Charity Shop Alt. Worship

Alternative worship service at a Salvation Army Charity shop. Now thats a good idea. I am at the Cell Church UK conference in Harpenden right now. Nice people, including my partner in crime Richard White and some Norwegians that heard me speak in Copenhagen last year. We are meeting at the YWAM base.

Anyway, this Scottish chap named Captain David Robertson was sharing about the various cell church ministries of the Salvation Army and he described an “alt. worship” service each Wednesday morning at one of their charity shops. I asked the question about what they did – and the obvious question . . . did they all dress up in vintage clothing from the shelves? Well apparently there is no costuming at all and in fact the service is quite traditional – a talk, some sharing and prayer at the end.

But it got me thinking what i would do if i hosted an emerging church alt. worship event at a thrift shop. It could be a blast! I would totally use FOUND OBJECTS from the store itself. Teaching would be from the Bibles already on the shelf and any illustrations would be taken from books on the shelf. Costuming would be encouraged and perhaps an award (voucher) given to those with the thriftiest and yet funkiest outfit. Drinks would be poured out of found jars and jugs into found cups and mugs from the shelves. Children might want to play some found games. Everything is found in the shop. Nothing is imported in. An offering could be taken {in an old hat, of course) for Salvation Army and a blog post with all the details of the service uploaded to a blog so that others might catch the vision to start one up in their local Salvation Army charity store. Maybe its a really lame idea. But it might be trying.

Speaking of Salvation Army, Strawberry Fields in Liverpool where John Lennon used to play as a child, was recently sold by Salvation Army. It was also used recently as a 24/7 boiler room.