Worship

I love bringing worship to life creatively!  My experience is that the more people in the congregation whom I can engage in the process of creating such services, the more powerful that they will be.  While we seem to do a good job encouraging musicians in worship, I think we are less likely to seek out the artists of other varieties - painters, sculptors, designers, dancers, wood workers, quilters... and more.  It can take some time to discover these people in the congregation and some encouragement to get them to share their gifts!  But it is so worth it!

There is a worship "slideshow" I put together for a workshop on Creative worship here:

Video:  Creative Worship presentation

PDF of Slides:  Creative Worship PDF

Resources is you want to try a Holy Week Shadow Drama:

Shadow Drama - Mark

Shadow Drama - Luke

And here are some other things I have tried with varying success!

Lenten Love Letters - Year B:  Ash Wednesday was on
Valentines this year and we wanted an "upbeat" lent
focus, so each week we added one of God's love letters
based on the Covenants.  The biggest technical challenge
was getting them to "fly" in an orderly fashion!

Holy Week Shadow Dramas:  I have done these Palm Sunday and Good Friday in churches depending on the year.  It is an effective way to read the whole passion week story.  Youth in one of my churches would do this every year and told me that they knew the Holy week story so much better because of it.  I have mixed it up various years, but the heart of it is usually simply the scripture reading.

Life sized walk out Bible!  One of my favorite props to use in lots
of ways.  This year, we used it for the Advent Wreath with different
Christmas characters coming out each week to share a reflection
and light the candle.  I have also used it for Children's messages
and liturgical dramas.

Paper cutting for the season of Creation
This is a great and inexpensive way to make
community art

The trick with this is to find the rolls of paper.  Easiest
to find at Teacher supply story in the bulletin board
section.  Sometimes the big craft stores will have them.
Create design in a computer file and use projector to
put it on paper and sketch out with pencil.  Then go at it with
Exacto knives.  Youth love this project.  This was the most
Complicated one we did and it took the longest.

World Communion Table
Tried to use fabrics that represented different
cultures.  Also put on the stable lots of different
kinds of bread.

All Saints Day altar
Hard to see in this photo, but there were ribbons
with the names of those whom we were remembering
under each candle and an empty photo frame.

Church 150th decorations
Not much theologically symbolic here, but lots of
fun with tulle.  Found a good inexpensive online source

UCC Christmas Fund had the theme "Shepherding
the Light" which we adopted for Advent
This was an attempt to create the theme.

Baptism of Jesus & Re-affirmation of our
own Baptisms.

An Ash Wednesday station
I used painter's tape to mask the cross  on a canvas
and then Church folks put their ashy finger prints on it

Ash Wednesday Station
Writing prayers and words of hurt on bandaids
with sharpies and adding them to the cross.

Greening the Cross
A beloved Easter tradition!
The trick is using "grapevine ribbon" from the
floral section of a craft store.  You can wrap it around
a cross.  It looks natural but holds flowers when it is
time to add them.  

An Advent wreath turned vertical.  Created by a member of the worship team.

These animal wind spinners were part of our Season of Creation procession.

An Advent Papercut created by members during an Advent workshop

We did a lot with Rocks during this particular Lent:  a prayer wall, a well for the Samaritan woman, a tomb for Lazarus, a bench for Nicodemus, and then a pile around the cross.  It was effective and we asked the congregation to bring in their own rocks, but by the end of the season, I was tired of moving them around every week.  ;-)

Tulle is so effective and inexpensive for creating dramatic altar scenes.