Gone for Good?: Negotiating the Coming Wave of Church Property Transition

Is your church facing the difficult decision to sell property? 
 
Consider using church buildings and land to further the gospel mission. Mark Elsdon, author of We Aren’t Broke: Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry, revisits questions of church resources with a team of pastors, scholars, developers, and urban planners. This collection of essays sheds light on how church communities can transform their properties to serve their neighborhoods. 
 
Essays explore spiritual, sociological, and practical aspects of church property transition, including: 
     • assessing the impacts of churches on their neighborhoods—and the gaps they will leave behind 
     • developing church property into affordable housing 
     • transforming ministry in rural churches 
     • partnering with Indigenous peoples to return land 
     • fostering cooperation between congregations, developers, and city planners 
     • navigating zoning laws 
     • working with foundations and funders
 
Thousands of church properties worth billions of dollars are being sold or repurposed each year. Nothing can stop the currents of change. But congregations and cities can take steps now to ensure a legacy directed toward communal good rather than private interests. Gone for Good? will be an invaluable guide in navigating these radical shifts in church life and ministry.

Contributors: Jennie Birkholz, David Bowers, Philip Burns, Mark D. Constantine, Joseph W. Daniels Jr., Patrick Duggan, Mark Elsdon, Ashley Goff, Jim Bear Jacobs, A. Robert Jaeger, Willie James Jennings, Tyler Krupp-Qureshi, Eileen Lindner, Elizabeth Lynn, Nadia Mian, Kurt Paulsen, Jill Shook, Coté Soerens, Rochelle A. Stackhouse, Keith Starkenburg, Andre White

Mark Elsdon lives and works at the intersection of money and meaning as an entrepreneur, nonprofit executive, and speaker. He is the author of We Aren’t Broke: Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry. Mark holds degrees from the University of California, Berkeley, Princeton Theological Seminary, and the University of Wisconsin School of Business. He is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA) and lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with his family. 

Willie James Jennings is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Systematic Theology and Africana Studies at Yale Divinity School. His book The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race won both the American Academy of Religion Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion and the Grawemeyer Award in Religion, and his book After Whiteness: An Education in Belonging won the Lilly Network Book Award.