Silver Spring CRC Receives Worship Grant
Silver Spring (Md.) CRC has received a Vital Worship, Vital Preaching grant totaling $25,000 from the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship (CICW), which will be used to help diverse pastors explore best practices in preaching. The grant project officially began Jan. 1, but for Silver Spring CRC interim pastor Don Ridder, the idea behind the grant started much earlier—documented on a McDonald’s paper bag.
“I was dreaming one day while sitting in a McDonald’s,” Ridder said, “and I just started taking notes.”
Silver Spring CRC’s building is home to three congregations, a Christian Reformed congregation, a French-speaking Cameroonian congregation, and an Indonesian congregation. Ridder had been approached by several members of the Cameroonian congregation who wanted to learn how to preach.
That request, paired with the church’s growing vision for a multicultural community, sparked the idea to apply for the grant.
Katie Roelofs, a local preacher and consultant involved at Silver Spring CRC, immediately saw the need too.“That was just kind of the growing sentiment,” she said. “They need leaders to be raised up from within their own congregations.”
Roelofs had studied at Calvin University and knew about the available grants. In partnership with Ridder, the church submitted a grant proposal to CICW.
In its most recent round of funding, CICW announced 79 grant awards across the United States and Canada. These one-year grants are designed to promote thoughtful, innovative projects aimed at strengthening Christian worship practices and preaching.
Kathy Smith, CICW’s interim director and director of personnel and grantmaking programs, described the grant program this way: “The Calvin Institute of Christian Worship seeks to foster, strengthen, and sustain well-grounded public worship throughout the United States and Canada. The Vital Worship, Vital Preaching grants program, with the generous support of Lilly Endowment Inc., allows us to help many congregations from various ecumenical traditions learn about worship and enrich their worship in creative ways.”
“We believe that renewing worship leads to healthier congregations that can have a significant impact on the health of our society. We are especially excited that the grant project planned by Silver Spring CRC focuses on preaching and pastoral formation, but does so by training preachers and pastors from a variety of diverse congregations,” Smith added. “What a beautiful way to expand the reach of God’s Word and God’s care for a great variety of people! We look forward to seeing the impact of this grant project.”
Ridder added, “When you have an idea and it’s exciting, people jump on board. God is really doing something here, and we are a part of it.”
The grant’s learning cohort consists of 14 people from the Cameroonian, Indonesian, and Silver Spring congregations. Over the course of a year, the group will explore what it means to preach.
“How does a preacher generate ideas and sermons? How does a preacher write those sermons? How do they deliver those sermons in a way that is understandable, and in which the gospel is clearly communicated and lives are changed?” Ridder asked, listing key questions the project aims to address.
Some of the session themes include the preacher’s spirit, the preacher’s imagination, the preacher’s eyes (seeing God’s Word as God intends), and the preacher’s ears (listening carefully to the text), he said.
Participants in the project come from a wide range of careers and backgrounds, something that excites both Ridder and Roelofs, they said.
“I hope it has a yeast effect or is like a seed being planted,” said Roelofs. “If each participant faithfully serves God in their context, the lives touched as a result will be beyond counting.”
Though the program is just getting under way, the leaders said they are already seeing its impacts. This grant will equip leaders serving in a multinational variety of communities. Its reach will extend beyond the three congregations and into the surrounding area, they explained.
Ridder and Roelofs noted also that the grant will support stronger preaching, better-supported pastors, and healthier congregations.
And it started with some thoughts written on a McDonald’s bag.
“Just be faithful with what God gives you, and if there is something on the other end, be grateful for that as well,” Ridder said. “It really is encouraging that there are people who believe in what is happening in the local church and want to provide additional funds like these to make sure it can happen.”
