The order of worship is the spine of the bulletin: the list of what happens, in what order, with the hymn numbers, readers and responses people need to follow along. Every tradition has its own shape, but each one is a sequence of short titled parts with an optional detail line — which is exactly how the bulletin maker lays it out. Below are three starting points to adapt.

Traditional Protestant service

The sequence the maker fills in by default. Add hymn numbers and names on the detail lines.

1. Prelude — title and arranger, e.g. "Be Thou My Vision" (arr. Held)
2. Welcome & Announcements
3. Call to Worship — Psalm 100
4. Opening Hymn — #138 "Holy, Holy, Holy"
5. Prayer of Confession & Assurance of Pardon
6. Scripture Reading — John 10:11–18, read by …
7. Children's Message
8. Sermon — "The Good Shepherd" — Rev. …
9. Hymn of Response — #801 "The Lord's My Shepherd"
10. Offering — Anthem: "The Lord Is My Shepherd" — Chancel Choir
11. Prayers of the People & the Lord's Prayer
12. Closing Hymn
13. Benediction
14. Postlude

Liturgical service (Word and Table)

For congregations that celebrate communion weekly. Mark congregational responses in bold in the detail line if your tradition prints them.

1. Prelude
2. Processional Hymn
3. Greeting & Collect for Purity
4. Gloria or Kyrie (in Lent)
5. Collect of the Day
6. First Reading — Old Testament
7. Psalm — sung or read responsively
8. Second Reading — Epistle
9. Gospel Acclamation & Gospel
10. Sermon
11. The Creed
12. Prayers of the People
13. Confession & Absolution
14. The Peace
15. Offertory
16. The Great Thanksgiving — Sanctus, Words of Institution, Lord's Prayer
17. Communion — a note on who is welcome at the table
18. Post-Communion Prayer & Blessing
19. Recessional Hymn & Dismissal

Contemporary service

Fewer, longer parts. The detail line carries song titles and who is leading.

1. Welcome
2. Worship Set — "Great Are You Lord" · "Build My Life" · "Goodness of God"
3. Prayer
4. Announcements & Offering — Give online at …
5. Message — series and title, speaker
6. Response Song
7. Closing Prayer & Sending

Wording that helps visitors

A bulletin is read by people who have never been in the building. A few phrases that cost nothing: mark parts where people stand (* please stand as you are able), print the Lord's Prayer or the creed in full rather than assuming everyone knows it, name the people leading (reader, musicians, preacher), and add one sentence about communion — who is welcome, how it is served. Put the announcements on their own page so the order of worship stays uncluttered.

From sequence to printed bulletin

Paste any of these into the free bulletin maker — each part is one row with a title and a detail line — and the inside page lays itself out. The bulletin template guide covers the rest of the bulletin, and this page explains how to give the congregation one permanent QR code that always opens the current week.