In my career teaching Christian educators, pastors would often attend my workshops. After one workshop a pastor asked, “I agree with the principles and strategies you are sharing about teaching. I am wondering if any of those principles can be applied to worship services I lead?” That excellent question led to a workshop where we explored how some principles of education apply to planning worship.
Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences greatly influenced my approach to teaching and can be seen in the ten points below. Gardner pushed against the idea that there was a single, general intelligence. Instead, he suggested that there are different types of intelligences including: linguistic, logical-mathematical, usical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic.
The ten points below originate from that workshop and reflect some of what I learned from Gardner. I’ve added a suggestion or two to illustrate how each affirmation might be experienced in a worship service.
- Concrete concepts can be communicated more easily than abstract concepts.
How can we reduce the abstractions and increase the concreteness of Scripture, sermons, and other elements of worship?
Suggestion: Use words with fewer syllables. If your natural choice is an abstract word, use a synonym that is less abstract. Some abstract concepts are unavoidable. Illustrate those with a personal experience or illustrative story to help worshippers better understand the concept.
- Personalizing concepts, persons and events so that learners identify with them results in motivated, satisfied participants.
How can we design ways for persons to “look through the eyes” of others in the Bible, church history, the mission of the church, or current events?
Suggestion: One way to accomplish this is to invite imagination. Set the stage, or context, of a passage of Scripture or historical event or mission setting. Then, invite the worshippers to identify with a person or situation by imagining themselves as part of the narrative. With whom do they identify? What would they say or do? How might the narrative develop?
- Persons who make choices are more motivated to participate and learn than persons who do not make choices.
How can we plan worship experiences that enable persons to make choices during and following the worship service?
Suggestion: When making a point, pose alternative ways to act or speak and allow the worshippers a few moments to think about what they would do or say. Suggest what might be some consequences following the choices we make.
- We learn and grow more when we interpret and apply information than when we simply recall or memorize.
What are some ways we can involve persons in worship in a self-conscious process of interpreting and applying information that is presented?
Suggestion: During the sermon the preacher could pose a question that invites the worshipper to think of alternative responses and to select one that seems most appropriate. During the reading of a Scripture passage, the reader could pause at a verse that sets the stage for what is to follow and invite the worshippers to place themselves as a character in the narrative and imagine what they might be thinking or doing next. Then, after the pause, continue reading.
- Learning and growing happen when people reflect on their own life experiences, their own stories of wondering, struggling, choosing, searching, and loving.
How can we plan for worship to encourage persons to reflect on, share and/or build upon their personal story in relation to God’s story?
Suggestion: One possibility is to provide several questions, printed in the worship bulletin, to guide the worshippers to make connections between the theme of the sermon and their personal lives.
- Creative expression enables people to communicate their ideas, beliefs, values, and feelings.
Worship is not the place for “artsy, craftsy” activities, but how can we enable persons to express themselves creatively during worship?
Suggestion: One possibility at the conclusion of the sermon could be to invite the worshippers to complete an open-ended question that appears in the worship bulletin with space for writing the response.
- Persons do not learn or communicate with words alone.
How can we introduce media and experiences that involve more of the senses in the experience of worship?
Suggestion: For churches that employ projection screens in the sanctuary, one or more photographs or art prints reflecting the theme of the sermon could be projected. Ask the worshippers to meditate on the visuals during a minute or two of silence. Special music by choir, organist/pianist, bells/chimes, and ensembles will serve as an important element of the worship experience.
- When persons experience a variety of activities, all focused on a common theme, they learn more than when activities are unrelated to each other.
To what extent are we able to plan worship services so that all the parts are focused on a central theme?
Suggestion: The key to this principle is in planning for hymns, anthem, prayers, Scripture, sermon, and responses to be related to a central theme for the service.
- People are enriched and learning happens in unpredictable ways when people of several generations and various ethnic, economic, or social groups are together.
What ways can we plan schedules, invite people, and structure worship so that people of diverse backgrounds and ages are included in the worship experience?
Suggestion: Children learn to worship by worshipping and that means we need to plan ways to include children in our services in meaningful ways. On World Communion Sunday, several members of the congregation representing different nationalities or cultures could each read the passage of Scripture in their native language. During a Minute for Mission, a representative from an agency dealing with underserved members of the community could speak about the agency’s mission.
- Spiritual growth involves nurturing one’s intellect and emotions with the opportunity to express ideas and feelings in an accepting and trustful environment.
What are some ways we can emphasize both the intellectual and emotional aspects of Christian living and believing?
Suggestion: Sharing stories of real-life situations that have an emotional appeal will invite worshippers to empathize with the situation or a character in a story.
A version of this article was originally published in Don Grigg’s Called to Teach.
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