You can use the Christmas resource pack in whichever way suits your church best! We appreciate that during this time church looks different for everyone, so we’ve aimed to be helpful but not prescriptive.

Here are some ideas of how you could use the resource:

1.     Use it as a service plan.
Take a look at the contents page on page two of the resource pack.
The layout of the resource pack could be used as the structure for a service plan:

• Welcome: Introduction to the theme of ‘Ordinary to extraordinary’
• Kid’s slot: The Angel who Couldn’t Sing followed by Kid’s quiz (pg. 3-4)
• Talk: God uses ordinary people to do extraordinary things (pg. 5-6)
• Prayers: Reflecting on the theme (pg. 7)
• Testimony: Share Mohammed’s story (pg. 8) or Sabita’s story (pg. 2)
• Challenge to congregation: how are they part of God’s extraordinary plan?
• Christmas giving: Share the Ordinary to Extraordinary video and encourage your congregation to consider giving to OM to enable more ordinary Jesus followers to share God’s extraordinary love in ways he is not known.

2.     Use aspects of the resource in your service.
Consider this to be a flexible resource! You may want to take some aspects but not others.

Here are some examples:

• Use the children’s video and quiz, but write your own sermon
• Plan your own service, but use the OM Christmas Appeal video at the end to inspire your Christmas offering.
• Use the sermon notes as a springboard from which to write your own sermon around the theme of ordinary to extraordinary.

3.     Use resources across multiple services.
You could use aspects of the resource across a number of your services.

If your church runs family services or Messy Church, the children’s video and worksheets could be part of an advent or Christmas service. Or, supply your children’s ministry leaders with these resources to use in their groups outside of the main service.

In services for the general congregation, you could use the theme of ordinary to extraordinary as a sermon series theme throughout advent or in the new year, looking at one ordinary figure from the Bible each week. Perhaps you could explore how God used each of them in extraordinary ways, before finally focusing on the one who was extraordinary in every sense of the word, but chose to become ordinary for our sake.

4.     Use the resource online.
With uncertainty surrounding when churches will be able to meet again in person, you can plan to use these resources virtually.

Videos are a great way to break up a virtual service and engage your congregation – use the children’s video and OM’s Christmas Appeal video at different points throughout your service.

You can also use the Powerpoint presentation template to include ways to give to the Christmas Appeal in your advent notices.

You may want to share the resources with your ministry team leaders if they need them for smaller services or children’s groups. Use this link to distribute the resources to your congregation.

5.     Use the resource anytime throughout advent.
You may want to use these resources at any point throughout advent or in the run-up to it. They’re yours to choose how to use.

The resources are also not limited to main church services – feel free to use the videos and worksheets in children’s groups, or use the ordinary to extraordinary theme as inspiration for planning youth group or small group sessions.

How about inspiring virtual church social activities, such as a Christmas quiz to raise money, to help bring your community together? For some, this advent may be much quieter than usual and some of your congregants.

You might also be thinking about outreach ideas for this unusual advent season, here is a blog with five ways to reach out to your community this year.

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