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Accidentally Intergenerational
—St Columba's Church in Inverness was only able to access its building once a fortnight. With a lack of venue and limited resources, they had to rethink what “church” looked like.
How could the church function in a way that was including everybody, without the resources they needed to run programmes for all ages every week?
Intergenerational Gatherings
It was a brand-new concept, but leaders at St Columba’s church started looking at intergenerational resources – a way to intentionally include people of all ages, not just to meet together, but to contribute, learn from one another and worship together. Using our Grace Gatherings, the church started a new house group and began looking at the book of Genesis together.
The group included people from the church aged 3 to 83, and from the outset, everyone was participating:
“The adults loved hearing children’s thoughts on the Bible, and the children commented on how good it was to pray with the adults.”
One lady who was part of the church family had dementia. She had been finding engagement at church difficult, but this intergenerational house group was a way where she could take part and feel part of the church again.
All-Age Worship
Meeting together this way brought a unity that was centred around the Bible. The Bible study meant that every age group in the church met together as one family, and as they did, met with God in the Bible.
