The convocation was attended by approximately 1,000 participants, including representatives of several conservative American or international denominations, such as the Lutheran Congregations in Mission for Christ, the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania, and the Anglican Church in North America. The new church was constituted in Grove City, Ohio, at the Lutheran CORE national convocation of August 26–27, 2010. It was felt that a new church body was needed for those Lutheran congregations who declined to join already existing conservative Lutheran groups.

Following Lutheran CORE's national convocation in September 2009, which resolved to pursue the 'reconfiguration of North American Lutheranism', the organization's leaders released a plan for organizing the North American Lutheran Church on February 18, 2010. The primary issue of concern for these groups was a 2009 decision by the ELCA which changed its teaching and policy on sexual ethics, allowing clergy / ministers to be in committed same-sex relationships. This action came in response to the dissatisfaction of theological conservatives within ELCA and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada (ELCIC) who perceived those bodies as moving away from the authority of the Bible and the Lutheran Confessions. The North American Lutheran Church was officially formed in August 2010 as the culmination of a process begun by Lutheran CORE (Coalition for Renewal), an organization which crosses Lutheran denominational lines.

The group describes itself as embodying the 'theological center of Lutheranism in North America,' noting that it stands between the more liberal Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and the more conservative Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod (LCMS) and other Lutheran church bodies in North America, 'firmly within the global Lutheran mainstream'. The NALC believes all doctrines should and must be judged by the teaching of the Christian Scriptures (the Bible), in keeping with the historic Lutheran Confessions.

The North American Lutheran Church ( NALC) is a Lutheran denomination with over 420 congregations in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, counting more than 142,000 baptized members.

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