The Story of Joseph ~ Very Successful

Our team met August 25th to discuss Jackie's new sermon series. We had just come off of a very successful Sunday Worship design surrounding a new school year, getting all our teachers, children and staff ready for another year of learning. Maybe we should have all stood up to and had our backpacks blessed since we were embarking on a new experience.

Joseph would be a full month of exciting stories, dreams and props that would help explain such a complicating and interesting story of the Old Testament. Jackie provided us guidance through this story by breaking down everything into 4 Sundays with pertinent scripture.

• September 7th (Communion) - Genesis 37 - The Story Begins...
• September 14th - Genesis 39 & 40 - Life of Joseph in Egypt
• September 21st - Genesis 41 - Still Dreaming After All These Years
• September 28th - Genesis 42 - 44 - Who Gets The Last Word?

The most important prop for this series of stories would have to be the coat. It was decided that Gary Denmon would take on the challenge of painting a "special" coat, not necessarily the coat of many colors or technicolor dream coat that had been portrayed before. But, something unique and something that was representative of our own committee of creativity. Fabric was purchased, 44" wide muslin, unbleached about 15 yards, and a remnant of gold to create the lapel and cuffs of our coat. Gary was the visionary behind the painting of the coat, and Jim Hannan was his assistant in painting. I merely forced red to be added, held a firm deadline and added the gold and completed the sewing. Very successful project! We did a great job in pulling this one off without any issues.

Gary was in charge of hanging the banners/coat up on the structures with our new ladder purchase in August with our grant money. It is fantastic! Gary approves... and I do to, I even got on it!

Other additions would be the grasses provided by Shelley... 7 to be exact. My daughters Camryn and Rylan would bring the sun, moon and 11 stars to the stay representing one of Josephs dreams. Stars were placed in the bulletin for a tactile element representative of Joseph being the favorite and the 12th star. Shelley and Forrest Craig had the bread makers going to add the smell of baked bread to our sanctuary signifying communion. I found this to be very successful during the first service, but the smell was lost during the second. We are looking into another bread maker that could be run for the second service to provide the smell that we were hoping for... hence our attempt at utilizing all 5 senses!

With each coming week, different details would be added to the sanctuary and the communion table to enhance the story of Joseph. But for the first Sunday in this series, we had communion by intinction.

The communion table would become a highlight in the weeks to come with the addition of a rugged cross, burlap, 3 branches and grapes, glass jars and vanilla scented candles. Gold fabric would be added to signify the richness of Egypt and the Pharaoh himself. 3 baskets and bread would be added to the stage to signify Pharaoh's baker that would be put to death, and the Cup and Plate on the communion table created by Melissa Frye would represent the Pharaoh's Cup Bearer whose life was saved but didn't remember to mention Joseph. This week choir sang a song from Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat... Amazing!

The 3rd Sunday would have subtle additions... the significance of the number 7 was represented by the 7 grasses and the 7 candles on the communion table. I borrowed burlap bags from Javaman coffee and filled them with paper to act as grain bags. I piece of purple satin fabric was added to the communion table to represent the richness and abundance of Egypt. But of course, 7 years of abundance, brought 7 years of famine.

The final Sunday in this series was a bit of a challenge. As I read the scripture I was drawn to the dialogue of the passages... this Sunday would lend itself to a dramatic reading. Shelley Craig was given the charge of writing and orchestrating this task, and she did a wonderful job. Shelley called on a cast of characters to play the different roles: Joe Breda, Tom Mahone, David Gerald, Joyce Olson, Carl Braden, & Joe Weir. Shelley acted as narrator of this piece and everyone did very well. I was told that it really help the story and it was wonderful. Additional props included the names of the characters and the silver cup that belonged to the Pharaoh.

I think by far, this series really hit on all the senses. I think our team is very gifted in the visual arts, and we sometimes struggle with the other senses. But this series really covered every sense! For example, the tactile sense of touch, having the stars in the bulletins. It may have been subtle, but it was a step in that direction. The sense of smell: the bread maker and the vanilla candles were a bit of an accident. The smell of vanilla had nothing to do with the story, but I had someone tell me how comforting the smell was. The sense of hearing of course would be the choir vocals and the dramatic reading. Taste... well that was a little too easy, communion. These are things to ask as we move into other sermon series for the year... How do we use all 5 senses in Worship??