Alrighty folks. If you want a copy of one of our annual surveys, you can email our office manager at amanda@theaterchurch.com. She’ll send you the 2005 survey. I feel like it’s a good cross-section of questions! I think she’s going to get deluged with requests so please say something nice to her

Just thought I’d share the story behind the survey because the survey is part of our culture at NCC.

We’ve never taken a vote in the history of NCC. Actually, we did vote to ratify our bylaws And we do ratify leaders annually. But we’ve never voted on vision. What we do is survey our congregation about everything. I really believe in the survey culture. It gives you the psychology without the politics

I know there are lots of different types of church government structures and I’m not knocking any of them. It really depends on the personality and ecclesiology of the church.

NCC is a staff-led model. That doesn’t mean we devalue non-staff leaders. I think we give leaders tremendous freedom to get a vision from God and go for it. We’ve simply tried to minimize bureacracy and maximize ministry. Bylaws must never be seen as an end to themselves. They are a means to an end called ministry.

We’ve made a decision in our bylaws not to discriminate against staff. I just don’t think that the people who have invested the most blood, sweat, and tears ought to be excluded from the highest decision making capacities within the church just because they are called and trained. Makes no sense to me. At the same time, I totally value non-staff opinions because a staff can develop blindspots. You’ve got to find the right equilibrium.

So here is the way surveying works itself out in reality. We don’t vote on vision. In other words, we don’t vote on whether or not we should launch another location. We survey the congregation. And if no one wants to be part of the launch guess what: the vision got voted down But if the survey says that the congregation is on board then the vision moves forward. We try to give a measure of ownership via surveying.

One disclaimer then I’m done. I’m not prescribing anything with this post. I’m just describing the way we’ve functioned.