Resource Search Results

Chaplaincy Changes during COVID-19

The coronavirus pandemic has raised the profile of chaplains and profoundly affected how they do their work. Learn how you and your congregation can pray for chaplains and those they serve.

Feature Story | May 12, 2021

James Abbington on Planning Henry “Hank” Aaron’s Funeral Music

Although news coverage of public figures’ funerals often focuses most on speakers and eulogists, music is crucial. James Abbington thought pastorally while planning music for baseball star Henry Aaron’s homegoing.

Conversation | May 11, 2021

J. Todd Billings on Embracing Our Mortality

Unless we are very ill or old, many of us avoid thinking about our deaths. J. Todd Billings’s new book, The End of the Christian Life, explains that remembering our mortality and learning to die well will give us a more profound view of true Christian resurrection hope.

Conversation | January 19, 2021

Funeral Practices during COVID-19: Praying for Wisdom in Pastoral and Liturgical Adaptations

During the COVID-19 pandemic, pastors and churches preparing to conduct funerals face unique challenges, particularly restrictions on public gatherings even for those who grieve.

Reflection | March 19, 2020

Coop's Column - Risen Indeed

"On the third day he arose again from the dead." Simple words often capture life's most profound and important truths the best. How better, therefore, for Christians to make their most astonishing declaration about Jesus Christ than by this direct, unadorned, and so forthrightly clear confession?

Reflection | February 11, 2011

Pastoral Undertaking: A Case for Prearranging Funerals

At one of our church member's funeral, we gathered in Christ’s name to proclaim his resurrection as well as hers. Yet something seemed to be missing from this service of worship. This woman had dialogued at length with her own death, and we had heard only part of the conversation.

Article | November 19, 2010

How to Develop a Requiem Choir: A Congregational Ministry for Funerals

In the midst of life, we are in death.” But fewer and fewer of us share in the sad, sometimes openly commercial rituals that surround our final passage in this culture—more and more grieving family and close friends mourn by themselves.

Article | November 19, 2010

Coop's Column - Simply Fellow Strugglers

My years as chaplain among college students have convinced me that many young people suffer from what I call the "immortality virus": "Death-accidents, illness, and weakness, too-can, and sometimes do, happen to others. But it won't -read: cannot- happen to me." Or so they foolishly imagine.

Reflection | August 16, 2010

Singing the Psalms Against a Backdrop of Persecution: A View from Pakistan

Find out how the psalms bring hope to suffering Christians in Pakistan and how the psalms can challenge theologians, poets, and musicians around the world to strengthen faith, ministry, and worship.

Audio | March 23, 2010

Reclaiming Funerals as Christian Worship

While funerals have often been seen as family affairs or private activities, the fact is that death impacts entire communities: both the faith community and the community at large.

Audio | January 01, 2008

Christian Funerals: Going to be with God

Thomas Long makes a case for classic Christian funeral traditions. Howard Vanderwell and Leonard VanderZee offer pastoral considerations for planning funerals and memorial services. A feature story exploring the planning for Christian Funerals and Memorial Services.

Feature Story | October 26, 2007

Dying Well - Genesis 25, 49

The sixth service plan in a series entitled "Chapters of Life." The focus of this service is the reality of death--even within the Christian life--and the hope the gospel brings of being able to "die well" and enter eternal glory.

Worship Service | June 01, 2005

What A Friend We Have in Jesus - Service of Prayer for Healing - Isaiah 61, Matthew 11

This worship service plan of prayer for healing was prepared as a pastoral response to a series of deaths, illnesses, and other traumatic events suffered by a local congregation over a short period of time.