may be healthier than preserving a cherished but unsustainable building.
In all of this, the Trust Clause (the provision that says local church property is held in trust for the denomination) and the mission of the church must remain central. The point is not to turn every church into a landlord, but to make sure our buildings are tools for ministry, not anchors dragging us down.
5. Learning to live leaner and smarter
The UM News article points out that some money has already been saved by changing how meetings happen—using technology more, shortening General Conference, and rethinking travel. Those moves are not just about convenience; they are about adapting our structures to match our size and our purpose.
When a family’s income drops, it may mean fewer vacations, simpler meals, or postponing big purchases. For the church, it may mean fewer in-person meetings, more shared staff, reduced office space, and careful pruning of programs that no longer bear enough fruit to justify their cost.
This includes the way we fund and structure the ministry of bishops. The Episcopal Fund supports active bishops around the world, but it has come under pressure as membership has declined in the United States. Sustainability may require a fresh look at how many episcopal areas are truly needed, how they are organized, and how responsibilities and costs can be shared more effectively across conferences and regions. That is delicate work, because bishops are not just administrators; they are spiritual leaders and symbols of unity. But stewardship requires that we match the scale of our oversight to the scale of our connection.
Living leaner does not have to mean living smaller in spirit. Sometimes, trimming a structure can actually strengthen its ability to focus on what matters most.
6. Building trust through transparency and learning
Money and trust are inseparable. People are more likely to give, and to keep giving, when they believe funds are handled wisely, transparently, and in service of clear goals. In anxious times, rumors and half-understood numbers can do enormous damage.
One very practical step toward sustainability is better communication. Imagine if every United Methodist could easily see, in simple charts and stories, how much the connection asked for in apportionments this year, how much was received, how reserves changed, and which ministries were funded as a result. Not just in dense reports at annual conference sessions, but in accessible dashboards and narrative summaries that pastors can share with church councils and finance committees.
Equally important is education. Many local leaders—pastors, treasurers, trustees, lay leaders—have never had the opportunity to learn the basics of reading a financial statement, understanding a budget, evaluating a lease, or planning a capital project. Offering regular training in these skills is not a luxury; it is an investment in the church’s long-term health.
And finally, when conflicts arise over money—between conferences and the general church, among agencies, or within local congregations—we need processes that are pastoral as well as procedural. Mediation, patient conversation, and shared discernment often do more to preserve the connection than quick resort to legalistic solutions.
Conclusion: From alarm to imagination
The image of a house on fire is alarming, as it should be. It wakes us up. But the most hopeful line in the UM News story may be something quieter: a reminder that God has already given this church extraordinary resources—people, faith, property, knowledge, and money—and that the real question is how creatively we choose to combine them.
Economic sustainability will not come from one single fix. It will come from many smaller decisions made over and over again: local churches teaching their people what connectional giving accomplishes; conferences and agencies treating reserves not as a bottomless well but as seeds for a future that outlives us; leaders looking at buildings, staff patterns, meetings, and programs and asking, “Does this still serve our mission?”; and the whole church learning to talk about money honestly, without shame, secrecy, or magical thinking.
If we can do that, then Bishop Graves’s warning will have done its work. The fire will not have destroyed the house; it will have forced us to rebuild, wiser and more faithful, in ways that can sustain both the church we are now and the church we are becoming.