Every Baptist church likely aims to provide an outstanding worship service on Easter Sunday. Some churches host special services during Holy Week, which runs from the Sunday before Easter through Easter, commemorating significant days such as Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday. However, few offer other meaningful Lenten services that truly prepare our hearts for Holy Week and the joyous celebration of Easter.
This year, Ash Wednesday falls on March 5, marking the beginning of the Lenten season (see Why Baptist churches should celebrate Lent). I encourage you to consider ways to help your congregation navigate the Lenten season in both personal devotion and corporate worship, enhancing their connection with the life, death and resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ.
As worship planners and leaders, having the right resources is essential for stepping beyond our usual services and finding creative ways to engage the hearts, souls and minds of worshippers each week. I have curated several valuable resources to assist you in this endeavor that are available at the end of this article.
In addition to planning services, I strongly encourage you to support your congregation’s personal worship by providing devotional materials. These resources can help members spend time in the Word and in prayer each day throughout the Lenten season, preparing their hearts and perhaps embracing spiritual disciplines such as fasting to make their journey even more meaningful. There are many online devotionals available, and some churches have members create devotionals to compile and distribute as a collection.
If this concept is new to your church, you might start with a Holy Week devotional this year, investing significant energy into making that week vibrant, and then expand your focus to the entire Lenten period next year. You will find guidance on assembling a devotional in this article.
Remember, Easter’s significance is greatly enhanced when we help our congregations experience the Lenten season leading up to Easter.
Check out these articles to help you understand more about the Lenten season and worship:
- Why Baptist churches should celebrate Lent
- Lent: A Crash Course for the Modern Church Worship Leader
- Lent planning workshop
- Embracing Lent: The Spiritual Benefits of Fasting
Here, you will find resources to locate new songs for the season as well as great arrangements of hymns:
- Contemporary hymn arrangements for Lent/Easter
- Easter hymns, service guides and medleys from HymnCharts.com
- Spotify playlist of “Top 50 Worship Songs for Easter” from Lifeway Worship (2020)
- The top 100 songs Easter worship songs from PraiseCharts.com
- Worship music for Easter from PraiseCharts.com
- Songs about the cross from PraiseCharts.com
- The top 100 modern hymns for Easter from PraiseCharts.com
Here are a number of creative resources to help build your services:
- Preaching and worship resources from Zeteo
- A list of service ideas, readings, prayers, seasonal resources and much more — many you can search by Scripture text (explore their subject searches)
- Easter worship resource list from re:Worship
- Easter resource guide from Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
- Lent resource guide from Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
- Holy Week resource guide from Calvin Institute of Christian Worship
- Worship resources for Holy Week and Easter from Reformed Worship
- Lenten/Easter articles from Reformed Worship
- Easter worship ideas from EngageWorship.com
- Online resources for the Season of Easter from Textweek.com
- Easter worship resources from ThePastorsWorkshop.com
- Free Easter graphics and more from LifeChurch
- Creative service ideas from rethinkworship.com
- Resources for Lent, Holy Week and Easter from A Sanctified Art
And finally, here are a few creative services I have used in the past that might help you think of ways to greatly enhance your Holy Week observance:
- Service ideas for Holy Week:
Wishing you a Lenten season filled with worship that helps your church reflect on the events leading up to and including the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, whose life and teachings form the foundation of our faith.
(EDITOR’S NOTE — Kenny Lamm serves as the worship ministries strategist with the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina. He has also served as a worship pastor for more than 20 years and regularly conducts trainings for worship leaders.)
