Worship Service Transitions

My church seems to be moving away from having 3 services to having just one.  While part of me understands, part of me hates to see our innovative side slip away--because the one service that we're keeping is more traditional.

I've been trying to think about why I hate the idea of the innovation side slipping away.  Part of it, of course, is because that was the service that meant the most to me.  We did a lot with a variety of creative practices, and I was often in charge.

I don't hate not being in charge--but I will miss the creative outlet.

More than that, I miss the way we were able to connect with each other in a way that I'm not sure we can during a traditional service.  I wonder if there's a way to maintain that connection, even if we don't meet every week.

If we had a creative brunch once a month, could that work?  Would it be in addition to the church service or a service on its own?

That's the key question--do we need to offer a less formal option as a worship service?  And what does it mean to worship?  Could we do our own thing and join the traditional worship for communion?  Hmmmmm.

The other part of the question:  how do we connect with each other if we're meeting for a worship service?  There's the possibility of coffee hour after church, but since we're a small church, many of us have tasks after church that keep us from coffee hour:  clean up, money counting, and occasional rehearsals.

I wish I had a tidy solution--that would be a great way to end this blog post.  But so far, I just have possibilities, and I'm not even sure they'd be of interest to anyone but me.  I'll keep thinking on this and reporting back.