All-Age Services

PUBLISHER'S DESCRIPTION:

Including 15 designs for exploring the Bible together. Written in Bob’s inimitable style, this book explores how services that will appeal to all ages can be shaped by the Bible passage you want to teach. Many churches have traditionally had a monthly ‘family service’ on a Sunday morning but even more are now looking for alternative formats and times to attract new families into church. The 15 designs that are in this book include services for Christmas and Easter. Each design gives scripts, active and interactive learning opportunities, and appropriate prayer and worship opportunities.

Bob Hartman is well known author of best selling books including the Lion Storyteller series, Telling the Bible - a series of retellings of passages from the Bible for individual and group performance, Anyone Can Tell a Story - full of Bob’s tips for great storytelling, and the highly acclaimed Angels, Angels All Around. He is also the pastor of Bethseda Baptist Church in Trowbridge and a professional storyteller who speaks to thousands of children every year, tells his stories at a variety of festivals and conferences and trains teachers and church workers in the craft.

Introduction
Using this book
Service Plans:
1.    June – Creation (Genesis 1)
2.    July – The Fall (Genesis 2-3)
3.    August – Abraham (Genesis 12-21)
4.    September – Exodus (Exodus 1-20)
5.    October – Crossing the Jordan (Numbers10-14; Joshua 3-4)
6.    November – Nehemiah (Nehemiah)
7.    December – Christmas (Matthew 1:18-24; Luke 1:26-38; 2: 1-20)
8.    January – The wrecked roof (Mark 2:1-12)
9.    February – The feeding of the five thousand (John 6:2-14)
10.    March – Walking on water (John 6:16-21)
11.    April – Resurrection (Luke 24:13-35)
12.    May – Peter and John heal a lame man (Acts 3:1-4:31)

"Bob Hartman’s All Age Services gives you 12 creative service plans for exploring and teaching the Bible. Each plan gives you: an easy way-in to your theme, a story, teaching outline, activity, a prayer and ideas for songs and worship. Ideal for family and new-to-church services, Bob Hartman gives you something for everyone, and everything you need - including all the practical details like timings, and things you might want to do in advance. All Age Services keeps your mixed age congregation involved and interested in what you have to say, and brings them back next week."

All Age Services can be tricky, so we at Eden.co.uk want to help. Here are some useful tips to help you with your planning.

The Hand-In-The-Air Trick:

The 12 service plans each contain a story from the bible, re-written by Bob to include audience interaction. Whether it’s noises, actions, acting or sound effects, there’s always something to include your congregation. Bob’s number tip is this, the hand-in-the-air trick. Just explain that when your hand goes up in the air, they have to be silent or stop whatever they are doing.  Noise – hand in air – quiet. Now you are in the driving seat, steering the story and your audience wherever you want it to go.

Many Primary Schools use this helpful trick in assemblies (so if you're a Christian School's Worker you've probably seen the hand-in-the-air trick already).

Ban the Story Mat:

Don’t invite the children to the front, it encourages adults to switch off – ‘this part is just for the kids’. Instead have the attitude that story transcends age. The beauty of stories is that they can be interpreted at different levels of understanding. What a child enjoys and learns from the story of creation will be entirely different than what a teenager, a baby-boomer, or a university lecturer. Your story will do all the work, for every age. Let everything in your service be for everyone!

Your Most Helpful Tool – Delegation:

In his introduction, Bob insists you are not a preacher, you are a ring master. A preacher will stand behind a lectern and talk at you for an hour or so. A ring master will oversee the service, allowing other people to led a prayer, hand out resources, or tell the story. The ring master is in control and always knows all the sections inside out. This variety of voices will grab your congregation’s attention and keeps the service flowing nicely. Build a reliable team around you and harness the most useful tool a leader has in their tool belt – delegation.

One Service a Month:

‘All Age Services’ includes 12 separate services. Their original intent is to begin in June and then continued monthly. In doing so the Christmas story will land neatly in December and the Easter story in April. Although Bob says you’re welcome to cut up this formula, we’d recommend you stick to this structure. Why – because it will have the most impact.

The services will work great on their own, but will feel disconnected. Following the monthly (or weekly, fortnightly) structure and soon you will realise each story connects together, telling one big story of redemption. In fact, we’d even recommend including recaps of previous services at the beginning to connect the dots. Maybe even keep the group work and hang it somewhere as a visual reminder to your church.

Psst ... Here’s Some Extra Help:

Bob is great at providing you with plenty of help with the stories, prayers and the activities in the book. But the one thing he leave bare is the sung worship. Not to worry, on the Family Ministry website there is a helpful list of appropriate songs listed for each individual service, plus a song sample, words sheet and music sheet too. We hope this helpful guide to ‘All Age Services’ has lived up to its description.

Many churches up and down the country spend lots of time pondering how it’s possible to keep everyone in the church engaged and understanding the message that is being presented to them at the front. This is exactly why top communicator Bob Hartman has created All-Age Services to help you do just this.

So here are 5 reasons why you will love using All-Age Services.

1) He knows exactly what he is doing.

Bob Hartman loves to tell a story and has spent the last fifteen years of his life dedicated to entertaining children through dynamic and creative yarn spinning. Author of nearly 40 titles from church resources such as All-Age Services to his children’s titles such as the famous Lion Storyteller Bible, Bob is extremely well equipped to produce a resource that will help you to communicate to any age in your church from the littlest to the eldest.

2) All-Age worship is a real treat

There is something very special about having the entire church enthralled by what is going on at the front. It’s not an easy job speaking to hugely diverse range of people that you are most likely to find on a Sunday morning. So with a resource such as All-Age Services you can keep everyone on their toes, waiting with baited breath for your next word. For many churches up and down the country it can be difficult to come up with creative and inventive ideas to get your congregation going so why not let someone else do the hard work for you. Aren’t you excited about hearing everyone (yes, everyone) at the end of the service chatting about what they have just been a part of?

3) Practical help that will inspire and motivate

If you are wondering where to start then grab a copy and find a session relevant to what you are currently doing whether it be the creation story, Christmas or Easter there is sure to be a service outline to fulfil every need. Each session helpfully sets out exactly what you need to do to prepare an outline of the service plan and then clear instructions on what to do; even including scripts for dramas should you feel dramatic!

4) 12 sessions included to help you through the year

As most churches will try and do some form of ‘all-age worship’ once a month the book has been designed to set you up with 12 sessions to get you through the year in style. Though the sessions take you through the Bible story as a whole in line with the calendar you could easily use elements of the book to adapt to other stories or to use them out of order. This book will definitely give you ideas to go on and develop yourself, ignite the creativity in you.

5) Great resource for teaching the Bible

Not only is Bob Hartman an expert storyteller and communicator he is also the Pastor of Emmanuel Christian Church in Pennsylvania, which needless to say gives him authority to teach God’s Word in a faithful and helpful way. Each of these 12 sessions have been created to communicate the story of God from Creation right through to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

If you are looking for a one stop resource for All-Age ministry in an easy to handle, down-to-earth style then this could well be the resource for you. Written with wit as well as authority Bob has created a service book for any church looking to reach those who may be on the fringes or are uncomfortable in a traditional church service. He is also keen to see church engage with everyone in the church to build up all generations.

Written in Bob’s inimitable style, this book explores how services that will appeal to all ages can be shaped by the Bible passage you want to teach. Many churches have traditionally had a monthly ‘family service’ on a Sunday morning but even more are now looking for alternative formats and times to attract new families into church. The 12 designs in this book include services for Christmas and Easter. Each design gives scripts, active and interactive learning ideas, and appropriate prayer and worship opportunities.

Pastor of Emmanuel Christian Church in Pennsylvania, Bob is a professional storyteller who speaks to thousands of children each year, trains people in the craft, and tells his stories at festivals and conferences in the UK and the US. Bob is also the author of over forty children’s books including the Lion Storyteller series, Telling the Bible – a series of retellings of passages from the Bible for individual and group performance, Anyone Can Tell a Story- full of Bob’s tips for great storytelling, and the highly acclaimed Angels, Angels All Around.