1855 Knollcrest Circle SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402 USA
On the campus of Calvin University and Calvin Theological Seminary
© 2025 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 equip a new generation of worship leaders with musical skills and vocal techniques to foster the creation of worship experiences that connect with and reach out to people from the surrounding community.
To develop more contextualized public worship services through equipping musicians and lay preachers with resources and skills shaped by the experience of the immigrant church.
To create a worship team and provide the group with initial formative training on musical skills and biblical-theological foundations.
To create a youth choir and train choir members and worship leaders on vocal techniques.
To create and implement a model of bilingual worship that will foster church unity among worshipers from different generations.
To develop a new generation of church musicians and worship leaders who, in addition to typical roles, could acquire skills required to compose new congregational songs and to produce new worship music.
To equip lay leaders with practical skills in the areas of music, public speech, visual arts and crafts, and technology to enhance the congregation’s liturgy and preaching and enrich the communal celebrations.
To strengthen intergenerational worship through the creation of a children’s choir, liturgical discipleship courses for children, and communal prayer projects that integrate people from different generations.
To deepen the congregation’s knowledge of preaching and worship through the development and implementation of a curriculum centered in the scriptures and the community, with the added goal of sharing the curriculum with other congregations in this church’s network.
To deepen the congregation’s understanding of the theology of worship and its faithful practice through a series of seminars, classes, and activities based on the CICW’s Ten Core Convictions.
To deepen the practice, enrich, and connect the worship-discipleship program and the community outreach program in the context of the semi-rural Hispanic immigrant population.
To provide educational resources and practical exercises to facilitate the contextualization of a liturgy marked by biblical and theological content and focused on developing healthy spirituality and human relationships.
