Startig salary

[Chris]

I am on a Pastor Search committee for a church with a membership (contributing) of 110-125 family units. Would anyone care to suggest what a starting salary should be for a senior pastor in a church that size. The way things are now structured, there would be an Associate Pastor on board, also, to share some pastoral responsibilities, so the guy/gal we will hire won't be responsible for everything. Someone suggested I go to Guidestone.org for help on this, but I could find no links at that site that addressed this issue.

Any other links would be welcomed.

There is a good possibility that the current Associate Pastor will apply for the job, in which case we may abolish the Associate position and have just one pastor (at higher compensation). But, for the moment, that's not where we are. Having one pastor, alone, in a church of 125, might (or might not) be more than one person could handle.

[Sandy]

[William Thornton]

The 2014 is done bi-annually with GuideStone.

You can look at compensation by state, church budget, attendance, position, experience, etc., and get a high-low-average range. Pay attention to the definitions and footnotes ("salary" is cash salary plus housing allowance) to be sure what you are looking at.

The figures are probably skewed upward because it is all self-reported responses. It's SBC but would include any dually affiliated churches that chose to respond.

This is a good tool. Let me know if you have any questions about using it.

[Chris]

Thank you, Sandy and William. Both of these responses were very helpful.

[Ed Pettibone]