There are many resources available to the partners of ARC Churches. One in particular, an app created by Silicon Valley innovator Vance Roush, uses technology to solve a challenge many churches and organizations face in the twenty-first century.
Roush took a particularly interesting path to ministry. The executive pastor at Vive Church in the San Francisco Bay area has a long background in technology, having launched his career at Google.
Like many techies in Silicon Valley, Roush has an entrepreneurial mind. He was even named one of 2022's rising innovators to watch by The Silicon Valley Business Journal.
So, when some of the congregants of Vive Church expressed the desire to give -- but also the challenges they faced in doing so -- Roush realized something needed to be done.
All Miracles Start with a Need
In a sit-down interview with the executive director of ARC (Association of Related Churches), Dino Rizzo, Roush said he believes that all miracles start with a need. It's like the story in the Bible about the little boy with the loaves and the fish. There was a need for the miracle that Jesus completed.
Roush said that ARC church planters and innovators often focus on the solution and the services, which can result in them just chasing the problems. He said that if you follow the problem and the pain from the very beginning, a byproduct of understanding the problem deeply, you'll be better able to reach the best solution.
This is what Roush did when he was talking with members of his congregation -- many of whom were in the tech world like he was. They expressed a desire to give generously to the church, but the only way they could give big was through their stock portfolio since they mostly got paid in stock options from their companies.
Roush started a brokerage account for Vive Church, but donors still had to print a form, fill it out and fax it over from their own brokerage. He quickly realized that there was so much friction and inconvenience in just trying to give back.
"I literally felt the Spirit of God tell me, 'If you remove this friction, it will unlock unprecedented amounts of generosity.' Talking about the loves and the first multiplication -- God is not a God of addition. He's a God of multiplication," Roush said."
Removing the Friction of Giving
In October 2019, Roush partnered with an engineer to create the very first version of Overflow, which was a digital platform for donating to the church. At first, it was primarily only for Vive Church, allowing people to give straight through the platform digitally.
Roush emailed a list of 1,000 active recurring donors and expected to raise a couple of thousand dollars. Instead, 32 people responded to the email, and the church raised $1.1 million in stock donations alone.
"The message is the same. Generosity, the principle of it, hasn't changed for thousands of years -- Biblical generosity," Roush said. "While the message doesn't change, the method has to change. The way we facilitate generosity is going to evolve over time."
In two years' time, Overflow now serves almost 400 churches and nonprofits, including many launched with support from ARC Churches, providing people with an easy way to donate through the use of a technological platform. For Roush, it just made sense.
"We live in an Amazon generation. We live in a Venmo generation," he said. "This is the environment we live in."
About ARC (Association of Related Churches)
ARC (Association of Related Churches) is a cooperative of independent churches from different denominations, networks, and backgrounds that strategically resource church planters and pastors to help them reach people with the message of Jesus. ARC exists to see a thriving church in every community, reaching people with the message of Jesus. Since its beginning in 2000, ARC has grown into a global organization and has helped plant more than 1,000 churches.
