Budgeting remains one of the most difficult issues for the senior leadership of local churches. It's a dreaded process that presents itself annually and if you catch a senior pastor in a vulnerable moment, he'll confess it's one of the tasks he likes the least about being in ministry. It is a defining moment when he or she realizes that the success of the budgeting process has a direct impact on life in the church and is therefore a topic that has to be addressed and mastered. At Willow Creek, learning to link vision and budget together, completely changed the budgeting process here at Willow Creek.