Contents
- Good to Know
- Create a Plan
- Edit or Delete Plan Items
- Reorder Plan Items
- Work with Plan Templates
- Additional Options
With Worship Planning, you can organize your church events for a better experience for your community. In this guide you will learn how to create and manage Worship Plans from within ChMeetings.
Good to Know
Planning Page Structure
The Plans page allows you to view and manage events, worship plans, and volunteers, all in one place.
- You can add new events directly from this page, so you can then create and organize plans and volunteers.
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The filter panel allows you to:
- Toggle between All Events or Events with Plans Only. By default, this toggle is turned on, so you see only the events with plans when first accessing this page.
- Apply a date filter to view matching events.
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Events are organized under two tabs:
- Single: Lists one-time events, sorted by date (newest first).
- Recurring: Lists recurring events, sorted by their next occurrence date.
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Each event row includes two quick-action buttons:
- Plan: to manage the event’s worship plan.
- Volunteers: to manage the assigned volunteers.
Plan Structure
To build your worship plan, you can use sections and items, as follows:
- Sections divide your plan into logical sections representing the major components of your plan. They serve as containers for items. Sections are optional. You can create plans with items only, but if you decide to add sections, your items must go under a section..
- Items map out your plan in detail. They can live under a section or can be standalone if you build an item-only plan.
Based on this structure, there are two types of plans you can build:
- Plans containing sections with items. In this case, items go under a section and can’t be standalone.
- Plans containing standalone items. If you start with this type of plan, but decide to add sections later, all items must go under a section.
These two types cannot be mixed, so you can choose either one or the other. For this guide, we’ll build a plan that contains both sections and items.
You can create complex plans using multiple sections and add multiple items within each section.
Create a Plan
Get Started
To start creating a Worship Plan, you must first create an event.
Existing events that you can create plans for are available either under your Events section, or under Worship Planning > Plans. Moving forward, we will be guiding you based on the Worship Planning section.
Here is how you can create a worship plan for your events from under Worship Planning > Plans:
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Find the event you want to create a plan for, under the corresponding tab, depending on whether the event is single or recurring. If your event does not already have a Plan associated with it, please turn off Events with Plans Only and click Filter.
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Alternatively, you can create an event using the Add Event button on the Plans page. Just note that you still need to apply the filter since the event has no plan.
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Alternatively, you can create an event using the Add Event button on the Plans page. Just note that you still need to apply the filter since the event has no plan.
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Click Plan next to the desired event.
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In the Worship Plan screen, you can start creating your plan. For each event, your initial Worship Plan will be empty. You must build it or start from a template. Continue reading to learn how to do both.
Add Plan Content
Add Sections
To add sections to your plan, whether it is empty or not, click the Add Section button.
You will be taken to the Add Section window to enter a section Title and Save.
Once you add a section, you can see it listed on the Worship Plan screen. You can edit it using the pencil icon and delete it using the bin icon. Deleted sections cannot be restored.
You can click Add Section again and add more as needed.
Add Items
To add an item to your plan, whether it is empty or not, click Add Item.
There are four types of items you can add to your Worship Plans: General, Song, Scripture, and Note. Here is how to configure each:
General
For the General item, configure the following:
- Type: Select General.
- Title: Enter a title for your item. This should designate the name of an activity taking place during service; for example: Arrival & Checkin or Welcome.
- Duration: Enter the activity’s duration, in minutes and seconds.
- Description: Briefly describe your activity.
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Attachments: You can add attachments by uploading or linking to files:
- Upload: Click Choose File to upload an attachment for the item. The maximum file size should be 5MB.
- Link: Under Add Link to URL, enter or paste the link to your file. Click the ⊕ icon to add more.
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Click Save when you’re ready to save your item.
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When your item is saved, it looks like in the example below.
Song
To add a Song to your plan, configure the following:
- Type: Select Song.
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Title: Enter the Song’s title or another generic title that clarifies the item. If your Song Library already contains a song with that title, you will be able to select and add it to the plan. Otherwise, you can also add a new song to both your Plan and the Song Library, using the Create New option under the Song Title.
- Duration: Enter the song’s duration, in minutes and seconds.
- Key; Optionally, enter the song’s key.
- Description: Briefly describe the song.
- Artist: Add the artist’s name.
- Tags: Enter relevant tags that will be associated with the song within the library.
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Attachments: You can add attachments by uploading or linking to files:
- Upload: Click Choose File to upload an attachment for the item. The maximum file size should be 5MB.
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Link: Under Add Link to URL, enter or paste the link to your file. Click the ⊕ icon to add more.
If you select a song from the library, this will automatically be attached to your plan item. Otherwise you don’t have to upload the song itself, this is optional.
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Click Save when you’re ready to save your item.
- If you selected a song from the library, just click Save and you’re done adding the item. If you make any changes to a song from the library, those changes will be saved only within your plan and will not affect the original song in the library.
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If you have added a new song, then you can choose between the following options:
- Save to library and plan - This adds the song both to your Song Library and to the Worship Plan you’ve added it to.
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Save to plan only - This only adds the song to the plan without saving it to the Song Library.
- Here is what your song looks like when saved to the plan:
Scripture
To add a Scripture item to your plan, configure the following:
- Type: Select Scripture.
- Title: Enter the Scripture title or another generic title that clarifies the item.
- Duration: Enter the duration, in minutes and seconds.
- Description: Briefly describe your Scripture item.
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Attachments: You can add attachments by uploading or linking to files:
- Upload: Click Choose File to upload an attachment for the item. The maximum file size should be 5MB.
- Link: Under Add Link to URL, enter or paste the link to your file. Click the ⊕ icon to add more.
- Click Save when you’re ready to save your item.
When your Scripture item is saved, it looks like in the example below
Note
To add a Note to your Worship Plan, provide a clear Title, then add your note to the Description field. Save when you’re ready
Once added, your note will look like this:
Edit or Delete Plan Items
You can edit or delete plan items using the pencil and bin icons respectively. These are found next to the plan item.
Note that edits made to song items DO NOT update the main Song Library item, only the plan. Deleting a song item also only affects the plan item.
Deleting any item in a plan means you must add it again if you change your mind. There is no option to restore deleted items.
Reorder Plan Items
You can reorder plan items if you just drag and drop the item to the desired position.
Work with Plan Templates
Plan Templates make it faster and easier to create Worship Plans. Here is how you can use them:
Save a Plan as a Template
If you’ve created a Plan and you want to save it as a template, you can do so by clicking the Save as Template option at the top of the plan.
Load a Template
You can only load a template when your Worship Plan is empty. If you have items in your plan, you won’t have the option to use a template. So, from the empty plan screen, click Start from Template.
If you want to do this from a plan with items, you must Clear it first, then load a template.
Next, select the template to load and click Start. (In case you want to edit the template title, you can do so using the pencil icon in this window. You can also use the bin icon to delete the template - just keep in mind that you can’t restore it after deletion, so you must recreate it if needed.)
All items and sections in your saved template will load onto your Worship Plan. You can add new items and sections, edit or remove any existing ones as you see fit.
Additional Options
Download the Worship Plan
You can download your Worship Plans as .pdf files, by clicking the dedicated Download button.
Share the Worship Plan
You can share your plan using the following methods:
- Email - Click the Email button, or click Share > Email. You can edit your email, attach additional files and select the sender as the main church account or your own.
- Direct Link through which anyone can view the entire plan. Click Share, then copy the link;
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Social Media (Facebook or Twitter/X). Click Share > Facebook or Twitter/X), respectively.
Print the Worship Plan
To print your Worship Plan, click the Print button at the top right. Your browser’s print dialog will open and you can proceed to print your plan as you would print anything else from within your browser.
Clear the Worship Plan
If you want to start again with an empty plan, you can use the Clear button at the top right. This removes all sections and items and cannot be undone, so please only use this option if you are sure that’s what you want. You will be asked to confirm your choice.