This is your one-stop shop for planning amazing worship experiences for Advent, Lent, and other seasons of the liturgical year. Check out all of our fully-scripted series below! Get access to all of these and many other series and resources for worship by becoming a full-year member of the Worship Design Studio.
What are fully-scripted worship series?
Fully-scripted worship series from the Worship Design Studio are designed to give you the complete package of a ready-made worship series for you to share with your faith community.
These stand-alone, fully-scripted series come with:
• Full scripts for worship services in their entirety: everything from the Introit to the Benediction!
• Original music written specifically for the series, plus lots of suggestions for music in popular songbooks and sources that fit well with the series themes
• Visual and Media Arts document with tons of ideas for creative lighting, crafts, images for projection and publicity, and more!
• Children's time scripts and suggestions for engaging your young ones in worship
• Small group resources to boost your congregation's engagement with one another beyond the walls of your church
• Preaching prompts to inspire your writing of the message. We don't give you the entire sermon; that part is up to you! But, we do provide ideas to spark your creativity.
The best part is that you are welcome and encouraged to tweak our materials for your own context. Take what you like and leave the rest: you will be supported with creative ideas that give you more ease and joy for spiritual leadership while honoring your community's unique values and practices.
Our series for Advent
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Advent can be filled with worry about finding the perfect Christmas gifts. Deep down we want people in our lives to know they are special and that we love them. But sometimes we overlook the greatest gift of all… our very presence. This series is based on the scriptures for RCL Year B and features music suggestions from our guest expert, Mark Hayes, and a book study by Amy Oden. Find out more at worshipdesignstudio.com/present.
As we enter the Advent season, how can our churches become houses where the Holy will be born anew–offering respite, sustenance and care, opening the doors ever wider to those seeking shelter from the onslaught of life? This worship series utilizes scriptures from the Revised Common Lectionary Year C.
"I Believe Even When..." is inspired by the beautiful choral anthem by Mark Miller, "I Believe." Rather than turning away from music in this year of pandemic when group singing is not encouraged, we encourage you to develop virtual choral offerings so that your community can feel powerfully connected through music.
This series celebrates the 200th anniversary of the beloved hymn, "Silent Night."
This series helps us see our roles as messengers who offer assurance to the world– “Do Not Be Afraid."
This series uses the story of Ebenezer Scrooge combined with scripture to remind us to let go of the past, relish the present, and hope for the future.
"Heaven and Nature Sing: 300 Years of Joy to the World" is a celebration of the 300th anniversary of the writing of the beloved Christmas hymn, "Joy to the World."
"Reflecting the Sacred" draws inspiration from Every Thing is Sacred: 40 Practices and Reflections on the Universal Christ by Richard Rohr and Patrick Boland. This series follows the scriptures for Revised Common Lectionary Year A (usable any year if you do not follow the RCL). Find out more at worshipdesignstudio.com/sacred.
Our series for Epiphany
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The new year always brings opportunity to move beyond our limitations…to find new beginnings and be better than we were before. We use this cultural word-play in our series title to remember that the most basic transforming experiences of our faith — communion and baptism — are the starting points for life “beyond” our limitations. Let’s make this year one of amazing transformations — for our lives, for our community, for our world!
Seasonal Affective Disorder happens when a lack of sunlight affects our moods and ability to cope effectively. Spiritual Affective Disorder can also be a condition when we've had prolonged stress and life is disturbingly uncertain. What is our faithful response to our strained mental health? What if everyday life activities could become spiritual practices — deepening our experience of a meaningful life and helping us shine a light on the "blahs?"
After the rush and activity of the holiday season (even in pandemic), the new year can offer us a time of slowing down, simplifying, and leaning on reflection and prayer to help us sustain the journey toward a time when we can move to the rhythms of life for which we yearn. It is difficult to be patient in the midst of difficult times. The Psalms can help us with that.
We spend too much time being “driven” rather than “drawn in.” We focus on what we “should” do rather than what we feel excited and compelled to do in our lives, in this world. Connect with your inherent creativity and renew your congregation's energy for passionate work, delightful play, and creative problem solving to make this world a better place for all.
Our series for Lent
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Lent is often known as a time of giving something up in order to make room in our lives for spiritual pursuits. Rather than just “giving up” in Lent, the scriptures ask us to consider all that Jesus is “up to” and all that he asks us to be up to in his name. Instead of bemoaning what we can’t do, or used to do, in a culture where “measuring up” to external standards seems impossible, this Lent we will celebrate the small things that we can do right now to respond to God's call in our place, for our time.
The Christian scriptures offer many images of where love, grace, forgiveness, righteousness, and healing can REALLY be found. And it is not in the “usual” places. Move through stories of Jesus to find out who offers the “real deal."
worshipdesignstudio.com/love
This fully-scripted Lent series is based on the new devotional book by Kate Bowler, Good Enough: 40'ish Devotionals for a Life of Imperfection. The book makes an excellent companion studio to the series!
This series takes your congregation on a journey of seeing life’s difficult times as a time of spiritual gifts.
This series connects the call of our baptism to the work of making this world a better place.
This series invites us to get quiet enough to hear the still, small voice of God and find our own voice.
This series asks us to slow down the hectic pace of life and reconnect with an unhurried God.
This series pulls us into the dramatic story of Holy Week during the entire season of Lent.
This series offers on a journey toward recovery on the individual, communal, and global level.
Our series for Easter
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NEW for 2024!
What keeps us locked up inside? What holds us back from the joy of life? What binds us, keeping us from the fullness of who God created us to be? Join us for powerful testimonies — Resurrection Stories — from those who have found “resurrection” in their lives.It might just inspire you to unlock your own rising up!
The butterfly has long been a symbol of the resurrection of Jesus, as well as our own resurrection as we emerge from the power of fear and death. In this series, we will consider the process of metamorphosis as a guide to examine our own transformations from cocoons and tombs to the unfurled beauty of all God calls us to be. This series can be used as an Easter Season series OR any time of year you need to focus on new life!
Originally designed at the very genesis of the Covid-19 pandemic, this series highlighted the Acts scriptures that describe the early Christian community's worship in the temple and around their tables at home. They shared what they had with "glad and generous hearts."
As Easter people, we are called to dance our dances of freedom for all the world to see. Dances of hope. Dances of justice. Dances of love. During this season, post-resurrection stories point to the joy of living in the beloved community and extending that fellowship through our witness as we "dare to dance again!"
Ordinary Time / Anytime Series
In this “Come to the Table” series, we hear the call to dine with Jesus — an invitation that means much more than a simple eating experience. It never was with Jesus. The table was the place where he fed people, and also challenged them to acts of hospitality that reflect God’s way. When we say “yes” to the place at Christ’s table, we accept a way of life that embraces God’s definition of love, peace, grace, and joy. Let us celebrate the depth of communion to which we are called.
“Change is good… you go first!” Our brains were designed to be suspicious of change, and for good reason–homeostasis in good measure helps us thrive, protecting us from danger. But if we look closely at what the Creator set in motion, we find that change is actually the most constant part of life and necessary for animating our spirits as we find renewed purpose throughout life. Jesus advocated for changes that would keep us moving toward greater goodness!
Whether you travel far away or see your local surroundings as if for the first time, pilgrimage has long been a spiritual practice, and “journey” a deeply-felt metaphor for our spiritual lives. “Quest” comes from the Latin root meaning “ask, seek.” This four week worship series encourages us to open ourselves more fully to the curiosity and wonder, reflection and transformation that travelers–not merely tourists–experience when they choose to immerse themselves in soul-widening adventures.
This fully-scripted series has been specifically designed for online worship. This series includes video packages to help alleviate the amount of video production work your worship team is doing for online worship (can also be used as projections as we return to our sanctuaries). The get-ready webinar will train you in using these elements.
This Ordinary Time series was originally created for the Epiphany "Plus" season, but can easily be adapted for anytime. Explores all forms of creativity as a spiritual process.
After the rush and activity of the holiday season (even in pandemic), the new year can offer us a time of slowing down, simplifying, and leaning on reflection and prayer to help us sustain the journey toward a time when we can move to the rhythms of life for which we yearn. It is difficult to be patient in the midst of difficult times. The Psalms can help us with that. Originally designed for Epiphany Plus, easily adaptable for anytime.
A fully-scripted four-week worship series for churches focused on stewardship, drawing on the classic film It's a Wonderful Life and the book Integrating Money and Meaning by Maggie Kulyk and Liz McGeachy.
Dr. Marcia McFee is a professor, worship designer, author, preacher, and ritual artist. Drawing on a first career in professional dance and musical theater and equipped with a Master's in Theology and a PhD in Liturgical Studies and Ethics, she understands the role of any worship artist in the church as that of creating extraordinary portals through which communities journey with the Spirit. Dr. McFee has designed and led worship for regional, national, and international gatherings of several denominations for the last 25 years, including United Methodist General Conferences 2008 and 2012.
Dr. McFee is the Creator and Visionary of the Worship Design Studio (www.worshipdesignstudio.com), an online experience of coaching, education, inspiration, and community-building that currently serves over 1000 congregations.
