My church doesn't use the lectionary. How can I find material to use with the readings we are following?

1. By Bible reference:

You can use the Advanced search on the Search page to look for items by Bible reading, or by theme or topic. To get to the Advanced search form, first select Search from the navigation bar in order to open up the Search page. Then scroll down to the Advanced search form. On about the eigth row down from the top of the form you will see a row labelled Bible reference, as illustrated below.

In the middle of the row are three fields that you need to fill in according to the verse(s) you're using. You need to fill in all three fields for accurate results, and should search on just one verse at a time. The database will show you the results for all passages containing that verse. Most of these will probably relate to the context as well, so you don't need to do a search on every verse within your reading. It's normally best to choose either a key verse, or something near the middle of the passage.

The first field is a drop-down list from which you choose the book of the Bible that you are looking at - this prevents any typing errors or problems with variations of names. The next two fields are for the chapter and verse, and you simply need to type a number into each. When you've completed the fields, scroll down the page to find the Go button and press it to start your search.

Note: At the moment you're unlikely to get results for every search, as the material in ROOTS is written according to the Revised Common Lectionary. This means that at present we only have material available to complement the RCL lectionary readings that appear between Sunday 1 September 2002 (when the ROOTS programme began) until the end of the cover period of the latest magazine. In addition, we only index items by Bible reference when they are very closely tied to the reading, and generally index only according to the passages the writer worked from - though we do endeavour to cross reference to other relevant passages where possible (for example when a parable referred to appears in more than one of the Gospels). As time goes on, the coverage will increase, and you will be more likely to find material that matches the passages that you have chosen.

2. By theme or topic using Simple text search:

To find resources according to their theme, focus, topic or subject matter, use the Simple text search. First go to the Search page using the button on either navigation menu within the subscribers' area, and then scroll down a little if necessary, until you can see the Simple text search area (illustrated). Some instructions are given, together with a box into which you can type your search terms, tick boxes that further specify your search, and an OK button that will start the search.

To begin a search type a word or words into the empty box to sum up the subject that you're looking at, for example 'forgiveness' or 'creation'. Try not to use words that are likely to turn up in a large proportion of the resources, such as 'Jesus', or 'God', as you may find the number of results a little overwhelming! Also remember that you don't have to type in the whole word. For example, you can use 'forgiv' in order to get results containing 'forgiving' as well as 'forgiveness', which might have been missed if you typed in 'forgiveness' in full. Then when you've typed in your terms, hit the OK button to begin a quick search with the normal settings. Often this will bring up enough results, but if you're getting too many results, or you want to specify your search a little more, then read on for information about the options that can be chosen with the tick boxes.

Tick box options:

Underneath the text box, you'll see tick boxes for various options (as pictured). Clicking them with the mouse will tick and untick them. Once you've entered your search terms into the text box you can tick and untick the option boxes as appropriate to tell the computer what to look at when running your search. You can tick all of the boxes to get a large number of results, or you can just tick one box - perhaps the description field - to get a smaller number of results.

The title is the name of the resource and will probably bring up the least results if selected on its own, as the titles obviously contain very few words.

Description is the short text that appears with the title in the Sunday listings and on the search results page, and usually indicates the type and main focus of the resource. Knowing this can help you to specify quite an exact search: for example you could try searching the description field alone for something like 'respons confession' or 'sketch forgiv'.

The content is the full text of the resource itself, and when ticked on its own searching in content will exclude the title and description. So if you're searching the content hoping to find a drama sketch that mentions a juggler, don't type in 'sketch juggler', as the word 'sketch' is unlikely to be included in the script itself. Instead you would need to tick to search in description as well as content before running your search.

Ticking Welsh will search in the Welsh content when it becomes available - obviously you will need to enter your search terms in the Welsh language if using this tick box!

Finally, keywords searches through the invisible index information attached to each resource, typically listing its type (e.g. prayer) and its main focuses (e.g. creation, confession). If you search through the keywords, you'll sometimes get results that do not appear to contain your search term at all, but when you read through the resource you should find that it suits the subject well.

The best way to get a feel for how the simple text search works is just to experiment with it. However, if you get too many results, it's sometimes worth trying again using a combination of words in order to refine your search further. Alternatively, you could use the Advanced search facility instead, in order to restrict your search to particular types of resource, such as images, or items suitable for children.

Note: Many of the ROOTS resources, even those commissioned to accompany a particular set of lectionary readings, will be useful when considering a more general theme or topic. For example, on 15 September 2002, the Gospel reading from the RCL was Matthew 18.21-35, which includes Jesus' response to Peter that we should forgive 'not seven times, but seventy-seven' and the parable of the unforgiving servant. Many of the resources that appear in ROOTS for this week, including the prayers and the children's story 'The quarrel', could also be suitable when looking at other readings that centre on the importance of forgiveness.