Category: Liturgical Time

Educational designs for the church year

Micropracticing

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“What is the simplest this can be and still be effective?”

Over the last twelve months I’ve found myself asking the question above over and over. I’m exhausted by the realities of day-to-day living during a pandemic, and I’m guessing many families around the world would say the same.

As I was brainstorming what to offer for Lent in Vibrant Church Communications, the question of simplicity was front and center in my thoughts. As my thoughts tumbled around, the rough edges knocked against each other and smoothed into shape: micropractices.

directions for planting seedlings

On the surface, micropractices are simple. They are an action that can usually be taken in the moment or easily done at some point in the day. They follow the three pillars of Lent: praying, fasting, and giving. There’s an additional fourth category called “more” for practices that don’t fit into the first three.

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Faith at Home- Narrative Lectionary

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Just as Hope4ce offers Revised Common Lectionary related at-home activities, we want to provide a similar resource for congregations that follow the Narrative Lectionary. From the Working Preacher site, “The Narrative Lectionary is a four-year cycle of readings. On the Sundays from September through May each year the texts follow the sweep of the biblical story, from Creation through the early Christian church.

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Pentecost in a Parcel (Bag or Box)

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Pentecost is May 31st!  It is the birthday of the church and it is a day of great celebration.

Creative Flame Kids has a wonderful idea, “Pentecost in a Parcel”.

Pentecost in a Parcel

You may want to rename this “Pentecost in a Box” or “Pentecost in a Bag”. Mina Munns, Priest in Charge and Pioneer Minister – Parish Churches of Cresswell and Lynemouth, Church of England is the author of this particular version of this idea.

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Make Room: A Big Picture View of Lent

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When my children were very young I always looked forward to the changing seasons. Inside and outside the church, the turning of the circle brought new colors and sights and smells—plenty of opportunity to explore and create.

My little library of activity books kept us busy. But when it came to Lent I was never satisfied. The kids and I ironed grated crayon on to waxed paper to make stained glass crosses; we made purple paper chains, and hot crossed buns; we even blended and burned our own incense. But something was missing. Continue reading →

Illustrated Children’s Ministry

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In my ten years of ministry, serving four different churches, one element of worship that has always been hit-or-miss was the children’s moment.

More often than not, a well-meaning pastor or lay leader would invite the kids up for a few cute jokes, or maybe a creative object lesson that would just go over the kids’ heads. This always annoyed me.

In my last call, as I was exploring and reclaiming my identity as an artist, I began creating illustrations of the lectionary passage for the day, and used those as visual aids to simply tell children the biblical story for the day. I then gave the children a copy of the illustration to take home. Continue reading →

Pentecost Resources

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It seems like we just celebrated the glorious news of Easter, but Pentecost, the fiftieth day, is rapidly approaching. This is the day we celebrate the coming of the Holy Spirit and the birth of the church.

This seems to be a holy day where many churches craft their own intergenerational traditions, rituals, and ways of celebrating. Some congregations dress in red and take a church picture. Others release balloons symbolizing the spreading of the Gospel. Some fly kites, make pin wheels, or wave streamers/flags in worship to live out the Holy Spirit’s symbolization of wind in Acts 2, John 3, and in the very Hebrew and Greek words for spirit.

Many denominations provide resources or take up special offerings on this day.  Here are some links to the denominational resources I found. What resources and ways of celebrating this festive day, have you found helpful? Continue reading →

Holy Week for Leaders

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Amidst the palms and pageants, extra services and rituals, it may be difficult to remember why this week is holy and to hear the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection in a new way as ministry leaders.

So instead of educational activities geared to telling the story to others, which we may have been planning for weeks, today’s post is a collection of resources from around the web that will help us to hear the story anew. The only planning you’ll need to do here is to find 10 minutes or so during this week to read or view some of the following devotional pieces from many different traditions. Continue reading →