Outline act of worship for all ages

Created by God

• As the service begins, display some images of creation: views, animals, etc., and ask people to vote for their favourites. Ask for reasons as to why they have chosen this image. Alternatively, ask:
  What is your favourite view/place to visit? Why?
  What is your favourite season? Why?
  What is your favourite animal? Why?
  Make a list as you go along.
• Then ask, what do all these have in common? (Draw out that they were all created by God.)
  Now ask people to add to this list something that they have seen this week that demonstrates God’s creative acts.
• Explain that today we are going to focus on the fact that God made all these things and what our response should be.

First impressions

You could also use the image and following questions to help introduce the theme.

Click on the image to view a larger version or use the Jump menu to go to This week's images. For artist's details, see this issue's illustrators.

Questions

• What fills you with awe?
• How do you respond to something vast and beyond your comprehension?
• What words could you use to describe how wonderful God is?

Job 38:1-7,(34-41)

CORRECTION: Apologies but there is an incorrect reference to a drama in the magazine for this item..

The back story to this reading is important to help make sense of the story – use the précis ‘A brief guide to the story of Job’ to help with understanding. See also The Bible Project's Guide to the Book of Job.

Mark 10:35-45

At the turn of the 21st century, the BBC conducted a poll asking people who they thought were the greatest Britons to have lived. (If you are not in the UK, do a poll about who the congregation think are the greatest in your country.)

There were some surprises along the way – see full list here.

(The top 10 were: Churchill/Isambard Kingdom Brunel/ Diana, Princess of Wales/Darwin/Shakespeare/Isaac Newton/ Elizabeth I/John Lennon/Nelson/Oliver Cromwell.)

See if anyone can guess who the top 10 were. Explore why they think they were considered ‘great’.

Invite the congregation to listen out for Jesus’ definition of greatness in the Gospel reading.

The reading would be most effective if read with different voices, ideally three and a narrator. You could split the words said by James and John into two separate voices or they could speak together. After hearing the reading, pose the question:
Looking at Jesus’ definition of ‘greatness’, are there people you would take off the list or add to it?

Active worship

Personification poem      W E S

Create creation imagery

You will need: paper and pens for each person.

• Display the words from the Old Testament clearly. Remind everyone that personification is when non-human things are given human characteristics and look for examples: e.g. the stars sang together, the lightning speaking.
• Invite people to create (in writing) some of their own imagery about their favourite aspects of God’s creation, e.g. the snow clothes the ground; the sun smiles on me in the summer.
• Put the phrases together into a poem to read out as part of your worship.

Mind-blowing statistics W E

Make a poster showing the amazingness of creation

You will need: large paper, pens, images of creation, glue and scissors.

• Either display or invite people to look on their phones for some mind-blowing concepts about the world, e.g. There are thought to be 75 sextillion grains of sand; about 3 trillion fish are caught every year; there are 333 million cubic miles of water on earth.
• Using the printed images or drawings, invite the groups to make a collage including some of these amazing stats. Across the top of each poster, write: This is our God.
• Display them in your worship space. Then invite people to call out a statistic from one of the posters and everyone responds with: Hallelujah, this is our God.

Rainbow dance E S

Create dance moves for worship

You will need: ribbons and musical instruments.

• Use the children’s hymn ‘Who put the colours in the rainbow?’ as an opportunity to create some actions or dance moves. You could work in small groups with a few lines each or just suggest actions or moves for each line. Provide some ribbons, instruments and anything else you think might be needed to create a visual, active version of the hymn.

A simple worship activity W E

Reflect on the majesty and humility of God

You will need: the words or a recording of the song ‘The Servant King’ (Kendrick) .

• This week’s readings from Job and the Gospel of Mark show both the majesty and the humility of God.
• Reflect on the contrast between the two readings. In the Job reading, God reveals his majesty to Job by pointing towards the intricacy and magnificence of his creation. Yet in the Gospel, Jesus presents a model of servant leadership.
• Play the song ‘The Servant King’, or ask someone to sing it or, failing that, look at the words together in a hymn book. Invite people to think about which line of the song speaks to
  them most.
• Then ask everyone to think about how they might follow the example of Jesus by serving others in the coming week.

Activity sheet

• Invite people to say one new thing they have learnt about who God is today. Invite suggestions as to how they can embed and reflect this in their lives this week. Is there one thing they can do or say differently? W A

Go with God 24/7

Encourage everyone to put their faith into action

Take time to consider an aspect of creation carefully this week, e.g. looking at the night sky, watching insects, playing in autumn leaves. What does this tell you about God? E

Thrive

Give out the
Thrive resource
to encourage
faith at home.