Riverside Lutheran Church in Wannaska, Minn., passed its final vote Sunday to cut ties with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Congregants voted 52 to 14 (78.8 percent) in favor of the departure, congregation President Jason Schneider said.
A two-thirds supermajority was needed to pass the resolution.
"We looked at what was going on in the ELCA and the way they were stepping away from Scripture systematically, over the last 10 years especially, and decided it wasn't the right place for us anymore," Schneider said.
Riverside's departure brings to 10 the number of congregations from the Northwestern Minnesota Synod that have left the ELCA this year, synod Bishop Larry Wohlrabe wrote in an e-newsletter dated Wednesday.
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The ELCA continues to feel the effects of decisions made at the 2009 Churchwide Assembly, when voting members opted to allow individuals in same-gender relationships to serve in the clergy and passed a controversial social statement on human sexuality.
Riverside church members voted to join the recently formed North American Lutheran Church, Schneider said.
NALC's formation was spearheaded by Lutheran CORE, a group that opposed the Churchwide Assembly's decisions on sexuality.
Riverside has 163 baptized members and an average attendance of 74, according to 2009 numbers from the ELCA.
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