Pastoral Notes for Sunday, November 1, 2020


Dear Cornerstone Family,

Today is the one Sunday a year set aside to remember the legacy of the Protestant Reformation and give thanks for the dead in Christ on whose shoulders we stand. By way of preparation, I spent time this week giving thanks for my spiritual relatives—those with whom I share the same Heavenly Father, and the same elder brother. We are not family by blood. We are family because we are blood-bought.

I have the privilege of being blood-bought kin with many of my blood kin. One of those was my grandfather, Grover Mann. I can see why the name Grover has fallen out of fashion, though he took pride in being named after the 22nd and 24th President of the United States. “The only President to serve two non-consecutive terms,” as I was sometimes reminded. Be that as it may, he was Papaw to me.

Papaw grew up dirt poor as we’d say. Which is why his education was cut short. As best as we can tell, the 4th grade was the pinnacle of his educational achievement. At 9 or 10, he joined the work force, spending most of his days picking cotton, doing his part to bring home the bacon.

Papaw never learned to read. I remember him asking me to read a label for him. He said the writing was too small for his bad eyes, but I was old enough to know better. He tried to overcome it later in life; mainly because he wanted to read the Bible. His daughter, my Mom, taught him to read a little after he retired. Can’t say how much he learned, but I have a vivid memory of he and Mom crouched over a Bible at the dining room table sounding out words.

Papaw was blown up in a jeep in WW2. He was laid up for months in a German hospital. He received a purple heart. He rarely ever talked about it, but the reality of it lurked in his subconscious. He’d relive the battle scenes in his dreams, often springing from bed in the middle of the night to jump in a fox hole. He loved his country. The red, white, and blue always waved from his front porch.

I took over mowing his grass after his knee replacement. Whenever I’d finish, I’d come in and sit a spell with him as he watched wrestling on TV. There we’d sit, quiet before the glow of the TV screen watching Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage go at it. Papaw loved wrestling. I never will understand that.

In high school, we’d meet up on Saturday mornings at Hardee’s. Before I headed off to baseball practice or work, he’d buy me breakfast. We’d sit together with the old timers. I’d listen as they talked about the news, weather, and how things aren’t what they used to be. Before I’d leave, he’d find a way to brag on me to them. It was part of how I know he loved me.

Papaw wasn’t often vocal about his faith. Men of his generation kept such matters close to the vest. But he loved Jesus; he assured me of this from time to time. As my penchant for theology developed, he occasionally asked me questions about the Bible, most often about the end times. After he was diagnosed with lung cancer, he queried about heaven. It was one of the last conversations we ever shared. Though his voice was reduced to a raspy whisper by then, he choked out the words, “I’m ready to go. I’m not afraid. I know where I am going.”

Today, I give thanks to God for Papaw, and for all those in the faith who have arrived at where they were going and have showed the way to us who remain. Until we meet again.

Your servant,

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Pastoral Notes for Sunday, October 25, 2020


For the pastoral notes this week, I asked Ben Griffith to write about our Home Fellowship Group ministry.

Dear Cornerstone Family,

God made us to live and thrive in community. We have all discovered this to be true in new and fresh ways over the last few months. God made us in his image, which means that we were made for relationship. The need and desire to know and be known in community is not a weakness to be overcome—it’s something God himself stamped onto our identities as image bearers. We were made for fellowship! Fellowship with God, and fellowship with one another.

One of the ways we pursue this calling to live in community here at Cornerstone is through our Home Fellowship Group ministry. Simply put, HFGs are small groups within the church that meet regularly for fellowship, prayer, and discussion. Our aim is for these groups to be environments of grace where lives can intersect, relationships can grow, and gospel community can be lived and practiced together.

If you’re not currently connected to a Home Fellowship Group, now is the perfect time to join! Our hope is to form several new groups that will begin meeting in the spring of next year. Towards that end, we are beginning a sign-up process this week that will extend into November. Starting this Wednesday, you’ll find a link in our mid-week email, on our website, and on our app that will allow you to add your name to a growing list of folks who are already interested in forming new groups. If you are not already a part of a Home Fellowship Group, we would love for you to join one!

Now, you may be asking yourself, “what exactly would I be getting myself into if I join a Home Fellowship Group?” Good question. Typically, groups meet once or twice a month in someone’s home, usually around a meal or coffee. Most groups meet on Sunday afternoons or evenings, though some meet throughout the week. Groups are facilitated by approved leaders, and our “sweet spot” group size is 10 to 15 people, though this can vary.

One final word: our Home Fellowship Groups are as perfect as the people that form them—you won’t find a perfect group, but we believe you will find a community of brothers and sisters who can encourage one another as we stumble towards Heaven together. And that is worth pursuing! We hope that you’ll consider this invitation and join a Home Fellowship Group. If you have any questions, I would love to speak with you.

Ben



Pastoral Notes for Sunday, October 18, 2020


Dear Cornerstone Family,

Frustrated with the false teaching and corruption in the church of his day, an Augustinian monk named Martin Luther took matters into his own hands when he nailed the now famous 95 Theses (or grievances) to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany. In God’s good providence, that simple action sparked one of the greatest gospel renewal and church reform movements the world has ever seen.

Fascinatingly, it all began on Halloween. Wait, what? Yes, you read that right. The launch of what would come to be known as the Protestant Reformation began on October 31, 1517, the one night a year where ghosts and goblins rule the streets. Believe it or not, Luther’s decision to nail the theses on that particular day was no coincidence.

Halloween is short for All Hallows’ Eve. The word “hallow” means to honor something or someone as “holy.” You know this because you say it every week in worship when we pray the Lord’s Prayer: “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name” (Matthew 6:9). Historically speaking, All Hallows’ Eve was the name given to the night before the Christian feast of All Saints’ Day—the annual remembrance of those who have died in Christ and gone before us into heaven—celebrated on November 1st.

It’s been suggested that Martin Luther chose to nail his 95 Theses on the night before All Saints’ Day because he was calling the Roman Catholic Church to return to “the faith once delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3). Luther believed that the only way forward for the church in the 16th century was to return to the foundations of the apostles and prophets and the faithful Christian witness of previous generations.

For almost fifteen hundred years, it’s been the practice of the historic Christian church to pause during this season and remember with thanksgiving those who have died in Christ, passing down the legacy of truth and faith to the next generation. As a way of honoring the Lord’s work through the lives of the faithful men and women who have gone before us to glory, we will take time on Reformation and All Saints’ Sunday (November 1st) to name, remember, and give thanks for “the great cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) upon whose shoulders we stand in faith.

Between now and November 1st, take a moment or two and call to mind anyone in glory who made a spiritual impact in your life. Let the memory of their life and ministry fill your mind and heart with gratefulness. Then, pause in prayer and thank God for them, anticipating the day when you’ll be reunited with them in glory before the face of Jesus. As the old hymn writer put it, “...what a day of rejoicing that will be!” I can hardly wait.

Your servant,

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Pastoral Notes for Sunday, October 11, 2020

I asked Martha Brooks, one of the leaders of the Women’s Ministry, to give an update and a preview into this upcoming season of women’s events.

Dear Cornerstone Family,

I’ve joked in the past about me always being up front, making the announcement, drumming up “business,” but in reality, the Women’s Ministry has an incredible team of women working behind the scenes—praying, planning, teaching—doing All The Things to push the women of Cornerstone towards Jesus. Two fairly new additions to the team are Rebecca Griffith and Rachel Taggart, who just happen to know each other from their “past” lives. They were an obvious choice to plug into Women’s Ministry somewhere, and Women’s Events fit the bill! In the church where they previously worshiped, they had an evening where they heard from other women within the body who could speak to a time when their life had a specific focus – a season, if you will. 

It feels like our lives are a continuous changing of the seasons. We just get used to the way things are, and then suddenly everything is different again. When a change comes, our natural instinct is to go looking for someone who has been there and done that. Someone who can tell us the top ten tips and best books to read. Since the early 2000s, there has been a plethora of ways to get this information. We can just type “potty training” or “moving to Seattle” or “wrestling a python” into the google box, and literally millions of results pop up in seconds. Strangers who have been there, and done that, and are anxious to share their wisdom with the world via blog, Instagram, podcast, YouTube, and on and on. 

Is this bad? Not really. Ten years ago, I needed all the best tips for potty training. Once I may/may not have asked the internet “What to do when your husband’s fantasy football league is making you crazy.” Recently my searches have been along the lines of “when is it wise for my teen to open a snapbook/facegram/tiktok/whatever account?” Sometimes I find exactly what I need, so, yay, Internet! But. 

If you had asked my Grandmas for tips, they would have had a wealth of information to share, no google required. They worked at office jobs and reared families of five, had husbands who travelled, figured out how to make the ends meet, moved towns and started over. They both buried children, and one became a widow while she still had young kids. They could have written some blog posts sure to go viral with their titles: “How to have Five Children in Six Years and Remember All their Names” or “Disciplining Your Strong-Willed Son When He Abandons His Sister in a Rowboat in the Middle of the Bayou.” They had been there. They did that. 

As I look around our church body, I see so many unique women in different stages of life, of multiple generations, doing life in all different ways. But one thing that I know is true about all these women: there are stories behind those faces. Every woman here has been there and done that for a particular season: had a marriage in crisis, cared for an elderly parent, been a full time CEO, been a full-time CEO of laundry, been sick, had a newborn, wished they had a newborn, known real fear, borne deep grief, grappled with disappointment. I want to hear from and be discipled by these women—the women in the Cornerstone church family. 

Actually, that’s the way God designed it. We are each different parts of the same family, and we are each necessary (1 Corinthians 12). We are to teach the others in our midst who are coming along the path we’ve already travelled (Titus 2). And we are not to neglect meeting together (Hebrews 10:25). Facebook can be great, but let’s look into each other’s faces.

Join the Women’s Ministry as we embark on a season – a season where we share these “Seasons of Life.” Our first installment will be on the patio at Biscuit Love, October 22, at 6:30 p.m. We will enjoy sweet fellowship, drink coffee and eat desserts, and learn from women in our community who have been there and done that. We want to use these seasons for the glory of God—to use what God carried us through to encourage others in what they are walking through as we collectively strain forward to what lies ahead: the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.    

Grace, 

Martha Brooks


Pastoral Notes for Sunday, October 4, 2020

Dear Cornerstone Family,

Last week in Sunday School, we considered how holding together the key biblical-theological categories of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration establishes proper expectations for and wise Christian engagement with culture.

We said, in short, because of the original goodness of creation, it’s right for us to have a deep love for, care of, and engagement with creation and culture, eagerly embracing all that accords with biblical Christianity. But because the fall is a pervasive reality, infiltrating every aspect of creation and culture, we must, at the same time, be wise, cautious, and even suspicious at times in our engagement with creation and culture, ready to reject all that is out of step with biblical Christianity.

Further, because the reality of redemption is afoot, we have confidence to labor for truth, beauty, and goodness (righteousness) in the world with the expectation that God will advance His kingdom and use our endeavors as He pleases. But because the final restoration/consummation is still in the future, we work with humility and hope knowing that Christ will return and make everything right, but we won’t see the complete removal of sin and its effects until that happens.

Now, I didn’t say this last week, but it needs to be said. If we hold these four biblical-theological truths and allow them to increasingly control our thinking and engagement, we are increasingly kept from the polls of naïve triumphalism and faithless cynicism. Let me unpack that.

Naïve triumphalism thinks, “If all Christians pull together and use their collective energies to make a difference for Christ in the world, we will win the culture.” Notice, this thought pattern is confident, knowing the power of the gospel and assurance of the coming (future) restoration, but it underestimates the reality of the fall and the power of sin in the world.

Faithless cynicism thinks, “Sin and corruption are such powerful forces in the world that no matter what we do things are never really going to change.” This thought pattern is humble, keenly aware of the reality of the fall, but it’s missing the power of the gospel to bring about the change God promises.

Both positions above fail to hold all four realities together. But if we hold the four realities together, we’re steadied with wisdom and equipped with love for engaging with the world. On the one hand, we’re humble, because we know we can’t make change happen or bring in the kingdom in our own strength, but on the other hand, we’re hopeful because we know God is redeeming the world and will one day bring everything to rights. Further, we have courage to act because we know God promises to use His people’s efforts to bring about change, but we’re simultaneously submissive and patient looking to God to work in his way and time to bring about the change He’s promised.

Today in Sunday School we’ll go a bit further discussing convictional kindness. In the next few weeks, we’ll explore the practice of speaking the truth in love, making a case for Christian civility. Come and join us as we learn how to bear witness for the gospel in a world at odds.

Your servant,

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