At Faith Presbyterian (https://www.facebook.com/faithpresgso), we embrace our traditional worship style and space while making our service accessible and engaging for all. Children and their families are welcome at the front of the sanctuary with activities geared toward their age level. Our family worship guide follows the pattern of the service and offers extra enrichment ideas and activities for children and active learners of all ages.The outline of a traditional worship service centered around The Word is beautiful and quite freeing when we remember that The Word is The Living Word of God – incarnate in Christ, written in scripture, and enacted in the world.

For Lent, we are using a themed sermon series inspired by Rev. Whitney Wilkinson following the “Landscape of Lent.” Each week, we add a new visual element to represent some aspect of the scripture – ashes, wilderness, wind, water, mud, cave, palms, bread – and we will close with Easter in the garden.

We’ve integrated interactive prayer into the prayers of the people by encouraging worshipers to write a word or draw a symbol on purple circles which we tie onto a burlap wreath or thread onto string to form prayer garlands at the entrance to the sanctuary.

We offer the opportunity for children and adults to use a prayer ribbon and “dance a prayer to God” during hymns, anthems, or any service music. (It’s amazing how quickly you can loose your inhibition and imagine you are a Russian rhythmic gymnast when you have a ribbon on a stick. It’s fabulous!)

Karen Ware Jackson
Pastor, Faith Presbyterian Church, Greensboro, NC

www.faithpresgso.org

So if you’d like to try your hand at creating interactive worship, Karen Ware Jackson is also sharing her workshop materials created for Salem Presbytery on this same topic. See below!  KLD

Resource List for Creative Worship and Learning Styles

Learning Styles for Worship

Salem Presbyery. Worship feb 2015

Interactive Prayers Used in Workshop