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Article Listing:

Missing the Magic

Just Getting Warmed Up

The Trump Cards

The Touchy Stuff:
How to Handle Edgy Scenes

The Unspoken Contract: How to Keep Your Audience Satisfied

Method Acting and the Church Drama Team

Incorporating Drama into Your Church’s Ministry Program

Don' Call Us...We'll Call You!

You're Fired!

Cross Where and
Don't Break What?

Let Me Check...
I'm Only the Assistant Director

Auditions Tonight!

Seven Deadly Sins of Directing

Finding Your Character from the Inside Out

Invitation to Intimacy

Your Kids Are Doing What?

Why Some Christmas Dramas are Doomed for Disaster

Networking

A Stones Throw Away

How to Take it From the Page to the Stage

What to do When the Unexpected Happens on Stage

Do You Know Where You're Coming From?

What Your Kids Get From Drama Ministry

What to do When Your Drama Team Doesn't Care Anymore!

What Else Can I Do?

Clearly Your Intention…

Moving Past the Red

Time for a Creative Boost

What Makes Dialogue Good?

Alone on Stage

The Physical Actor

10 Things to do Before Your Performance

Background Acting

Extraordinary Lessons from Peculiar People

The Drama Retreat

Tech Talk: Costumes
Jeni Fabian's costume book recommendations

Telling A Great Tale

Lights, Camera, Worship?

Drama Ministry for the Masses

Don't Panic

Tech Booth

featured article:

Drama Ministry
for the Masses
by Karen Lund

Using drama at church is a very effective way to introduce God's word to a new group of people. Calvary Chapel in Olympia, Wa., has done one acts and full-length plays for almost four years. After the last production, they received almost 30 response cards from people who wanted to turn their lives over to God. They knew that drama was reaching people in a wonderful way.

Beyond These Walls

While this sort of evangelism works well, we all know that there are many people who simply will not step inside a church building-for any reason. So Calvary decided to take their drama straight to those people. They did two outdoor performances in Olympia's crowded downtown Sylvester Park, a popular spot for people to meet and hang out. They chose to perform two plays. The first play, The Eight Cow Saint, has an obvious and straightforward Christian message. The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg, the second play, was adapted by Christian playwright Sean Gaffney from a short story by the famous skeptic Mark Twain. How well were these plays received? Tad Sowers of Calvary Chapel had this to say: "The downtown performances of The Eight Cow Saint produced several conversations all over the park … I do know that the Gospel was communicated … The Eight Cow Saint demonstrates that despite our unworthiness, our glorious God has paid a great price to be with us-just because he loves us. We got a lot of feedback that the message was received loud and clear, by both believers and unbelievers."

Even performing a nonreligious play hit the right chords. And because the second play was nonreligious, people who may have tuned out, instead, tuned in.

Sowers says: "The fact that Hadleyburg was not an expressly religious play did not turn out to be the problem I thought it could have been. To reinforce the message of the play, our pastor gave a short six- or seven-minute wrap-up at the end of the evening, inviting people to acknowledge their status as sinners and turn to a loving God who paid a great price to redeem them. Hadleyburg so effectively points out that even the best of us are corrupted sinners, no matter what we, or others, may think of us. We have fallen so short of a glorious God."

Stepping Out

Moving your drama program out into the world is not as hard as it may seem. Try following these steps for off-site drama ministry:

• Produce the play at your church as usual, but make it easily movable. (Not too many props or set changes. Simplicity is key.)
  
  
• Seek out a people-friendly venue. (Parks, community centers or fraternal organizations often have stages or outdoor amphitheaters that can be rented or borrowed for your event.)
  
  
• Publicize your event. (Invite people through posters, postcards and newspaper ads.)
  
  
• Make it easy on yourself. (There is no need to sell tickets if making money isn't your goal. Open it up to as many people as possible. Families are a good target market, as they are always looking for free, wholesome and entertaining things to do with their kids.)
  
  
• Be ready to talk with the audience. Sowers pointed out the one thing they would correct next time: "Open-air theatre can produce quite an array of responses-sometimes hostile. It would have been nice to have people on hand ready to dialogue with those in the crowd about what they saw in the play."

Be bold: Go with your drama into the world and engage your audience onstage and off. And go with God. If you offer your firstfruits, (work of the highest quality possible), you will participate with God to work his will on your community.

Karen Lund is the Associate Artistic Director at Taproot Theatre Company and an adjunct faculty member at Seattle Pacific University.