A to Z prayer

Urban Saints: Join the community...
Was just doing some research on the Crusaders organisation, recently renamed (wisely, I think) to Urban Saints... Thought this was a neat idea - take two A-Zs, chop them all up and tape them down on the ground, and then walk all over them and pray.

That would make an amazing set-up for a 'pray for london' week. Take your, shoes off and walk all over london. You could have a route marked out to follow, and have prayer points pinned in various locations, and you could carry a marker with you and just write a prayer anywhere on the map.
Imagine what church on the corner would look like with all the furniture gone and a huge map of london pasted to the floor...

PS, trying out Mark's Flock recommendation. Looks magic to me.

Passing trade

There are probably quite a few lessons to be learned from sunday night... Wouldn't want to explore them all here, but one thing that caught my attention was that a fair number of people up and wandered in off the street. St Mary's have a prime location, but I still reckon that's pretty unusual for them. I was just wondering what it was that made them want to come in, and what made them feel comfortable doing so.
At church on a sunday evening you can sit there and watch people crossing the road, going past, looking in. I'm sure many of them would pop in if they thought they could. We provoke a lot of curiosity there on our corner.
So what can we do to make it okay to stick your head round the door? Anyone up for running a few experiments? Here's one I think we could try: now that the odd corner fire exit thing is gone, how about we try putting the musicians on that side, shifting the angle of the seats, and then opening those double doors for the summer? If we put a couple of cafe tables just outside in that space, a few chairs along that wall by the fireplace, and give people the freedom to wander about in the middle of the service, I reckon people might pause, maybe ask what's going on. I volunteer to sit out there and chat to people, as long as it's sunny. We could even get some parasols...
(Incidentally, months before I moved to London I walked past church on the corner on a sunday morning, thought I might step in for a bit, and couldn't find the door. So it's not just speculation! We're used to the wierd side entrance into the random glass corridor and don't notice it any more, but it's not immediately obvious. Nobody wants to walk back and forth round the building with everybody looking at them, especially if they're not sure they want to stay.)

Book Club

This was inspired by Sophia's comment in the discussion below. Book clubs are well established - the idea is commonplace, but what a fantastic chance to mix with people and talk about real things. Soph can you tell us some more?

Creative Consultants email

You can now email the Creative team for ideas or advice using the email cotccreatives[at]yahoogroups.com
Obviously replace the [at] with the correct symbol!
“When 900 years you reach, look as good, you will not.”

Telling stories

I have been meaning to get this started for 18 months, but never got round to it.
I love the idea of testimonies, but not the usual contrived and formulaic ones that you often hear in church. Real stories of what peoples walk with God has been like in the last year - the good, the bad and the ugly; what you have learned, what mistakes you have made, etc.

I think it would build the idea of real world spirituality, of the God who is part of the everyday, who loves us through our brokeness and our beauty...

Just need someone to take it on.

Welcome to COTC Creatives

Chatting to some of you who were just finishing their term on the service leading team and asking 'what next', we came up with this.

COTC Creatives is a forum for sharing and discussing ideas about creative stuff for the services and events at Church on the Corner. This is where we record our crazy middle of the night ideas, or where we work on creative solutions to issues, or post questions for others to think about.

It is open to anyone to contribute, but moderated by a group of experienced creatives from withing Church. The first post will be by skinny with a fantastic idea for a video of hands...