NaturalChurchDevelopment - St James Episcopal Church, Painesville OH

What is Natural Church Development?

In essence Natural Church Development (NCD) is all about releasing the potential that God has already implanted in our lives. Based on research in more than 40,000 churches on six continents, NCD describes universal principles that are applicable regardless of culture or spiritual style.

The Natural Church Development Cycle

The NCD process is a cycle that will be repeated. The basic cycle is outlined below:

The NCD Cycle
Prepare
Diagnose (1-3 months)
Plan (1-3 months)
Implement (6 - 9 months)
Evaluate (1 month)

St James is presently finishing the Diagnose phase and beginning the Plan phase.

2011 Annual Meeting Presentation

The NCD Church Health Team (CHT) made a short presentation at the Annual Meeting. The presentation introduced the Eight Quality Characteristics that NCD research has shown were universally present in all healthy, growing churches. It also presented the scores that St James received in each of those eight characteristics during our recently conducted survey of church members.

PDF file containing that presentation.

2011 NCD Insights Report

In addition to the eight quality characteristic scores presented at the annual meeting, the NCD Insight report includes additional information. The NCD Insight has an introduction section with guidance for interpreting and understanding the scores. The NCD Insight report also breaks the eight quality characteristics down into four insight areas to help dissect and understand the results better. That full report is included below for your study in preparation for the coming focus groups.

PDF file containing the NCD Insights

Church Health Team:
Warren Fish
Mark Hovencamp
Sandy Goodale
Matthew Birch

NCD Coach:
Rev. Julie Fisher

Usefull NCD related links:

Website for Natural Church Development