How They Once Grew Church Plants

The EFCA has a long history of financial giving towards church planting. As I read through the official board minutes of one of our districts, I was amazed to see how often larger and older churches in the area supported small churches. Sometimes a larger church would partner with a smaller church many miles away. Like today, leaders in the past placed a high priority on planting churches to serve new communities.  

Various financial tools were used to encourage growth. In some situations, district leaders would use revolving funds, lending financial resources to a church to help build their building. The church would pay it back over time, allowing other churches to benefit from the funds. Eventually, Christian Investors Financial emerged, using the same principle over the last 65 years on a much larger scale. 

Back in 1952 another concept was developed called Shareholders. This was where individual donors gave one dollar for a share in a new church plant up to three times per year. Some would “buy” more than one share, and over time thousands of people “bought” shares to help build churches in EFCA districts. 

From the first project in 1952––which helped a church in Edmonton, Canada (then a part of the EFCA)––until at least 2007, 281 churches received help, ranging from $2,215 for that first project to more than $16,500 for some of the later churches. The total amount was more than two million dollars, a significant sum considering the value of the dollar in those early years. 

While some of the churches have moved, merged with others or closed, the vast majority are still serving the Lord and their communities because of God’s blessing over this project. 

Though the Shareholders project has ended, the EFCA is grateful to God for the continued support of individual donors sharing their resources to plant and strengthen churches.