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What to do in an outside Church Service.

In case you missed it. It seems that Churches can now sing outside again. In fact, The Church of England have released a load of information about outside worship is found here.

As singing outside in a crowd could appear different to some, we’ve compiled a list of ideas to remember when hosting an outside Church worship service.

  1. Make sure your dressed for the season. So therefore depending on the season, this could mean winter coat for when the sun is behind a cloud, and shorts / T-shirt for when the sun is out.
  2. A two meter stick. Because you know…
  3. Have multiple garden heaters, because it gets cold.
  4. Ensure the worship leader knows that this isn’t a dry run for early morning worship at the next Church approved Big Christian Conference.
  5. Make sure there is a big sign asking EVERYONE to bring an umbrella, because rain. Particularly important in Manchester.
  6. Don’t expect to go get a pie, pint, or pizza at half time. But MY WORD. That should be a thing in all churches. from now on.
  7. Wonder out loud if church should meet outside more often.
  8. Look after that one person who actually knows all the rules and regulations. Maybe offer them a strong coffee or something stronger to help steady their nerves.
  9. Pretend its Christmas. Bring Mulled Wine.
  10. Or in fact, if you’re meeting in a park, bring cheap cider. Because memories.

Anything we’ve missed out?

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Alternative – Socially Distanced – Christmas Service Ideas

Once upon a time. In a simpler pre-covid age, Sofa wrote a little thing about Alternative Christmas Service Ideas, and as a post. Its fine. You can argue some of it could be adjusted for a socially distanced church service, but… some of them might take work.

With that in mind, may I present* the Church Sofa…

Alternative – Socially Distanced – Christmas Service Ideas…

  1. Ok. Lets face it. Inviting a group of people anywhere may not be the best the thing to do right now. So – lets bring it to the people. Find a heavily pregnant lady and ask her to walk around the local streets. Knocking on peoples door, asking if theres any room in the inn.
  2. Add a hassled husband into the mix.
  3. Have a live donkey with them as well. Don’t forget to walk the long donkey up to the house whilst they are being asked if there is any room. Bonus points if the donkey leaves any “bonus” gifts on the door step. It will add to the atmosphere.
  4. Have a socially distanced choir follow the couple and donkey.
  5. Livestream a Christmas reading. Just outside the open window to a labour ward. See if any “bonus sounds” get picked up.
  6. Live stream a reading of the shepherds, in the light of a camp fire. Possibly on the church carpert. Granted someone on the PCC / a Deacon / Church Wardens, may come after you, but the young people will love it. Besides. It might be a while until anyone notices.
  7. Do you normally have a midnight service? Try and have drop a little bottle of port around everyones houses. See if anyone has it by the time the service starts.
  8. Is there anyone pregnant in your church? Get them to change their Facebook name to “Mary”, then a few days before encourage her say she has to go on a journey… and the travel arrangements aren’t great.
  9. Raise money for Sofa to make the Christmas Carol Service Bingo Card – an app. Therefore cutting down on paper being given out to people.
  10. Its Christmas. Its not cancelled! Its a time of celebration! Live stream fireworks being set off! Just dont have the donkey involved with it.

*Some of this might actually get you arrested, or result in a fire or something… The Sofa doesn’t take any responsibility – for anything – let alone the internet getting into trouble.

Are there any you would add?

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When Church Service Leaders Go Rogue.

When-Church-Service-Leaders-Go-Well

Imagine you’ve dragged your none Christian friends / family to Church. Well done. You’ve got them there. Now what if the person leading the service, or giving the sermon is feeling particularly…. adventurous. What if the person leading the service goes a little rogue and says, or encourages everyone to do something a little… different?

What do you NOT want them to say??

How about this collection of comments that may or may not have some bearing on real life events…

  1. “Turn to the person on your right, and make your confession”
  2. “Why don’t we spend a few minutes, where we all share our favorite Bible verses with each other?
  3. “Grab each others hands! Dont be shy! Now lets dance around the hall!”
  4. After the above “Let us all turn, look, and lay hands on the person having an asthma attack after all that dancing!”
  5. “In this time of prayer, we will anoint each other with (baby) oil”
  6. “As we are a family church, lets ensure we treat each other as family. To that end, lets all invite the person sitting in front of us to dinner this week?”
  7. “Let us show our servant heart to each other, and wash the feet of the people next to us”
  8. “Let us sing out own joyful song of praise. In our own Heavenly tongue if needed”
  9. “Wasn’t that a lovely word from the Pastor? I would love it if we could all turn to the people around us, and share 3 things we learnt from Gods word tonight”
  10. “In the spirit of the early Church, I would like us to give each other a Holy Kiss”

Any you could add?

(Its just occurred to me that I could call this “Christian Introvert Nightmares”)

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9 Excuses For Not Going To Church

Imagine. Its Sunday morning, possibly even tomorrow, you’re there in bed struggling to wake up. Maybe it was the kids waking you up over the night, maybe its because you had to watch Doctor Who one more time last night, maybe it was that bank holiday bar b q that lasted a little longer then planned… Either way, the idea of going to Church is feeling more and more like a distant dream. So has you lay there in bed, what excuse could you use for being hungover not going to Church?

Here is The Church Sofa list of acceptable reasons for not going to Church:

  1. Your elderly parents wished to visit, and didn’t believe it was Sunday.
  2. You were so caught up in your morning prayer you didnt know what time it was.
  3. Wife / kid was sick… Not because of wine
  4. Jesus told me not to
  5. You missed Match of The Day the night before (acceptability does vary depending on who you spoke to).
  6. A random family member (who you’ve never mentioned before) came into town at short notice and popped in.
  7. You were on your way to church, and saw that someone had broken down. So you stopped and helped! (Sadly helping them out took longer then the church service, or obviously you would have invited the breakdown victim along to church)
  8. You literally had nothing to wear. (Obviously this wont work if you go to a naked church)
  9. You figured that you could get a better mornings kip at home rather than listen to the person down to preach. (That one might be true in some cases)

Remember… Sometimes it’s just best to be honest. (Especially if it’s your accountability partner)

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How Kids Disrupt Church Services (A guide through the ages)

Kids in Church

The Sofa is pleased to share this guest blog from Kate from Londonwithatoddler.com. Kate describes herself as a “mother, writer, thinker. Granted, the kind of things I think about are along the lines of “What’s that smell?” or “Where can I buy chocolate around here?”, so maybe not that much of a thinker.  But I am definitely the first two”. Recently she has been thinking about the many different ways kids could disrupt Church Services.

LittleFamilyHere’s her look at children and young people in Church:

Children in church is always one of those contentious issues that puts people on edge – parents are constantly anticipating the next cry of “But what IS a virgin?” during carol services, meeting leaders are always keeping a close eye on where they leave that cordless microphone in case it falls into the small hands and the pensioners are torn between cooing at the cute baby and wishing that they would stop crying because it really interferes with their hearing aid frequency.

As with all things though, isn’t it the unknown and unpredictable that causes the most worry? So, with that in mind I have spent some time studying the habits of children in church and have put together this handy age-by-age guide of just how children will disrupt your service. Once you can predict their movements, you can relax.

0-1 Contrary to popular belief, a newborn baby is one of the easiest types of child to take into a service. They sleep all the time. If they’re in a sling, being soothed by the latest Hillsong drum fill, they will barely open an eye for the whole service, much to the disappointment of the old ladies cooing over them. But as they get older, the capacity for mayhem increases. Maybe they’ll cry a bit. Maybe they’ll need a feed, exposing the whole church – and especially the worship band at the front- to the possibility of a nipple of some kind being flashed about. There may also be some suspicious smells. But they’re child’s play compared to toddlers…

1-3 The toddler. Comes with the advantage that they can be bribed into near-silence with a packet of Hula Hoops. Comes with the disadvantage that they will throw a tantrum if the packet is the wrong colour or they don’t have the right sippy cup. Prone to hiding under the altar/welcome desk and arguing with each other.

3-5 The age of maximum destruction. The world record for the number of times a 3-year-old has run around the entire congregation in one service currently stands at 5500. Depending on the length of your service, that’s between 30 and 92 circuits per minute. Consider that for a second. They also enjoy playing the piano/drums/percussion/anything they can get their hands on as loudly and frequently as possible. Keen on doing actions at the front but almost impossible to remove once they’ve taken to the stage. Never let them near a microphone unless you want the congregation regaled with tales about dinosaurs or mangled versions of the “Octonauts” theme tune.

5-10 School age. Where children can theoretically sit quietly and pay attention to someone talking for literally minutes on end. Pity that they squeeze every ounce of their “sitting still” ability out during the working week. So, they’ll spend Sunday mornings complaining that they’re bored and asking when Kids’ Church starts. Then they’ll find another 45 minutes’ worth of good behaviour for the Childrens’ workers before melting down during coffee time and forcing their parents to abandon their much-needed cup of hot caffeine.

10+ The dreaded Youth. A time of drink, drugs and wild living…and that’s just the Youth Pastor. Expect the worst and it probably won’t happen, but they will almost certainly fall asleep during the preach after a heavy night of partying/video gaming/Bible studying. Teenagers are not natural morning people. Employ a few drum shields to deflect the worst of the snoring.

So now you’re prepared….let the little children come to you.

Would you like to guest post for The Church Sofa? If so give this a read and drop me an email!

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10 Ways to Create Trouble in Church

10 Ways to Create Trouble in Church
Be careful of letting your local Milhouse know of any plans you may have.

We all feel a little mischievous sometimes… Have you ever sat in Church and just wanted a giggle? Well here’s our list of 10 Ways to Create Trouble in Church, to help you feel inspired next time you’re in Church.*

  1. Someone coughing next to you? Be nice. Offer them a bottle of water. Don’t tell them it’s sparkling water. Also, don’t tell them you’ve recently dropped it.
  2. Renumber the service card.
  3. Cough. Splutter. Mutter about the Plague. (Careful of doing this in a Healing Service, you may get prayed for / anointed with oil etc)
  4. Put duckies in the Baptism pool.
  5. During the sermon, project a timer counting down from 20 mins onto the back wall. Watch the preacher get more and more nervous as his time starts to run out.
  6. Preacher likely to go on for to long? Arrange for the entire back row to “fall asleep” at the same time.
  7. Let the local gang of toddlers play with the above mentioned duckies… During the service.
  8. Do you have one of those baptism pools which are covered up during none baptism services? Try hiding a phone in there. Ring the phone half way through the prayers, enjoy watching the ensuring confusion.
  9. Sit behind someone who is scared of mice / rats / anything that crawls. Set a wind up mouse going under their pew.
  10. Fart bombs. Rigged up to a timer, and placed behind the pulpit…

*No one on the Church Sofa takes any responsibility for anything that happens to anyone if any of the above is done or not done.

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Does the Church ‘preach what it practises’?

A moment from Richard Littledales blog, where he looks at the question of if the Church should preach what it practises:

Preaching is the charcoal stick which outlines God’s possibilities on the canvas of the soul. Preaching is the place where timeless truth and temporal limitation collide, showering the faithful with sparks of God’s illuminating brilliance. In short, it is motivation for the church more than PR for the world.

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