How to Organize a Faith at Home Fair
One of the things that I’ve learned in the years I’ve been working with congregations and Faithful Families is this: nurturing solid faith at home practices requires a bit of coaching, instruction, and “show and tell” from faith formation leaders for their congregations. This is why, when I was invited to First Baptist, Greenville, to preach and speak, we decided the best use of the time would be a faith-at-home fair after worship.
HUGE thanks to Bridget Kokolis and Mary Carol Anderson at First Baptist Greenville for absolutely every detail in making this fair a huge success (including making the printable signs linked here!)
The idea is simple: stations set up to teach families some practices they can use at home with their families and give them some things to take home with them.
It was such a fun and successful event, we decided to teach everyone how to do it! I’ll maybe try an Advent and Lenten version as well sometime, but for now, here’s a simple one you can use any time. These instructions are for four stations.
- Prayer Baskets
- Gratitude Tree
- Smartphone Prayers
- Nighttime
Materials List
INSTRUCTION SHEETS to be printed out and put on tables (Those are in Canva for easy editing.)
PLASTIC FRAMES/HOLDERS (for the instruction sheets on the tables)
Copies of FAITHFUL FAMILIES
Copies of LITTLE PRAYERS FOR EVERYDAY LIFE
SMALL TREE (Could use a Christmas Tree, ornamental tree, or large branch in a vase)
YARN
STRIPS OF PAPER
HOLE PUNCH
SCISSORS
MARKERS or CRAYONS
BASKET
Refreshments
Optional — we had finger foods at this one
Alternately, have a meal and these stations set up around the side
Room Setup
4 tables with chairs — one for each station
1 table for food/refreshments
1 welcome + book table
Station One: Prayer Baskets
Place the instructions on the table in the frame along with a basket, slips of paper and pens.
Families will write their prayers on slips of paper and drop them in the basket.
To take home: Mealtime prayer cards
Station Two: Gratitude Tree
Place the instructions on the table in the frame.
Set up the tree along with yarn, hole punch, scissors, and gratitude printables.
Families will write down what they’re thankful for on the medallions and tie them to the tree.
To take home: Make your own gratitude tree printable.
Station Three: Smartphone Prayers
Place the instructions on the table.
Families will stop by and give the smartphone prayer a try.
To take home: smartphone prayer instructions.
Station Four: Nighttime
Place the instructions in a frame along with the nighttime prayer “I stretch up high, I bend down low…”
Families will learn two ways to approach nighttime, a blessing and a prayer.
To take home: Little Prayers for Everyday Life
General Tips / Comments
- One of the things that made this fair run really well was that there was a volunteer at each station. The volunteers were given a very brief orientation to the stations and shown about their specific station. This helped everyone to feel clear on what to do. In a smaller congregation, it would be very possible to have one volunteer per two tables or even one volunteer for all of them.
- I preached on Faith-at-Home in the sermon which I think added a layer of energy and commitment to the whole event. Highly recommend! I used the children’s sermon to introduce a couple of other practices as well.
- We did a fifth station at this fair that was designed around the annual theme of the congregation. You could certainly add a fifth as you wish, or even do three of these instead of four.
- First Baptist went all out and had lots of copies of all five books. I recommend you give away copies of Little Prayers for Everyday Life for families with children ages 0-6 and Faithful Families for all.
Have fun with this and let me know what you think and how it goes!