Why do you need a church health survey questionnaire? The answer is a healthy church makes a huge difference.
Research by the Institute for Natural Church Development International found that healthy churches are more likely to grow memberships. The research also found that churches on the decline also displayed unhealthy characteristics.
Unless there is an obvious decline in memberships, many pastors and church leaders assume their church is healthy. But it's dangerous to make such an assumption. Instead, it's best to gauge the health status of your church by conducting a healthy church survey.
While it may be scary and uncomfortable to find out your church is unhealthy, a church health survey questionnaire or church questionnaire for visitors can be a launching pad for your church’s growth. Keep reading for more information on what a church health survey is and how you can conduct one.
Table of Contents
- What Is a Healthy Church?
- What Is a Church Health Survey Questionnaire?
- When to Do a Healthy Church Survey
- Who Should Complete the Healthy Church Survey?
- How to Build a Church Health Survey Questionnaire
- Sample Questions to Ask In a Church Health Survey Questionnaire
What Is a Healthy Church?
The National Church Development survey found that healthy, growing churches all have 8 key characteristics. They are...
- Empowering leadership
- Gift-based ministry
- Passionate spirituality
- Effective structures
- Inspiring worship service
- Holistic small groups
- Need-oriented evangelism
- Loving relationships
On top of this, the leadership in healthy churches applies certain principles that support their church’s growth. For example, they ensure the interdependence of all their ministries. Each department works with the other to achieve the church’s vision. At the same time, they empower each church ministry to be self-sustaining and fruitful.
What Is a Church Health Survey Questionnaire?
A healthy church survey is a data-gathering process that pastors conduct to establish how well their church is doing. You may call it an annual church health assessment. A church health survey questionnaire is the instrument used to collect feedback from the congregation about their church’s health.
To get the best value out of the questionnaire, it's best to craft the church health survey questions around the eight essential characteristics of a healthy church. The responses will help you identify the areas where your church is excelling as well as your most critical health issues.
To improve the health of your church, experts recommend you work on your weakest area for a year and then conduct another survey. Conduct the church health survey every year so that you can identify trends and track your progress. When done properly, this survey will help drive your church's growth and health.
When to Do a Healthy Church Survey
While a church health survey is extremely useful for any church, you must choose a good time to conduct it. For instance, it's not a good idea to conduct the survey when leaders and members are busy with a new church building project or launching a new program. During these times, you and your congregation won’t have the time and energy to take part in a church survey.
Also, if the church is going through a leadership change or major crisis, it may not be the best time to conduct the survey. Members will be too focused on getting the church out of the crisis.
However, if you and your members find yourselves questioning the fruitfulness of your church, conducting a survey is a good idea. A healthy church survey could also be useful if you are about to embark on a planning process.
Before conducting a church health survey, make sure your leadership team commits to deal with whatever issues come up. Otherwise, the exercise will be a waste of time. Also, commit to organizing a church health survey every year so that you can track your progress.
Who Should Complete the Healthy Church Survey?
Once you have your church health survey questionnaire, who should complete it? To get quality information, it's important to give the questionnaire to active and committed church members whose opinions you value. They should be involved in the church ministry and regularly perform tasks for the church. If you have home groups or cell groups, your survey participants should also be members of these groups.
Proper sampling of your church population is important to ensure that it is representative of your church members. Additionally, ensure you get responses from those that you want to attract to your church. For instance, if you want to increase your youth membership or men’s ministry, you should include those demographics in your survey.
Before administering the survey, hold a meeting for all the participants. During the meeting, explain the purpose of the survey and why you chose the participants. Explain to the participants how long the survey will take and any instructions they need to access and complete the survey. Give them a deadline to complete their survey which allows you enough time to analyze responses and write a report.
How to Build a Church Health Survey Questionnaire
When conducting a church health survey, drafting the questionnaire is the most important step. Each question on the survey should be carefully selected to help uncover an element of your church’s health. We recommend you craft your questions around the 8 characteristics of a healthy church.
Your questionnaire should also be short and straight to the point if you want thoughtful and useful responses. The questions should be short and clear. Avoid asking two questions in one as this will confuse your respondents.
If you fill your survey with a long list of irrelevant questions, participants might rush through it just to finish. Remember to leave a small space or section for open comments in case a church member has a comment they want to add. It's best to make your survey anonymous if you want to get honest feedback.
Also remember to collect the respondent’s demographic information like age, gender, years of attendance, etc. This will allow you to track trends and attitudes amongst different groups. Before conducting the survey, ensure you test your questionnaire on a few people to find out if it has any errors.
Note that there is a variety of survey software you can use to create your survey and collect and analyze data. These surveys are administered online but you should print out some questionnaires to allow for manual filling. Some survey goers aren’t tech-savvy so this will make it easier for them to take part.
You can input the information into the platform by yourself. If you conduct the survey manually, you'll need to create a spreadsheet to input and analyze responses. If you use survey software, the responses will be automatically analyzed and presented in a spreadsheet for your use.
Sample Questions to Ask In a Church Health Survey Questionnaire
Here are some sample questions you can use for your church health assessment.
1. Is discipleship a principal program in the church to bring individuals to maturity?
An important indicator of church health is whether the leadership empowers the congregation to grow in their walk with God. This question helps you identify whether members feel the church takes discipleship and growth seriously.
Other similar questions you could ask are as follows. Does the church train and develop members to become church leaders? Is there a balance between evangelism and discipleship?
2. Does the church encourage and empower members to serve using their God-given gifts?
Healthy churches encourage members to take part in gift-based ministries. This question helps identify if your church is proactively using members’ gifts.
3. Do you sense the presence of God?
Another aspect of healthy churches is the presence of passionate spirituality. This question aims to establish if members feel a sense of spirituality in your church. You could also ask them if the atmosphere of the church evokes a reverence for God.
4. Does your church have a good structure for finances and wise administration?
A healthy church must have proper financial structures if it wants to grow. This question will show whether your congregation trusts your administration.
5. Does the worship music at church resonate with you?
Many of us attend church for the opportunity to praise God in song and dance. Healthy churches all tend to have a great worship service. This question will help you gauge your church’s worship music. You could also ask if the worship celebrations inspire real heartfelt praise?
6. Has your small group helped your spiritual development?
Active small groups are another sign of a healthy church. Your survey must have a question asking about the effectiveness of your small groups. For other great small group questions, you might ask is it easy for church members to find and join a small group? Do the small groups in church have the Bible as the center of their curriculum?
7. Does your church have an effective evangelism ministry?
One of the main purposes of any healthy church is to conduct need-oriented evangelism. This question helps you discover how effective your evangelism is.
8. Do you have a strong relationship with any other members of the congregation?
This question helps you determine the percentage of the congregation that has close, loving relationships with other members. Many people go to church to be a part of a community. A church that doesn’t foster loving relationships is not healthy.
You can also ask if church members get together for social reasons outside of church functions? Do members linger after the service to talk and catch up with each other?
Every Church Survey Sample You Could Ever Use
Church surveys are valuable for every church. The feedback you get from these church survey questions provide valuable insights. Unfortunately, building the church survey questions takes time, which you are short on. That’s why we built Word Document templates for every church survey you could ever use. All you need to do is download the 18 printable church survey templates, which won’t cost you a thing!
