Testimonials

Lifeway Envelope Service has always been very responsive to design changes and other needs in our offering envelope service. However, what really sets them apart from other providers is their ability to respond quickly in an emergency. For instance, when the Postal Service misrouted our regular monthly envelopes we contacted Lifeway; they immediately and without question printed a new batch of envelopes and express mailed them to us. Most of our membership never knew there was a problem. That is service you can count on.

Donny Durr
Minister of Business Administration
Broadmoor Baptist Church, Shreveport, LA

During our annual planning and budgeting, I ran across your article in the September/October 2007 Facts and Trends article that featured LifeWay Envelope Service. I copied the article and handed it to my finance team. We looked at it as an investment that was sure to bring a return. After our first month, we had one of the largest regular offerings we've ever had. We expect to come in about $1,500 more than our weekly average in January 2008. It's pretty crazy. I would have never thought that mailing offering envelopes to our members would have such an impact on our giving. There is a good chance we could come in over budget! This will be a first in 12 years as a Pastor! I'm a believer.

Travis Smalley
Senior Pastor, Lakota Hills Baptist Church in West Chester, OH
Current President, Ohio State Baptist Convention

"The LifeWay Offering Envelope Service has become an integral part of the stewardship education and giving strategy for Brentwood Baptist Church in Brentwood, TN. Sending the envelopes into member's homes on a monthly basis has helped contribute to an annual average increase in giving of over 20% a year for the past five years. Further, by continuing to insert Building Campaign Envelopes each month after the three year campaign concluded has netted an additional $500,000 in contributions toward our Building Fund. Emphasizing the offering envelopes in Sunday School Classes and adult and children's worship services has created ongoing opportunities to teach regular, proportional, generous and joyful giving and giving as an act of worship."

In our first year of using LifeWay's Envelope Service, we saw our annual Mother's Day Offering revenues increase by 33%. Obviously, we have been very pleased with the service, and hope to see more strong gains in the future.

The LifeWay offering envelope service has been a positive experience for Severns Valley Baptist Church. Before we starting using the service we handed out a yearly box of envelopes to each member. We printed labels for members/married couples, teenagers, and children; and our staff applied that label to a box. The boxes were placed alphabetically on tables in the hallway for members to pick up. This method worked but it was labor intensive for the staff and an additional expense to mail unclaimed boxes to members who hadn’t bothered to pick them up.

When we started using the envelope service our Stewardship Team wasn’t sure it would work or that it would be cost effective. In order to save some of the cost the decision was made to drop our younger members and only mail envelopes to children 6th Grade and above as well as our adult members. We did provide a generic envelope for the younger children when parents asked for them.

Since that time we have realized we were missing a training opportunity as well as a giving opportunity for our younger children. Receiving envelopes by mail encourages the children to routinely give and they love receiving mail addressed to them. We also mail them statements. I firmly believe the best time to instill the idea of giving to the Lord is when people are young. It is much harder to convince a new adult Christian to began to tithe.

Two years ago we entered into the second capital campaign for our church's relocation plan. Our children's minister encouraged the children to give with the "Buy a Brick" campaign. We had 90 children who pledged to give over the next year to "purchase" so many "bricks" at a $1.00 a brick--an easy giving concept for young children to grasp.

Today, as children accept Christ and become members, they are assigned envelope numbers and they begin receiving mailed envelopes at the same time as the adults.

New adult Christians and members transferring from other churches are also assigned envelope numbers within the month and supplemental envelopes with their name and contribution number are mailed to them by LifeWay.

When the next quarter's envelopes are mailed, they receive their regular envelopes. Mailing the quarterly offering envelopes has also been helpful in reminding our adults to give on a regular basis.