All-Ages Resources bringing scripture and theme alive

Just what do we need to have in a worship service?
This will differ from church to church, from person to person, but I want to suggest that, boiled down to its barest, children and adults need STORY, RITUAL, SONG AND PRAYER. And so it is my life's work to help people and congregations enrich their use of all these things. This Linnea-page is my opportunity to share some of the resources I have created in 20 years as a "Musical Animator" for the Church. Read on to learn more on these four elements (and pass along to your Worship and Christian Dev't committees). Or scroll down to find my weekly Story Lectionary resources - otherwise known as: What Linnea Would Do on a Story Lectionary Worship Day.

STORY: Children and adults need story because it is one of the most basic ways we in our tradition form our images of God, learn who Jesus was and who we are. Do we love our bible? Then, why do we save the best for the grown-ups and only tell a related story during the time with the children? If it’s an actual story and is age-appropriate, how can we be creative in telling it? Tell the story! Show that we love our Book! Commission members of your congregation, youth group, UCW and choir to find a new way of presenting the scripture story of the week. Create a Bible Study group whose job it is to study the lectionary readings and find a variety of ways of presenting the story to all ages (reading, storytelling, choral reading, echo-telling, singing, drama, mime, etc, etc)

RITUAL: We all need it; repeated actions that make the awe and the mystery of the moment stand out in bold relief. The simplest movements, when made every single time an event takes place (such as candle- lighting, bringing the Bible forward, setting out the nativity figures, communion) take on much greater proportion to us than if we were merely told about the event. Rituals may be simply watched by the worshiper (such as seeing communion vessels taken back up). Or they may be actions that all people enter into (such as crossing ourselves or bowing for prayer). In either case, the movement itself plunges the watcher or do-er into a 3-D experience of the moment. It connects mind and heart. Ritual need not be "religious" per se. You might choose, every time you intend to read a story to children, to lift the book out of a special book bag. The children's theme-time might begin with looking in a box that has an theme object in it. Lighting a candle is the most singularly fascinating ritual I can think of for children. The same prayer, the same song, the same opening, the same closure can all be ritual that ground and give safety to children in worship and church school.

SONG: Please don’t tell the clergy I said this, but the truth is that we remember the theology we sing better than what we hear or even say. That makes our song-choosing important. A song that is helpful for little children is often - but not always - one with few words and much repetition, or new words zipped in and out (“We are marching in the light of God...”). A song with a chorus is helpful. Songs that require no reading are very helpful for children under the age of 8 or so. The best strategy for having an intergenerational repertoire to choose between is to be always working on songs - in worship and out - so that the children will truly “own” the songs when they come to sing with others in worship. In full intergenerational services, it is helpful to draw upon the songs that children have been singing all year long, rather than introducing new “children’s songs”. For ordinary Sundays, repeating the songs sung will be much more successful than switching them every week. We will also find it easier to move from listening to responding, from thinking to taking heart, from talking to praying, with music as the conveyance. That’s why it’s good to use music not only as “hymns” or “songs” to punctuate spoken parts, but as “connectors” and “invitations”. When we sing to lead ourselves into prayer, when prayers are themselves sung, when we sing to celebrate that we are about to hear the Word, these things are cues that work at a deep level within worshippers. A quiet instrumental line played between one piece of scripture and another, or during a transition can create a gentle continuity in worship, maintain an attention level and foster quiet reverence.

PRAYER: Worship is not an hour of talking ABOUT God; it is seeking to have an EXPERIENCE of God. We need to pray together because hearts joined in prayer have a power that is beyond them. We need to learn together how to pray so that we can do it on our own. We need to pray because it is possible that vulnerable praying hearts will be spoken to by the Holy One. Children need to pray with adults in such a way that they know that we mean it.

Here is a list of Linnea's material.