Links for Worship at Home for March 15, 2020

Dear Cornerstone Family,

As we prepare to gather for worship, let’s take comfort in knowing that our God promises to meet with us wherever we are. As much as we love our beautiful sanctuary, the order of worship, and the buzz of the Sunday morning fellowship, let’s be reminded that God takes delight when two or three gather together around the Word with broken and contrite hearts. Therefore, let the unusualness of this time of worship serve as a reminder that our God is pleased to meet us in the midst of our fear and frailty and lead us to renewed faith and greater degrees of glory (Romans 1:16-17; 2 Cor. 3:18).

Toward that end, please join with your Cornerstone brothers and sisters today in worship by using the abbreviated order of worship and the timely video message from Pastor Nate from Psalm 27.   

“Our soul waits for the Lord;
He is our help and our shield.
For our heart is glad in him,
because we trust in his holy name.
Let’s your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon us,
even as we hope in you.”—Psalm 33:20-22

Sermon Link

Service Order Link

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, March 8, 2020

Dear Cornerstone Family,

I want to take a moment today to relay some encouraging news on the officer nomination process that we began at the beginning of 2020. As you’ll likely recall, we opened up a nomination season for elder and deacon on Sunday, January 19th and closed nominations on Sunday, February 2nd. During that two-week nomination season, we received more nominations for office than we’ve ever received before! Fifteen different men received nominations; many men receiving 3, 4, or even 5 nominations.

As encouraging as it was to see a strong number of nominations, what was more encouraging was to see the quality of character of the men nominated. In reading through your nomination forms, it was clear that you carefully considered the qualifications for officership from 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 as you submitted your nominations. Thank you for taking the Scripture’s teaching on officership seriously and for setting forward qualified men for the office of elder and deacon!

After nominations closed, contacts with all the men were made, and, after a brief season of prayerful evaluation, ten men accepted the nomination and agreed to enter officer training. Those ten men are Matt Faulk, Dan Fiedler, Will Kesler, John Millard, Ron Moffat, Wes Pittman, Brent Roberts, Matt Suits, Casey Taggart, and Carl Ware. Please pray for these men as they enter officer training and for the Lord to confirm His direction—one way or another—as they pursue His face for wisdom and direction.

Finally, it was a heartbreaking week in middle Tennessee. Early Tuesday morning an E-3 tornado and E-4 tornado left a path of destruction 50 miles long extending from the Germantown neighborhood in northwest Nashville to Cookeville, TN. We’ve all seen the pictures of the destruction and prayed for the families of the 25 people (so far) confirmed dead. 

In addition to prayers, a team of folks from Cornerstone have been working with the PCA Mission to North America (MNA) Disaster Relief Ministry and other local PCA churches to find the best ways to serve the victims and assist with the clean-up effort. Cornerstone has set up a designated fund for Tornado Disaster Relief. All designated funds given to Cornerstone will go directly to the MNA Disaster Relief Fund, which will go to meet immediate needs of members, friends, and neighbors of sister PCA churches affected by the storm. 

If you would like to personally volunteer to serve with the clean-up effort, we recommend you visit Hands On Nashville at www.hon.org. Hands On Nashville works closely with the City of Nashville and the Office of Emergency Management to ensure that volunteers and resources are channeled to the people and places in most need. 

More opportunities will be available in the days to come for us to partner with other local PCA churches and ministries for short term relief teams. Please pay close attention to our midweek e-mail and other special communications from Cornerstone as together we pray for and serve our beloved city.

Grace & Peace,    

Pastor Nate

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, March 1, 2020

The first time I remember hearing the word conscience was watching the movie Pinocchio. You likely remember the story. The word carver, Geppetto, takes a block of wood and carves a boy out of it—a boy that comes alive through the magic of a fairy godmother.

Maybe you’ll recall that just before the fairy godmother departs, she gives Pinocchio a piece of advice, “Be a good boy, Pinocchio. Always let your conscience be your guide.” And then, of course, the great Jiminy Cricket proceeds with fairy godmother’s blessing to be, in a sense, Pinocchio’s conscience, giving him counsel at points of temptation, always steering him in the right direction. 

What do you think of when you think of the conscience? Maybe you think about the cartoon angel that sits on the shoulder urging us to do the right thing. (While the devil—a red devil no less!—sits on the other shoulder trying to persuade you to do the wrong thing.) This picture of conscience we’ve seen in cartoons is an enduring one because it resonates so deeply with our personal experience.

It’s no surprise that the conscience is regularly referred to as “an inner voice” for that’s how it comes to us. It’s a voice, a strong assured voice that makes judgments about things and gives instructions about what you should or shouldn’t do. This makes sense when look at the word conscience, which comes from Latin root words that mean to be “with knowledge.” Yes, a conscience is kind of built-into-you knowledge that is shared with you over and over throughout the day in dozens of different circumstances. 

In fact, no matter how hard we try, we can’t quite outrun the conscience. When we try to ignore it or, even worse, go against it, it only comes back louder with some reasoning like this: “If you don’t do what I told you to do, you know I’m going to make you feel miserable about not doing what you know you should do, which is going to ruin the joy you would have had in not doing what you know you should do; so you better just go ahead and do what you know you should do! 

Do you recognize this voice? I bet you do. We all do. But what are we to do with the conscience? How should we relate to our conscience? Is Jiminy Cricket right, should I always let conscience be my guide? So many good questions. And the Bible has very important instruction about each of these questions and many more.

This past Wednesday during our evening Vesper’s service, we opened a discussion about the presence and purpose of the conscience. It’s a discussion we’re going to continue for the next five weeks. I want to personally invite you to join us. You’re not behind; the conversation has just started. Make plans to join in on the conversation this week. I promise you will learn so many important truths that will positively impact your life on a daily basis.

I’ll see you Wednesday night!