At Verdigris UMC, Natural Church Development helped Anita Jackson, shown top left, assess her spiritual gifts. She began teaching Sunday school for children. The other photos are from Willow View church in Enid, which benefitted from DNA Coaching. Jeff Funk welcomes Sally McMillion. Band members are James Lambert, Pam Harmon, Jessica Cummins, Parker Summers, Gene Mooney, and drummer Bryant Peck.

By James Graham, Pastor, Verdigris UMC

One of my hobbies is cross-country bicycling. If you’ve sat on a bicycle at the bottom of a big hill, you know there is really only one way to get over it. Set your jaw firmly, start pedaling, and don’t stop! When you get to the top, the pedaling gets easier, and you can enjoy the sense of accomplishment.

Then comes the nice, easy ride to the bottom, coasting along without pedaling. For the past 20 years, we have been coasting down that hill as our churches decline.

At the 2008 Annual Conference, we made the commitment to reach more people, more younger people, and more diverse people for Jesus Christ. I took the Strategic Plan back to my church in Verdigris. We realized we had reached the top of that hill and had started to relax. Our attendance and growth had flattened out. We were even seeing signs of that coast to the bottom.

We began to realize the Plan was challenging us to look ahead to the next big hill. We decided to use Natural Church Development (NCD) as a tool to help us climb that.

Natural Church Development is a process that helps churches examine themselves and grow their capacity to climb hills, in order to reach more people, more younger people, and more diverse people for Jesus Christ!

"The kingdom of God is like a farmer who casts seed upon the ground; and goes to bed at night and gets up by day, and the seed sprouts up and grows—how, he himself does not know. The earth produces crops; first the blade, then the head, and then the mature grain in the head" (Mark 4:26-28). Natural Church Development helps the church release that growth potential already within it.

God brings the growth, but first we have to plant the seeds.

In November 2008, my church started the NCD process. A survey helped us identify which of eight growth principals we needed to work on. We found we could improve in the area of gift-based ministry.

Our NCD coach helped us put together a Church Health Team to diagnose where we might improve and put together an action plan to present to the church. Just before Easter we reported to the church, and then we began putting our plan into action to help members identify their spiritual gifts and use them in a ministry opportunity.

The whole process of Natural Church Development has inspired change and a sense of excitement in the church. As we began talking about what it means to identify and use our spiritual gifts in ministry, people began naturally to apply it to themselves.

Today we are climbing a new hill. We’ve added close to 20 new members since Jan. 1—including professions of faith and baptisms. Worship attendance is increasing, and Sunday school attendance has gone from 65 people to more than 90.

I called our coach, Tom Hoffmann of Tulsa, and said, "We HAVE to build some classrooms. We are busting at the seams!"

He said, "James, it doesn’t sound like you need NCD!"

I replied, "Tom, we still need NCD—to help us keep all of these people we’re taking in!"

We just broke ground on a new building project, which will give us that space for education and our swelling youth program.

Is your church climbing the hill and growing disciples for Christ, or are you coasting down the hill of decline? Perhaps you need Natural Church Development to help you.

If you want to find out more, ask your district superintendent to help connect you to NCD leaders. There are 40 trained coaches who can answer your questions and put you on a path to growth.

(Rev. Graham presented this report to Annual Conference delegates in May.)

Living the Plan related story >>>Willow View expands its welcome