1855 Knollcrest Circle SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402 USA
On the campus of Calvin University
© 2026 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 deepen connections between worshipers and to encourage a practice of recognizing the sacred in all of life by centering corporate worship and home groups on practices of shared attention, communal creation, and joyful expression.
To equip leaders to create a pilgrimage experience in their own context by together engaging the embodied experience of pilgrimage and developing worship resources for their communities out of that experience.
To enhance the theological and cultural diversity of worship in an increasingly diverse retirement community through educational events and guest worship leaders.
To disciple African American participants on the topics of prayer and spiritual growth through virtual meetings and an online platform, with special attention to the relationship between worship and discipleship.
To discern the theological distinctiveness and ethnocultural diversity of the church’s music by providing tools to evaluate CCLI Top 100 praise music from an Anabaptist theological perspective.
To encourage members to engage scripture by memorizing a weekly scripture passage with accompanying devotions, sermons, and other creative means.
Barry Whatley
To explore the vital role of poetic imagination and creative expression of poetry in enhancing spiritual formation and worship in the local church.
Jennifer Allen Craft
To help Christians recognize and confess how sin distorts our relationship to place and hinders our ability to love our neighbors, and to help the church develop artistic practices of placemaking that advance the kingdom of God by promoting justice, beauty, and connection.
To facilitate a deep engagement with scripture through a culture of God-centered storytelling that develops the habit of naming God as the main actor in stories from both scripture and worshipers’ lived experience.
To create a formation program on liturgy, theology, and musicianship that equips and encourages Spanish-speaking parish musicians and music ministers.
To increase ecological-biblical literacy in outdoor worship participants and their communities and to encourage lectionary-focused eco-preaching through nature-based outdoor scripture study.
To study and practice blessing one another and the wider community by emphasizing the theology of blessing in worship and by practicing embodied blessing of others in outdoor venues.
