Greetings!
Soon you will be hearing a great deal about NCD or Natural Church Development. NCD is not a program, but it is a process which churches have used worldwide. NCD's main premise is that God wants all of His churches to be healthy...and...a natural biproduct of health is church growth. NCD was developed by a Lutheran pastor in Germany nearly 20 years ago. Since this process has grown to help churches all around the globe.
WHY IS NATURAL CHURCH DEVELOPMENT HELPFUL AND SUCCESSFUL?
Church research in America shows that 85% of our churches are on a plateau or declining and that Protestant denominations have declined by nearly 10% in the past 10 years. But the more important reason has to do with the health of our churches.
Natural Church Development helps a church focus on its health as a congregation, not on the numbers of increase or decline. It assumes that healthy churches will be growing churches, but a church will not always experience an increase in numbers.
The questions Natural Church Development asks have to do with congregational health and transformation. For instance:
Does the church empower its leadership to do ministry?
- Does the congregation have a passion about its sense of spirituality?
- Do people leave worship knowing they have been in God’s presence?
- Do the relationships of the people show the signs of God’s love?
WHAT CAN BE DONE?
Teach leaders and members of our churches what a healthy church is like, and coach them in a process of becoming healthier communities.
WHAT ARE HEALTHY CHURCHES LIKE?
EIGHT QUALITY CHARACTERISTICS
Empowering leadership
Gift-oriented ministry
Passionate spirituality
Functional structures
Inspiring worship
Holistic small groups
Need-oriented evangelism
Loving relationships
WHAT PROCESS WILL HELP?
Churches are organizations, and they are organisms. As with any organism [any living thing]
God has designed natural processes for health and growth. Natural Church Development teaches churches to follow these six life-giving principles to enhance their health and increase their growth:
Interdependence: everything is connected:
Multiplication: living things normally reproduce themselves
Energy transformation: both negative and positive energy harnessed for good purposes
Multi-usage: increasing the capacity for ongoing growth and development
Symbiosis: cultivating cooperative relationships for mutual benefit
Functionality: an organism’s functions produce discernible results according to its purpose
WHAT IS NATURAL CHURCH DEVELOPMENT?
The Institute for Natural Church Development is an international, interdenominational organization based in Germany committed to helping congregations become healthy, growing churches. NCD resources are being used in the U.S. by many denominations, including Lutheran, Episcopal, Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian.
Christian A. Schwarz is head of NCD and the author of Natural Church Development: A Guide to Eight Essential Qualities of Healthy Churches and several supporting books and resources. In the 1990s they surveyed over 1,000 churches in 32 countries – churches of different denominations and with different theologies, both growing and declining churches. On the basis of that initial research, they identified the Eight Quality Characteristics which define healthy churches.
NCD has now surveyed 33,000 churches in 60 countries, including 20,000 churches in the U.S. Their research continues to support their initial findings and conclusions. They have discovered that every church surveyed which showed a certain level of health in all eight areas is, without exception, also a numerically growing church.
Send a pastor and key leaders to an informational night where they will learn how Natural
- Church Development can help them be healthier, growing churches
- Recruit a leadership team – called a Church Health Team – which we will train in how to oversee the process
- Have 30 active members and the pastor complete a survey which we will process and report on to the congregation
- Engage in a process to discern their next steps, on the basis of the survey report, to move toward health and growth as a congregation
- Begin that process, and work on it for a year.
- The time and energy required for the process is the most important contribution they will make.
- The extent of their financial contribution will be the decision of the denominational body sponsoring the Natural Church Development program in this area.
WANT MORE INFORMATION?
http://www.ncd-international.org/
God Bless...and...Give 'em Heaven!
Church research in America shows that 85% of our churches are on a plateau or declining and that Protestant denominations have declined by nearly 10% in the past 10 years. But the more important reason has to do with the health of our churches.
Natural Church Development helps a church focus on its health as a congregation, not on the numbers of increase or decline. It assumes that healthy churches will be growing churches, but a church will not always experience an increase in numbers.
The questions Natural Church Development asks have to do with congregational health and transformation. For instance:
Does the church empower its leadership to do ministry?
- Does the congregation have a passion about its sense of spirituality?
- Do people leave worship knowing they have been in God’s presence?
- Do the relationships of the people show the signs of God’s love?
WHAT CAN BE DONE?
Teach leaders and members of our churches what a healthy church is like, and coach them in a process of becoming healthier communities.
WHAT ARE HEALTHY CHURCHES LIKE?
EIGHT QUALITY CHARACTERISTICS
Empowering leadership
Gift-oriented ministry
Passionate spirituality
Functional structures
Inspiring worship
Holistic small groups
Need-oriented evangelism
Loving relationships
WHAT PROCESS WILL HELP?
Churches are organizations, and they are organisms. As with any organism [any living thing]
God has designed natural processes for health and growth. Natural Church Development teaches churches to follow these six life-giving principles to enhance their health and increase their growth:
Interdependence: everything is connected:
Multiplication: living things normally reproduce themselves
Energy transformation: both negative and positive energy harnessed for good purposes
Multi-usage: increasing the capacity for ongoing growth and development
Symbiosis: cultivating cooperative relationships for mutual benefit
Functionality: an organism’s functions produce discernible results according to its purpose
WHAT IS NATURAL CHURCH DEVELOPMENT?
The Institute for Natural Church Development is an international, interdenominational organization based in Germany committed to helping congregations become healthy, growing churches. NCD resources are being used in the U.S. by many denominations, including Lutheran, Episcopal, Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian.
Christian A. Schwarz is head of NCD and the author of Natural Church Development: A Guide to Eight Essential Qualities of Healthy Churches and several supporting books and resources. In the 1990s they surveyed over 1,000 churches in 32 countries – churches of different denominations and with different theologies, both growing and declining churches. On the basis of that initial research, they identified the Eight Quality Characteristics which define healthy churches.
NCD has now surveyed 33,000 churches in 60 countries, including 20,000 churches in the U.S. Their research continues to support their initial findings and conclusions. They have discovered that every church surveyed which showed a certain level of health in all eight areas is, without exception, also a numerically growing church.
Send a pastor and key leaders to an informational night where they will learn how Natural
- Church Development can help them be healthier, growing churches
- Recruit a leadership team – called a Church Health Team – which we will train in how to oversee the process
- Have 30 active members and the pastor complete a survey which we will process and report on to the congregation
- Engage in a process to discern their next steps, on the basis of the survey report, to move toward health and growth as a congregation
- Begin that process, and work on it for a year.
- The time and energy required for the process is the most important contribution they will make.
- The extent of their financial contribution will be the decision of the denominational body sponsoring the Natural Church Development program in this area.
WANT MORE INFORMATION?
http://www.ncd-international.org/
God Bless...and...Give 'em Heaven!
Pastor Tim
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