About 1,400 churches in North Carolina have bivocational leaders on staff. In some associations, 90 percent of the church staff is bivocational. Bivocational leaders are church staff who receive income from a source other than their church or local association.

Lester Evans, bivocational ministries consultant for the BSCNC, does not consider bivocational ministry a new idea. "It's as old as Scripture, Paul was a tentmaker and David was a shepherd," he said. "It's a noble calling."