Growing your church with stocks or bonds?

Tony Morgan, the pastor of "Administrative Services" of a mega church recently post an interesting question, which solicited many comments from burnt-out volunteers, and sparked my brain in the process.

I have wrestled with church stuff for a while now, being pulled between many directions: the PDC, the Emergent camp, etc.

It was fascinating to watch the PDC mega-churches grow at the double-digits rate annually, especially with all the latest innovation to lust about.

But then now I realized this cross-polination: Unlike businesses, church should grow by its equity, not by its liability - by stocks and not bonds, using business speak.

While I was in the MBA program, it was surprising for me to learn that the preferred way to finance a company is through issue bonds, not stocks. Bond was considered "other people's money", it's called "leverage". It's the borrow capitals you get from lenders, not your reinvest-earning or saving.

Consider Home Depot - it was surprising for me to learn that this giant was borrowing money up the wazoo from some 30-years bond in order to have enough capitals to keep building big boxes fast enough to saturate the market.

On the other spectrum, there is In-N-Out burger, an excellent fast food chain which is limited to the four states on the Western U.S. because they didn't want to incur debt for expansion. They just want to grow in accordance to their equity growth.

Now let's talk churches.

Technically we could embrace rapid expansion (numerical growth) by borrowing (using what we don't have). Put people into ministry so that they get involved and grow more and keep the church running in the process (which in turn will draw more new people to different programs and services the church has to offer).

Or we could grow the church (even numerically) by reinvest-earning (using what we have). Wait until people matured and reap the fruit of Christian service from them. But this would take way longer.

But there will be less burnt-out, more sustainable, and it would be healthier, and the experience with God would be more enjoyable.

What do you think?