If you have ever been asked to help plan a church service, you’ve probably experienced the type of writer’s block associated with creating an order of worship where you sit and stare at a blank sheet of paper or computer screen thinking to yourself, “Where do I begin?”
David Bolin
With the debut of the Celebrating Grace Hymnal this week comes a new online tool called The Worship Matrix™ to help worship planners “visit with the Saints” and other church members social-networking style to create a meaningful worship experience.
On Monday at Second Ponce de Leon Baptist Church in Atlanta, David Bolin, electronic design editor for Celebrating Grace Inc., explained the new tool and how it benefits service planners of all ability. Bolin, who is minister of music at First Baptist Waco, Texas, has actually been developing this for the past 30 years, beginning with hand-written notes on index cards. He explains the new online tool:
“The challenge for a service planner is ‘I’ve got to plan a service for a particular people at a particular point in this church’s history.’ That’s a very difficult thing to do,” Bolin said.
“You look at a hymnal sitting on a table and think to yourself, ‘Where do I begin?’ That’s what the Worship Matrix™ is all about. To help people find a pathway all the riches and the great cloud of witnesses God has assembled in that volume.
“There are six planning paths into the worship matrix. Often times, a pastor gives the music director a scripture to work with. That’s one of the portals where he or she can begin. But what if the pastor doesn’t? Well, the music minister or service planner can begin with a hymn text, or a choir anthem, or a topic at the topical index, or a reading such as a litany or meditation, a quote from early church father, or the lectionary – the church calendar …
“By entering through one of these portals, like a hymn text, the service planner immediately sees the relationship between that hymn and scripture passages. I can then select a scripture passage and see that it’s related to another hymn text, and see that it’s related to a meditation. And pretty soon, you find yourself walking through a room where all the saints are visiting together. You listen in on the conversation and you can get some sense of what your congregation will hear, or what you want them to hear. That’s where the service order begins to take shape.
“There’s also a pathway for all the different people from your church to get involved, for the service facilitator, the planners, the participants … any and all can go to the Worship Matrix and take their own journey and you all can have a conversation about how to plan a service. It gives you the opportunity to react to one another much like a Facebook-type of interface, where they are all able to collaborate and communicate and help to create a meaningful service.”
Bolin said there are other tools for the church such as the hymn commentary to provide background material, and a hymn discovery feature to help teach the history behind each selection. Bolin said this is a wonderful education tool for children.
“They can learn the history behind the hymn they are learning so when they go to worship, they’ll probably know more about it than their mom and dad. And what happens is that hymn becomes part of their personal prayer language for the rest of their lives.”
The Worship Matrix™ is available at http://www.celebrating-grace.org.