1855 Knollcrest Circle SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546-4402 USA
On the campus of Calvin University
© 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 support worshipers with mental health challenges by promoting mental health awareness, training congregants to offer peer support, and encouraging mental well-being through music ministry.
To engage children, youth, young adults, and seniors in planning and leading worship in order to promote intergenerational faith formation, leadership development, and a renewed sense of unity.
To create new baptismal resources that educate and encourage new believers in ways that respond to the needs of diverse twenty-first-century Christian families.
To foster a dynamic, participatory, and creative worship community where young adults can engage with God through visual arts, music, and worship leadership training.
To provide training in the theology and practice of leading worship in order to help people grow in faith and leadership and find belonging and purpose.
To reimagine the practice of the Lord’s Supper—including designing table installations, creating contextualized liturgies, and hosting culturally specific "love feasts"—to represent the diversity of Christ's body and enrich the spirit of celebration surrounding communion.
To create liturgical and educational resources that equip Moravian clergy and lay leaders to guide worshipers in connecting their faith with social justice.
To cultivate congregational commitments to justice and diversity by training worship leaders to incorporate music from various cultural traditions, commissioning new works, and collaborating with neighboring arts organizations.
To unite existing Korean-, English-, and Chinese-speaking Christian communities in worship by training leaders for new multilingual chapel services featuring rotating language leadership and real-time translation.
To promote reconciliation between Indigenous and settler Christians by co-creating worship songs through an ethical cross-cultural collaboration.
To strengthen the worship ministry so that each congregational gathering promotes holistic healing in which God’s presence restores hearts and renews lives.
To connect generations and strengthen community by launching a community choir that will integrate spiritual formation with musical practice.
