How to Host a Women’s Worship Night

We recently hosted our 3^rd women’s worship night.

It’s become a highly anticipated annual fall event for our women. Below you’ll find all the details. I hope it will encourage and equip you as you plan your own women’s worship event.

How to Host a Women’s Worship Night

Event Location

We host our event underneath lights in our pavilion (pictured above). It’s a beautiful space with plenty of picnic tables, a counter, a fireplace, and ceiling fans.

While we enjoy the unique location of this particular women’s ministry event, you could easily host your women’s worship night inside.

Music Details

Worship music, not surprisingly, is a key component of our worship nights. We have several talented women at our church who sing and play instruments. This year we had one woman playing guitar and two other women singing along with her. Two of the three are active members of our church’s worship team. They lead and we sing every song along with them.

After the initial worship night, we discovered outdoor speakers and microphones were necessary.

We provide copies of the music lyrics, although most of the songs we sing are familiar songs from Sunday morning services. We print out copies and send out a link to a Google document (for those who want to use their phone). The worship leaders have also created a Spotify list that we release in advance. Next year, we’re going to create a QR code that women can scan when they arrive as some struggled to find the link from the email that had been sent out.

Be sure to check with your worship leader to make sure you include any CCLI information that may be required. Your worship team likely has a list of songwriters they use and don’t use that you’ll need to honor. Even if not, I’d encourage you to stay away from using songs from music groups that would be divisive and any that contain questionable theology. If you don’t know who to ask to sing and play at your worship night, they may have some suggestions too.

It’s great to use women in your church if you can, but if they aren’t available you could hire a small team to come and lead worship – just be sure to coordinate the song selection.

Décor

We try to keep the décor simple. Since each women’s worship night has taken place in the fall, we’ve used a combination of lanterns, candles, and fall decorations on each table. The light bulbs hanging from the rafters add a special ambiance as the sun sets. I’d suggest adding Bible verses about worship or singing to each table. Tip: I often use Open Bible to search for verses. Here’s a list of verses about singing you could pull from.

Food

Each year we’ve changed this up a bit. The first year it was late enough in the fall that we had a fire going in the fireplace, hot water for hot chocolate, and pre-packaged kits for smores.

September in NC can be quite warm (and it was!), so this year we wanted something cold and refreshing. We provided packaged Italian Ices in a variety of flavors, smaller water bottles, and our women had the option to purchase dinner from a food truck. This was the first time we’d done a food truck for a women’s event and it was well-received!

Event Schedule

Here’s a quick look at this year’s schedule.

5:30 – 6:15 PM                 Decorate, Organize Food, Pray

6:30 – 7:00 PM                 Women Arrive – Food truck and Fellowship

7:00 – 7:25 PM                 Welcome, Worship Set 1 (4 songs)

7:25 – 7:35 PM                 Sharing of Stories about Prayer (2 women, 5 minutes each)

7:35 – 7:45 PM                 Worship set 2 (3 songs)

7:45 – 7:55 PM                 Video from missionary

7:55 – 8:00 PM                 Prayer for church-sponsored missionaries at tables

8:00 – 8:15 PM                 Worship Set 3 (3 songs), Close in prayer

Publicity & Registration

This year we did not charge for the event and used money from our budget to cover expenses. They were invited to purchase dinner from the food truck. We encouraged our women to register so we can have a good idea of how many will be attending, how much food we’ll need, and how many copies of the lyrics we’ll need to print.

Our worship team gave our ladies a sneak peek and recorded themselves practicing. We post the video on social media and in our women’s Facebook group. The team also took song requests in our Facebook group.

I try to prime the pump with a few worship-related icebreaker questions and scripture verse graphics. Click here to view my worship-themed social media kit.

Be sure to utilize every option you have available – slides before the service, email, text, etc. You’ll find additional publicity tips and ideas in this post.

Sharing Stories

Our church has a missions focus in the fall. In the last two years we have invited a missionary who is stateside to share. That’s a great way for us to support what our church is already doing.

This year our church is focused on prayer, so our women’s ministry director invited two women who have personal testimonies that center around prayer to share with our women.

If you have a focus or thread connecting your worship songs, you may want to have the stories connect to that theme or focus.

Think about all the creative ways you can direct the focus to God – songs and stories about hope, love, redemption, rescue, peace, grace, forgiveness, truth, etc.

I’m thrilled to offer the materials for a workshop you can host on Sharing Your Stories of God’s Everyday Faithfulness. Click here to find out more about the workshop. You may find it helpful to host the training first and then follow up with a Songs & Stories event.

Inviting women to share creates powerful points of connection as well as a witness to God’s faithfulness.

Additional Random Thoughts

I love the sound of women’s voices lifted in worship together! I’m so thankful our team knew when to back off the instruments and even their vocals a bit to let the group carry the song. It was beautiful!

You may find that women who may not raise their hands or sway on Sunday morning feel the comfort of doing so at a worship night.

Last year a woman in attendance worshiped through sign language, signing most, if not all, of the songs that were sung. I was away speaking at another church, but I heard from several people how special it was and that it added to their experience.

I attended an indoor worship night at another church in their sanctuary several years ago and it was a moving experience then too. Theirs was a bit bigger and more formal. Their worship leader held practices for a worship choir (any woman could be a part of it). I can’t recall if they had a band or if they used music tracks. They had teaching from scripture at the halfway point with an opportunity for us to respond at stations around the room.

Women’s worship nights can look a lot of different ways. I pray you’ll know what would serve your women best.

You may also want to check out:
Rethinking Fellowship: How to Host Meaningful Women’s Ministry Events
Worship-Themed Social Media Graphics
Sharing Stories of God’s Everyday Faithfulness Workshop