Pastoral Notes for Sunday, September 3, 2023

Dear Cornerstone Family,

I asked our dear brother, Rev. Tony Giles, to tell us about an opportunity we have to be trained in sharing the gospel and making disciples of Jesus Christ. Please give serious consideration to committing a few evenings this fall to this important study.

“‘Disciples who make disciples.’

That’s a phrase that should sound familiar to you. It lies at the heart of Cornerstone’s vision and purpose statement which you encountered in an Exploring Cornerstone Class on your way to membership.

Making disciples always involves the gospel and requires a growing ability to share that gospel with others. That’s all of us, not merely those with a gift for evangelism. We believe that everyone is called to be a disciple of Christ and make disciples for Christ.

So, how are you doing with that? Hesitant? Fearful? Maybe you are asking...

  • How do I share my faith in a manner that is effective but not offensive?

  • How do I become less scared and more confident to do so?

  • How do I deal with a question I’m not sure how to answer?

    This fall you have an opportunity to grow in your readiness and ability to engage in gospel conversations with friends and family.

    It’s a small group study on Tuesday evenings from 6:30-8:00 p.m., starting September 5 and concluding December 5. It includes eight lessons with assignments on intervening weeks.

    We will be using Gospel 101: Learning, Living and Sharing the Gospel by Jeff Dodge. This is much more than a book to read. It’s both a study and a workbook. You will be equipped to use survey questions with a friend and trained to listen to their answer and to reply with wisdom and clarity.

    Please consider this opportunity to examine the core tenets of the gospel message, entertain the difficult questions inherent in gospel theology and get you started on developing your own ways to share your faith simply and effectively with family and friends.”

    If you have questions, please contact Tony Giles at tony@cstonepres.org. To register, visit the website.

Your servant,

 

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, August 27, 2023

Dear Cornerstone Family,

I’m preaching today at Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, AL. As some of you will remember, Dr. Harry Reeder, the longtime Senior Minister of Briarwood, died unexpectedly in a car accident earlier this year. It was one of the great privileges of my life to call Dr. Reeder a mentor and dear friend. I am, as always, saddened to not be with you today, but I am grateful for the high honor to serve the Briarwood family in the midst of this difficult season of grief and transition. I cherish your prayers.

In other news, the start of Midweek at Cornerstone is a little over two weeks away! Wednesday, September 13th will be here before you know it! From 5:15-7:00 p.m. each Wednesday this fall, we will enjoy a delicious catered fellowship meal on the Biscuit Love Patio (5:15-6:00) followed by a full slate of children, youth, and adult ministries (6:00-7:00). If that weren’t enough, you can then sing with the Cornerstone choir (7:15-8:30). There really is something for everyone!

While the children are enjoying digging into God’s Word through teaching, crafts, music, and more, and while the youth are being led through a series on God’s design for the church, the adults will be gathering in the chapel for a topical series entitled, “Define Your Terms: The Vocabulary of Salvation.”

Are you often afraid in Bible study or Home Fellowship Group that you will be asked what some very common biblical word means? You are not alone. We use words like regeneration, repentance, and glorification all the time in the church, and we often only have a vague sense of what the terms mean and why they matter. In this ten-week study, we will look at one term each week in the Bible’s vocabulary of salvation. We will tease out the biblical and theological importance of each term, explore how each term relates to the other terms, and identify why each term matters in your daily walk with Christ. We’ll conclude this series on November 15th with a Cornerstone Prayer Meeting, preparing our hearts for Thanksgiving.

Define Your Terms: The Vocabulary of Salvation

  • September 13 – Union with Christ

  • September 20 – Effectual Calling

  • September 27 – Regeneration

  • October 4 – Faith & Repentance

  • October 11 – Justification

  • October 18 – Adoption

  • October 25 – Sanctification

  • November 1 – Perseverance

  • November 8 – Glorification

  • November 15 – A Sacrifice of Praise: A Cornerstone Prayer Meeting

    Please, do not miss this important opportunity to gather with the Cornerstone family. Clear your schedule and make plans to join us!

Your servant,

 

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, August 20, 2023

Dear Cornerstone Family,

Mark your calendar! Beginning Sunday, September 10, we will be back with Sunday School offerings for adults, youth, and children.

Our Children’s Director, Meredith Suits, has been busy preparing new classroom spaces for this fall and reviewing some new curriculum in several of our classes. Parents, here’s a breakdown of what you can expect this fall.

  • Our preschool class will be led by Joe and Joy Marlo and Faith Gulliver. They will be reading Old Testament stories as well as singing songs together and memorizing scripture. Our seasoned preschool leaders have a great weekly routine established for this class, and it’s such a joy to see our littlest kids learning Scripture together.

  • Our 1st and 2nd grade classes, led by Lisa Fiedler, Colleen McGarry, Alli Faulk, and Carl Ware, will be using The Biggest Story curriculum this year. You may have seen copies of The Biggest Story on our Cornerstone bookshelf. I encourage you to check out this children’s Bible for your own family if you haven’t already.

  • Our 3rd and 4th grade class will be led by Matt O’Roark. We will continue with the Show Me Jesus curriculum, which teaches key concepts and stories from both the Old and New Testaments helping students connect all of Scripture to the good news of Jesus.

  • Our 5th and 6th grade class will be led by Mike & Sabrina Brewer and Katie Ewing. It will be a study of the New City Catechism, taking 1-2 weeks to discuss each question and study the Scripture that supports it.

Head to the website or follow the link in the Life at Cornerstone midweek email to register your kids for Sunday School, and be on the lookout for additional information in the next few weeks about new classrooms and new check-in procedures.

Also, our new Youth Director, Drew Abercrombie, has hit the ground running. Youth Sunday School will be meeting at Merridee’s and wading through the life-giving waters of the Gospel of John this fall. His prayer for the youth is that they would “come and see” Jesus as he’s presented in the gospel, believe in Him, and have life in His name.

Finally, two adult classes will be offered this fall.

  • Delighting in the Trinity —Why is God love? Because God is a Trinity. Why can we be saved? Because God is a Trinity. How are we able to live the Christian life? Only through the Trinity. Join Tony Giles, Nathan Johnson, and Nate Shurden for this six-week series as we explore the mystery of the Trinity and how it relates to every aspect of our faith.

  • Resolving Everyday Conflict—Conflict is inevitable. The question is: how will we respond to it? Scripture teaches us how to address conflict in a godly way by understanding conflict’s source, our role in it, and how to make peace. Leaning on Kevin Johnson and Ken Sande’s work, Resolving Everyday Conflict, join Randy Allen, Will Kesler, and John Millard for this important six-week series.

Make plans now to join us for Sunday School this fall as we commit to growing in grace together!

Your servant,

 

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, August 13, 2023

Dear Cornerstone Family,

In our ongoing series in the book of Ephesians, we considered last week Ephesians 4:1-14. If you were with us, you will remember we examined in some detail the sin of sexual immorality. One of the things we saw last week was that sexual immorality, though a bodily act, never begins with the body. It begins, rather, with the mind dwelling on impurity and with a heart eaten up with covetousness, which is, at its root, idolatry (v.5).

The passage last week was addressing how sexuality can go wrong. It did not, however, specifically address the created good that sexuality is. In a few weeks, we will get the chance to carry this thread further when we explore the Bible’s teaching on gender, marriage, and complementarity when we spend two weeks on Ephesians 5:22-33. Given, however, the significant confusion in our day, I wanted to take a few minutes to briefly outline three (postive) foundational biblical truths regarding human sexuality:

First, God created the sexual differences of man and woman. God created us as sexual beings. Sexuality is part and parcel to what it means to be a human person. One of the many reasons Christians cannot support transgender assumptions and beliefs about the human person is that a Christian believes the physical creation of our bodies is meaningful. We are not, in other words, simply what we think or feel ourselves to be internally. Our identity as human beings is bound up with our bodies. Being created male and female is an essential quality of what it means to be a human person (Genesis 1:26-28).

Second, God created sex as a gift to be used for his glory. Sex is not ultimately about us. It’s about God and His glory. In 1 Cor. 6:12-20, Paul says, “The body is not meant for sexual immorality.” Now, what would you expect him to say next? You would expect him to say, “The body is meant for sexual morality.” In other words, you would expect him to advance the biblically defined parameters for sexual intimacy. Interestingly, that’s not what Paul does. Instead, he says, “The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body...do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body.” As we’ll see in our next point, Paul is not speaking against the biblical design for sexuality. He is, rather, identifying the ultimate end of sexuality: God’s glory.

Third, God created sex as an expression of covenant love within the bounds of marriage. In Genesis 2:24 we read, “For this cause a man shall leave his family and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.” The language of “hold fast” or “leave and cleave” is the language of covenant. The husband is leaving behind his previous attachments, and he is forming a new covenantal relationship with his wife. The consummation or ratifying of that covenant is the sexual union. In other words, sex completes the covenantal union. The sexual union is the capstone of the marriage relationship. This by definition excludes any notions of premarital sex, adultery, or any other form of sexual behavior outside the confines of the marriage covenant.

Obviously, there are many more important truths regarding sexuality in the Bible to discuss and many more matters related to sexuality in our culture to address. I hope, however, these three truths help lay foundations for a positive vision of sexuality from a Christian perspective.

Your servant,

 

Pastoral Notes for Sunday, August 6, 2023

Dear Cornerstone Family,

Is that a school bell I hear? Indeed, it is! Summer break has drawn (or is quickly drawing) to a close. It’s time to sharpen your pencils and your mind. Ready or not, a new school year is upon us!

Though it’s always bittersweet to see summer go, I love new beginnings. It’s an opportunity to stop and assess things. To see what worked and what didn’t in the previous season. To reprioritize and make adjustments in hopes to see more health and growth in the coming season.

Not long ago I was speaking at a teacher in service training. After giving a snapshot of our current educational landscape in light of historical definitions of education, I asked the question, “How can you help instill in your students a love for what is good, right, and true?”

Some responded, “Well, God must do it.” That is right. But it’s right in exactly the way the farmer is right when he says, “How am I going to get a harvest this year? God is going to have to give the growth.” In saying that, the farmer does not mean there’s nothing he’s responsible to do. The farmer knows that God uses means to bring forth that growth.

In other words, God bringing forth the growth is no excuse for the farmer to sit on his front porch and drink sweet tea. He must work. He must plant. He must water, fertilize, and weed. He must labor by the sweat of his brow in order to create conditions favorable for growth.

Growth in the Christian life works the same way. The Scriptures speak of our heart as a field teeming with potential for growth (Matthew 13:1-23). This fall, something will grow in your heart and life; that’s inevitable. The question is: what will it be, and will it last? Will thorns and thistles flourish, or will it be the seed of the gospel bearing the fruit of the Spirit?

Parents, consider the field of your home. Are you spreading the seed of the gospel and turning it over into the hearts of your children? Are you praying with and for your children, modeling the love of Christ, living lives of repentance? Grandparents, how can your unique role be used for the cultivation of godliness in the lives of your grandchildren? Are you a college student? How could you set a tone with your speech and conduct that will aid the growth in grace of your classmates?

Teachers, we are especially thinking and praying for you. It is a beautiful calling the Lord has given you. But it’s a hard calling, too. It’s easy to grow weary in doing good. Despite how it may appear at times, God is at work through your efforts. Be an ambassador for Christ in the lives of your students. Work hard at cultivating conditions favorable for growth, and then rest—trusting God for the growth that only He can give (1 Corinthians 3:6-9).

Your servant,