A Christian council governing almost 3,000 evangelical nonprofits is hoping its new guidelines will help diminish the ever-increasing moral failings of those in leadership.
The Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA) has noticed that the greatest threat to finances the church faces are due to leadership making bad moral decisions. Because of this, the ECFA is making the biggest changes to their standards in 45 years.
The proposed standard outlined in March this year states that “Every organization shall proactively care for its leader and support the integrity of its leader in conformity with ECFA’s Policy for Excellence in Supporting Leadership Integrity.”
This new standard by the ECFA is the eighth on their list of standards for churches and ministries and is appropriately named “the integrity standard.”
“There’s consensus around the idea, that the board has an opportunity and responsibility to come alongside a leader to help leaders be in a position where they can best thrive,” says ECFA president and CEO Michael Martin in an interview with El cristianismo hoy.
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During a survey done in 2021 involving over 800 members, the ECFA found that 94 per cent believed leadership failures are impacting donor trust.
los new standard set by the ECFA includes some direction for churches and ministries, including:
- The board, or a board committee, should meet at least annually with the leader to discuss how the board “can provide appropriate support in proactively caring for the integrity and well-being of the leader as a whole person.”
- The leader is responsible for “investing in their relationship with Jesus and guarding their heart (Prov. 4:23), striving to live above reproach in the biblical expectations for leaders (1 Tim. 3:1–7; Tit. 1:6–9), and submitting in a spirit of love and humility (1 Pet. 5:1–6) to the care and support offered to the leader by the ministry’s board.”
- The board should also ask the leader about the leader’s commitment to upholding biblical integrity principles, as outlined in a written code of conduct. According to the commentary, leaders ought to demonstrate traits like humility, growth, and the fruit of the Spirit. The board is then responsible for documenting these conversations in its minutes.
In 2021 the ECFA removed Ravi Zacharias International Ministry (RZIM)’s status after sexual misconduct allegations came out after Zacharias’ death.
“A leader’s relationship with God, with themselves, their neighbours—it has a massive impact on how they do their work,” says Scott Rodin, a senior consultant and chief strategy officer with The FOCUS Group. “Fuzzy ethical edges turn into cliffs really quickly.”
The previous seven standards set forth by the ECFA include doctrinal integrity, governance, financial oversight, legal compliance, financial transparency, compensation and third-party transactions, and stewarding financial gifts.
Roughly 70 per cent of lawyer Frank Sommerville’s clients are ministries or faith-based. While he shares his appreciation for the new integrity standard set by the ECFA, he has reservations about them being properly implemented.
“I applaud the effort of ECFA to address the issue of leadership integrity,” says Sommerville. “I have seen in my 30-plus years that the lack of integrity in the senior leader can harm or destroy an organization. [However], is it the job of the board to hold a leader accountable for non-work, non-job performance activities? Is that the best use of the board’s time? You don’t need a board that serves the vision of the leader; you need a board that ensures the leader is implementing the vision of the organization.”
The new standard will be implemented fully in the fall later this year.
Este artículo fue publicado originalmente en CHV Radio.
Sylvia St. Cyr es locutora de radio en CHVN, un medio cristiano en Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canadá.
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16 Responses
I once helped a Christian org. prepare for its annual ECFA audit. I was not at all impressed at what it actually entailed. An orgs finances would have to be very, very messed up before they would notice that anything is off. And they have a history of waiting until an org has been completely disgraced in many news sources before it tends to take any action. GFA and VOM are two instances of things being absolutely awful. After the bad press they failed GFA on most of its criteria. VOM is still on their list after two cases of them supporting child molesters and then doing nothing at all to help the victims. ECFA bends over backwards to get money out of orgs and put a very fake seal on them. They keep taking the Mammon until the stench becomes so strong that they cannot take it and give a fake seal any longer.
The ECFA has a long history of attempting to close the stable door long after the horse has bolted. Nothing will change with this new standard.
In fact, the reality is this will only encourage churches to circle the wagons even tighter when scandal hits in the name of “proactively caring for its leader.”
I had to read this twice. The new rule is sorely lacking. It is assuming you don’t have a wicked leader or a wolf in charge. Tired or frustrated leaders don’t abuse their power – predators do.
As a former church administrator, I believe there are 3 predators that target churches/ministries. The embezzlers, the child predators and the intimate partner predators(domestic violence). These wicked people are extremely covert and capable of deceiving large groups of people wanting to “give the benefit of the doubt “.
It seems that loss of money is the main reason for the changes, loss of finances, rather than loss of spiritual state and the damage done to God’s people.
I am going to be brutally honest with y’all, bc that’s who I am. I fought a wicked sexual addiction for decades. My three brothers and I inherited this from our father who was the leading elder at the small evangelical church we attended. There was no pastor in our denomination. During my involvement with several protestant churches over a decade or more I was accepted as a faith-filled man of God, just like my father, and given leadership positions in them all as we moved about with my business. I hated myself bc of this, I spent much time literally crying out to God for freedom. I knew I could not ‘love’ God while I was grieving Him. Nothing changed. Then in desperation I bought several versions of the bible & a concordance, and began a passionate & determined search for God & His truth that would set me free. After many months of four or five hours a day doing this, I suddenly had the thought that I was doing all of this selfishly. [God spoke to me?] I wanted to be free from the despair that filled my spirit. I began again with the motive of knowing God so I would know the plans & purposes He had for me & I could serve Him responsibly.
Many months later I knew God well enough to fear Him. Ex. 20:20, Prov. 14:26-27 I knew how incredibly marvelous, amazing, compassionate, holy, powerful and just He is. He truly meant that the wage of sin is death, despite what I had been taught. I knew that for me to make an active choice with my will to choose for His highest good [agape love] I had to cease sinning. He gave me power to do so! Now I am free!!
Repentance is not taught in churches today. They talk about ‘repenting many times’….like every night. That is confessing to sins NOT turning away from them. Repentance means one stops sinning. I recently wrote an article on Substack & on Facebook’s Life Abundant entitled AGAPE which describes clearly that agape [loving God & others in the manner in which the Greek word, ‘agape’ means, is intertwined with repentance. One cannot have one without the other, and both are essential for salvation. Today’s ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult which Satan created when the Holiness Movement died during the civil war NEVER transforms anyone’s life. But sadly that is what is taught in churches instead of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ. Jesus said something that totally negates the relevance of today’s gospel in Matt. 7:21-23. Sexual abuse will continue in churches until the true message of God’s salvation is preached. ‘A Nation Broken’ reveals the truth of God’s salvation & is available from Amazon or B & N now. PLEASE get a copy & read it with at least a curious heart & open mind.
Colin Stitt .. thank you for your powerful story. I celebrate with you ..! Finding your freedom from the nightmare you endured. Great depth in God be with you as you grow in Him.
I was sexually abused as a minor. Then raped. I became very promiscuous. When I got saved I stopped it. Then I went to Bible school and became friends with fornicators there. Fell back into it. (Still angry at this because the school allowed leaven in instead of protecting people like me.) I was just a babe in Christ. I repented. Years later I got involved again. This time the Lord, who is gracious, showed me why I was doing this. Yes, lack of fear of God but also lack of self worth, worship of man, and words spoken over me when I was a child. Those words were pushing me to sin. Since then I have walked free. Sad thing is when I was a kid I never wanted to sin or do anything bad sexually. I wanted to be pure, but Satan had other plans. And I always hated sex, hated it. So glad to hear you are free. So glad I am free. I must say that church and church people have been a great stumbling block to me over the years. I don’t go to church anymore because of it. People lack the fear of God in churches and thus there is gossip, fornication, greed, cliques, etc.
Repentance is a very emotional, once-in-a-life-time event for any sinner. It can NEVER be repeated. Heb.6:4-6 All the time today’s gospel is held to, the churches will be full of sinners, with leaders molesting young ones, and pastors having affairs with worship leaders etc. The first Church was made up of godly saints who knew, feared, loved & obeyed God, & had repented. When Paul heard of one of his flock being caught in a sin, a fire burned in his gut. He told the Church in Galatia that if someone was caught in A sin the spiritual ones must gently restore that one. Those folks lived in Christ where there is NO SIN. In fact they were referred to as ‘those in Christ’ before the word ‘Christian’ was invented.
Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness.
But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin.
No one who lives in him sins. No one who sins has either seen him or known him. 1 Jn. 3:4-6
Today’s gospel is Satan’s creation of a ‘Jesus Freaking’ cult which NEVER transforms a single soul. Jesus Himself told u that He is not the way to heaven but doing God’s will is. Matt. 7:21-23 John agreed with Him, 1 Jn. 2:17, as did Paul Heb. 10:36
At the top of God’s bucket list is that all sinners repent!! He desires a meaningful relationship with all humans & that is NOT possible in the absence of repentance. Col 1:21
I give the ECFA credit for trying. But their examples in the new standard are troubling.
On the one hand, they explicitly include conduct going beyond their jurisdiction of financial uprightness (like 2 Peter 1:5-9, 1 Tim. 4:16). On the other hand, there’s no mention of what ought to be the Biblical baseline for any leader with access to finances: “free from the love of money”. (Claiming that this character trait cannot be evaluated by others would imply that Paul was asking the impossible from Timothy, Titus, and us.)
Then there’s this contradiction in the “must have” section:
“The board or committee does not need to function as a leader’s personal accountability group. The focus should be to provide an appropriate level of oversight to confirm that the leader remains committed to upholding the agreed-upon biblical integrity principles.”
I can’t see any difference between “oversight to confirm that the leader remains committed” and “personal accountability”. Am I the only one?
The organization’s board is to hold the leader morally accountable? How many of these boards are stacked with some combination of family members, yes-men, good ol’ boys, and goons? How is the board supposed to hold anyone morally accountable when they themselves are corrupt?
Yes, that’s completely true Amy and what’s needed are sound governance policies and management systems that of many things mandate tenure and diversification of personal. From experience some of the best people who assist in healthy church management, don’t always agree with the minister and will use their insight and expertise, not at the behest of any individual or group, but for the benefit of the body of Christ.
Indeed, and the more authoritarian the pastor, the less likely it is there will be people on the board willing or even wanting to confront them about their behavior.
The ECFA was created to head off threatened government action to rein in the worst excesses of rogue pastors and churches. They have been exceptionally successful in keeping the government at arm’s length, but they have done virtually nothing to tackle the actual problem of church and pastoral corruption — i.e. working as designed.
I know I sound like Johnny One Note, but my post for every story along these lines is the same. Final accountability rests with the people in the pews. Whatever they do or don’t tolerate will influence the leadership. Sometimes costly? Oh, yeah, but its also costly to sit and do/say nothing, but that cost never accrues to the one who sits and does/says nothing. It will always be someone else who endures the cost of inaction. The best advice I have heard is really short….step up or step off. That door where you came in that swung open so easily the day you first arrived swings the other way as well. I’ve tested the concept. Its true. Easy? Cost free? No to both those questions. But in the long run, it remains the right thing to have done, in one case later affirmed by folks who didn’t act.
I would agree up to a point. Things get more complicated, however, when you see helpless people being targeted and victimized by the leadership, and no one is speaking up. I’ve seen too many people just quietly leave, rather than pay the price for defending the innocent.
It usually results in the defender being ejected anyway, but with a clear conscience.
The problem with ECFA isn’t lack of standards, but lack of enforcement. They have good standards, but unfortunately have become more a laptop than watchdog. The ECFA seal does not mean what it once did, and some organizations have stopped using it.
– ES