1855 Knollcrest Circle SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402 USA
On the campus of Calvin University and Calvin Theological Seminary
© 2024 Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
CICW has awarded Vital Worship, Vital Preaching Grants for over 20 years to teacher-scholars and worshiping communities in 45+ states and provinces and across 40+ denominations and traditions—including Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Pentecostal, non-denominational, and other Protestant communities.
While worship styles and practices vary greatly across these traditions, the grant projects typically explore at least one of CICW’s ten core convictions related to worship. Explore the hundreds of projects we’ve funded across both streams of the program.
To offer a series of intergenerational workshops, book studies and conversations with other churches that will help implement multisensory worship services interwoven with new sermon-based small groups to help the congregation better understand, retain, and apply God's truth to their lives.
To create on-campus initiatives that will connect academic life with campus worship by creating a university-wide theme of prayerfulness and to form a Spiritual Formation cohort of professors to intentionally link campus worship practices with the classroom, introduce spiritual practices in the classroom and explore the relationship between spiritual practice and pedagogy.
To equip five congregations in different regions and settings to use liturgies based on those used during the Protestant Reformation and to demonstrate how they may be used in congregational life today.
To immerse the congregation in activities that will encourage worshipers to pray and reflect on the effects of prayer through the Psalms, prayers for healing, drumming circles, embodied prayer and to use the written prayers of the community in worship.
To engage in a study of the relationship of liturgy, music, and space that will encourage worshipers to consider the biblical and theological rationale behind elements of worship and worship space and create a more God-honoring and formative worship environment in a culturally and generationally diverse congregation.
To offer workshops and learning opportunities for local congregations who seek to explore insights and practices such as contemplative prayer, meditation, simplicity and silence (re)discovered by the emerging church movement.
To study liturgy past and present that will lead to more deliberate worship planning resulting in a new understanding of God's character, nature and work in a young and growing congregation which meets in two locations.
To develop a process that brings together clergy and people with disabilities to create a model of inclusive worship in six area congregations.
To create worship liturgies that connect classic Christian texts and secular artistic, literary, and philosophical works in collaboration with local congregations and campus ministries.
To deepen students’ understanding of theology and the arts in worship in partnership with two other campus ministries through workshops and planning worship together.
To offer workshops for congregations throughout the Diocese of Pennsylvania that will help them become more aware of global Anglican resources and use them in creating liturgies that reflect the diversity within the churches.
To offer a series of workshops and small group gatherings to engage ministry leaders in worship planning that incorporates individual gifts and develops a creative arts ministry.
