Immanuel Lutheran Church, Grand Ledge, Michigan

30 MEMBERS TAKE NATURAL CHURCH DEVELOPMENT SURVEY AT IMMANUEL LUTHERAN CHURCH

hirty randomly selected members of Immanuel Lutheran Church recently completed the Natural Church Development Survey (NCD).

The Natural Church Development survey will measure the health of Immanuel Lutheran in eight areas that have been found to be essential to healthy church growth. Developed by the Institute of Natural Church Development in Germany, the NCD survey grows out of what was probably the most extensive study of church growth ever conducted, involving over 1000 churches, in 70 countries, and with virtually every religion. This study revealed a clear positive relationship between eight Quality Characteristics and church growth.

The 8 Quality Characteristics that are universally used in building healthy churches are:

	Empowering Leadership
	Gifts Oriented Ministry
	Passionate Spirituality
	Effective (functional) Structures
	Inspiring Worship
	Need Oriented (contextual) Evangelism
	Holistic Small Groups	30 Immanuel Members take NCD Survey.
	Loving Relationships

Prior to the survey being given, Pastor Jim Watson of Christ Lutheran church in Michigan Center met with the Immanuel NCD Team. Pr. Watson has been trained and certified in the NCD process and has been assigned by the Conference to assist congregations such as Immanuel Lutheran in the NCD process. He talked to the NCD team about the survey process and answered their many questions.

Immanuel’s NCD Team then randomly selected 30 members to take the survey by using the current church membership directory and assigning numbers to each member in the member directory. The NCD Team then placed these numbers in a container. The 30 surveyed members were selected by randomly drawing 30 numbers out of the container. These church members were than called by the NCD Committee members and were asked to take the NCD survey. The NCD survey will be scored by the Institute for Natural Church Development Institute at their national office in Lincoln, Nebraska.

The NCD team will receive the results of the survey in about a month. The NCD Team will then look at how we scored. Each of the 8 Quality Characteristics will receive a score. The Team will especially focus on the Quality Characteristic with the lowest score. With the help of other church members, the NCD team will then develop an Action plan to strengthen our church in that particular area.

The Immanuel NCD Team during this 12-month church strengthening process are: Jim Drown, Becky Frysinger, Jim Krenek, Mike Proper, Dick VanGilder Teri Sime (Chairperson). If there are any questions please do not hesitate to contact any of us.

Refer to this ELCA web site for additional information http://www.elca.org/outreach/ncd/

4/30/08

Past updates from the NCD Team

3/17/08 4/30/08