well the first grace of the season was wonderful on saturday night. we left at about 3 minutes to midnight - the longest grace for some time...
the idea was simple - have a community meal with worship and prayer integrated into the courses of the meal. we had permission to use the central church space (which isn't normally granted because of the stone floor) so we put carpets down and ran a table down the centre of the space. a white banqueting roll, dimmed lights and the obligatory grace logo projected from on high created a simply magical environment. a ton of effort shared out made it flow really well. the outline is in the archive of the grace web site here. more bits will be added shortly i'm sure.
september is always a service of recommitment to god, to one another, to community, to the grace ethos. what better way than in the context of a meal?!
steve has a set of photos on flickr and the gracelondon group will have more from others...
i am making the whole thing a worship trick - no 71 series 3
Sounds great Jonny... believe me though, if it's anything like safespace's "The Table" and if you do this more often Grace may have to watch it's collective wasteline!? ;)
Posted by: Mark | September 14, 2009 at 12:11 PM
Hey Jonny,
I really like this idea. I used to do big common meals for my youth group back in the youth director days. There is something about sitting around a big table and serving each other. I came across the website of a new church plant in Sacramento showing the same theme, which is an organizing principle to the whole gathering. http://www.thetableumc.org/
It looks like a great community. if nothing else, they must be commended for their logo and website. Very pretty! Hope all is well.
Posted by: Nathan | September 17, 2009 at 12:13 AM