MattGlover.com

Money was never really a big deal to me until there were others relying on my income for survival. It’s still not on the top of my list of my priorities, but wanting to ensure that my family is housed, clothed and fed means that it is more of a concern than it was when I was younger.

Being a pastor means I’ll never be filthy rich! But it’s not the amount, but the uncertainty of whether it will continue that is the hardest in ministry. It’s simply not always possible for people that work in churches to be paid. I sometimes wonder whether my generation will be one of the last where it is even possible to be paid full-time to be a pastor.

Our country churches and many of the emerging missional churches perhaps take the lead in this area, with bi-vocational ministry being the norm. In one sense, this seems more appropriate as it can keep the pastor grounded in the ‘real world.’

Anyway, this is one of the reasons why I have maintained my freelance cartooning career. I don’t claim to be great at it, and when I mix with other cartoonists, I’m a little embarrassed to have my work seen in the same room as theirs. But it helps pay the bills and after ten years of freelancing, it’s nice to be able to have a long list of satisfied clients who regularly come back to me with more work.

But the family is getting older and the expenses are growing, so it’s time to ramp it up a bit. I’ve decided to experiement with some web based advertising through Google’s Adwords and display some ads on my site using Google’s Adsense. I’ll give them both six months and see if they’re worth the effort. I’ll also see if I can get listed with some freelance agencies and pick up a few extra jobs that way.

In the ten years I’ve been freelancing, this will only be the third time I’ve done any advertising aside from my website. Word of mouth combined with the web have been amazing in connecting me with clients. Interestingly, in all that time, I’ve never met a client face to face - the communication has always been through email and occassionally the phone.

Anyway, it will be interesting to see how it unfolds. If you know somebody who needs a cartoonist, give them my details - and on the off chance it does make me filthy rich, drop in some time and I’ll buy you lunch.