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 sponsor a composer-in-residence to compose ten “call and response” invocations (prayers) that will be integrated into all aspects of the church’s worship life as a community.
To conduct two worship renewal seminars for small congregations, and invite up to eight congregational worship planning teams to enter into extensive on-site consultation with experts in liturgical music, worship space and environment.
To offer seminars and training for worship leaders in small or ethnic congregations, to plan and carry out joint worship with the participating congregations, and to create original artwork for worship.
To develop student worship leaders, increase understanding of worship among the membership, and enrich the visual dimension of worship through installations for the seasons of the church year.
To conduct workshops in biblical storytelling that will provide skills for telling stories in worship and for use in family devotions.
To create a multi-generational collaborative worship design process, to develop an interdisciplinary and multi-generational team to teach the process to pilot congregations, and to host a conference to train church leaders in the collaboration, practice and reflection of this process as an integral part of congregational life.
To develop a process of worship renewal within the congregation by training worship leaders, by deepening the practices of prayer and the reading of Scripture in worship, and by commissioning inner city youth to create art for worship. The project will also offer monthly worship services employing all the senses and actively involving the congregation.
To engage the congregation in a study of their worship environment, and to hold a symposium exploring how the arts can help shape a worship setting, especially for churches that do not have a permanent worship facility.
To offer liturgical training in three locations and through Interactive Distance Learning for church leaders who will assist their churches with liturgy planning, minister formation, and workshops on liturgical topics.
To offer worship resources and training to congregations who desire to be supportive faith communities in times of death and dying.
To focus fresh attention on proclaiming God’s forgiveness, offering prayers of confession, and receiving God’s assurance of pardon in corporate worship, through learning opportunities for members of the congregation, pastors and leaders from the community, and to develop worship resources.
To offer creative worship experiences, using theater and the arts, to five to seven congregations, and to teach them how to create artistic expressions of worship that will deepen the worship life of the congregation.
