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.
Find resources related to the learning from the Vital Worship, Vital Preaching Grants Program.
To develop a year-long emphasis on all ages living in the presence of God in worship by encouraging deeper participation in scripture, sacraments, prayer, and the arts.
To encourage the development of arts ministries and the incorporation of a variety of arts in worship as a regular liturgical practice of the community.
To create a template for developing multisensory celebrations of the Eucharist during each season of the liturgical year and collaborate with worship leaders to coordinate music and visual art with lectionary texts.
To create worship experiences that draw multiethnic congregations closer together and develop deeper spiritual connections to the city surroundings and global community through global music, arts and media.
To strengthen and encourage intergenerational worship through the church year and creative excellence in all aspects of worship including music, visual arts, sacred space design, spoken and written proclamation, prayer, and liturgy—all guided by the psalms.
To develop and deliver culturally relevant drama and visual arts training for worship leaders in prison settings as a means of promoting a vivid awareness and heartfelt response to God.
To provide music, worship, dance, and art opportunities to train young congregants for participation and leadership in worship.
To connect a theology of worship and the arts with the mission of the church through a monthly series of ecumenical worship services partnering with local homeless shelters, hospitals, and nursing homes.
To enter a church-wide intergenerational exploration of the gospel through the arts of drama, song, dance, storytelling, and sculpture and to integrate these artistic forms in worship experiences through the seasons of the church year.
To create opportunities for the congregation to cultivate a culture of story-telling – exploring new ways to tell and listen to scriptural narratives, and finding linkages between scriptural narratives and our individual life journeys – by engaging in movement, puppets, theater, poetry and integrating this creativity into the worship life of the church.
To provide opportunities for the congregation to publically lament the destruction of their building following a lightning strike and to remember God’s blessings while they are worshiping in a public school building by creating visual art for worship from salvaged objects that will have a home in their new building and that can be shared with other churches in similar situations to help them sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land.
To partner with local congregations by offering “hands-on” experiences in the visual arts as a means for artists and congregations to study and respond to the Creation Psalms.
