Comment here on Ministry Showcases...

Share your thoughts, your questions, and your reactions.

5 comments:

Dave said...

Last year we attended a couple of the showcases and were not exactly excited by what we experienced. The word "showcase" seems to imply that things will be live or video production of the entire service. That was not what was experienced. It was mostly teaching.

So this year we explored the showcases online from the arts conference web page and I felt like it implied that it was going to be different. It again is mostly teaching. The teaching is valuable for some but it doesn't allow for transitions, mistakes, visuals that can only be seen in the context of an entire service.

I would like to see something in the future that was more "entire service" oriented.

Anonymous said...

Hi Dave... sorry you are disappointed in the Showcase...it is always our hope that they will be more of a demonstration of things. We ask for at least a 60/40 split of showing/talking. We'd love to have the showcase churches bring their whole teams, but can't afford to do that.

I hope you are able to attend some of the other showcases...Church of Wrigleyville did have a team come since they are close by and last I heard were planning on creating a service experience. Since the Mosaic team is here for Scribble, I asked them to do the same thing. Also, if you are attending the Imagine Christmas, you will be able to watch the entire Christmas service on video and get some additional insight about that service from the Producers. Lastly, although I haven't had the opportunity to attended the Granger Showcase, they got awesome reviews last year.

We'll try to do a better job with wording the descriptions to help with expectations. Thanks for the comment.

brian said...

What was the name of the dance at the Mosaic showcase? It was unbelievable.

Anonymous said...

I loved the showcases and was actually disappointed that the mosaic was just a "service". I want to know their success and failures and from the description i thought it would be that, but instead it was a "worship experience" i love what Granger and the Journey did. they presented their philosphy and then gave us something we could take home with us. I come to willow each year for a time of refreshment but i also come for inspiration. Next year i would hope for even more churches to be able to showcase their successes and failures. i want to go home with a bag full of ideas that i can try to implement. Maybe they could focus on a semester or season of ministry.
Thanks for all that you guys are doing!

Bethany said...

I attended the first 3 of these - and all 3 were quite different.

I actually really enjoyed being able to see/experience/participate in a Mosaic service. And I was really jazzed and challenged by the Wrigleyville church.

The only one I was a little disappointed in was the Journey church. While we did get to see short clips of some of their creative pieces, I could have done without all the info & teaching (fill in the blanks) on how they worship plan and evaluate. That wasn't what I expected from a ministry showcase - I wanted to hear more about their church's vision for their community and how they used the arts as a part of that mission. And of course it would be ideal if the arts teams from those churches could be there to present and share live - but what can you do.

(The dance piece Mosaic presented was "Only Hope" by Switchfoot.)