All worship planners
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M
any years ago, I hit a roadblock. I was planning
Sunday morning corporate worship with four other people and spending most of my time making changes to a document that was passed around via email. Unfortunately, someone always ended up with an out-of-date version, or attempted to change something that had already been changed twice before by two other people. T e Sunday morning worship order was always a surprise to someone, and something was usually leſt out. Aſt er trying four diff erent templates for MSWord and fi ve diff erent templates for MSPublisher over a span of fi ve years, with no signifi cant changes in our process, I decided to check out professional worship planning web-ware. In 2009, I gave Planning Center Online a try. Four years later I’m still using this website as a key player in my worship planning.
Here are just a few items that
Planning Center Online (PCO) helped me with:
1. PCO centralizes your contacts in one place. And the database is accessible wherever wifi or cellular service (on a smart phone) is available. Update email, phone numbers, days unavailable, birthdays, anniversary, instruments played, vocals parts, and much more.
2. PCO keeps all services accessible via the web, and not just the order of worship:
Contributed by Fellowship member Chuck Bell, Director of Music Ministries, Creekside United Methodist Church, Cumming, GA. He assists churches with worship planning and design of new and (reworking) current services. Chuck served as the House Musician Coordinator for the 2012 General Conference of The United Methodist Church in Tampa, FL.
Thoughts on centralizing your worship planning
any detail that is placed in that specifi c order – songs, prayers, liturgy, pictures of platform design, everyone who was present in the choir, who preached, who served as an usher or greeter or on the electric guitar. Looking for the hanging of the green service order from three years ago? Need the name of the person that sang the anthem Feb 3, 2009? As long as it’s planned through PCO, all that information is a website away.
3. PCO places all rehearsal material in one place: PDFs, MP3s, M4As, chord charts, lead sheets with an easy link up to SongSelect for adding new songs. Have an account with one of the below services? PCO links to PraiseCharts, RehearsalMix, iTunes, Amazon, Radio/Spotify, YouTube, and Vimeo, allowing you to integrate those service within the PCO website. T e coolest feature is the ability to transpose MP3s to any key without changing the speed of the recording. T at means the singer who is scheduled with the praise band in two weeks can fi nally rehearse the song in the non- original key that the band might be playing in. AWESOME!
While there are countless other benefi ts for using a program like PCO, there one BIG thing that Planning Center Online does not do, nor should it.
PCO does not take my place
as the ministry leader. A program like Planning Center Online should only be a tool that works in partnership with your ministry. While it assists with email, scheduling, worship (or event) planning, and rehearsal material, it does not replace the need (and requirement, in my opinion) for one-on-one relationships with the people involved. Your voice cannot be replaced by a website or an email. Pick up the phone or chat in person as oſt en as possible.
Interested in fi nding
out more about PCO? Check out the SUPPORT page link on their homepage (www.
planningcenteronline.com) and attend an upcoming FREE webinar on the basics of the program. And here’s to another year of planning meaningful worship experiences for our churches and groups!
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January-February 2014 • WorshipArts •
www.UMFellowship.org
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