Pastor’s Blog I.XI

I believe deep within the soul of every follower of Jesus Christ is the ultimate longing to hear these words from the lips of Jesus Himself, “Well done my good and faithful servant.”  Imagine the sound and experience within your own soul to be standing before the one who gave His life on a cross for your salvation when you hear him say to you, “Well done my good and faithful servant.”

Can there be any sweeter words to hear?  At the end of your days to know the Saviour is pleased with how you lived out your faith and so announces this blessing for you to hear.  It just about sends chills up my spine to anticipate that very moment.

In order to experience that moment in the future it is important that you live well today.  It is crucial that your life bear fruit during these days so that one day the words you want to hear will be the words you will hear.  So, today we take what we believe and we put it into action.  We help those in need, we feed the hungry, we assist the thirsty, we visit those in hospital or prison and establish relationships with the lonely.  In other words we live out our faith in accordance with Matthew 25.

Oddly, in doing that we fulfill the vision we have established at Cornerstone to be a church that changes the world.  I have had the privilege of being associated with or part of different churches and organizations that have had some pretty significant goals.  Honestly I have never been possessed by a vision the way I am possessed by this one.

Think about it for a moment.  Right now we are raising a group of children who will grow up with this as part of their spiritual DNA.  They will have as their faith background that they were part of church that wanted to change the world.  How cool is that?  They will hoepfully grow up thinking that this is the way we are to live our lives: as world changers.

We are establishing within our teens the thought process that we go on missions trips not because it is cool but because we are part of a bigger vision to change the world.  We sponsor children in developing countries (as some of our teens are already doing) because it is the right and normal spiritual thing to do.  We help out in local ministries to the poor because that is what we as followers of Christ do.

We have moms and dads who have their spiritual heads on a swivel looking for opportunities to serve others not as a once in a while thing but as a constant thing.  They model their active faith to their children who will catch that and follow the vision.  We have dads telling their sons/daughters or sons/daughters-in-law that the coolest thing they could think of doing is to go on a foreign mission trip to serve another part of our world.  We have moms continually casting the vision for their children that the greatest thing they can do is to serve Jesus Christ in whatever capacity that He calls them but we do it as world changers.  We serve and in serving we change the world.

The year 2010 is upon us.  Doors are already open and only God knows what other doors He is planning on opening.  Are you ready?  Are you looking forward to this year knowing that it is only as we serve faithfully in this year that the future may bring those incredible words of blessing…well done.

Let’s chase the vision together.

Plan to Protect

Thank you so much to those volunteers that have made Plan to Protect a priority this year!

It is important for the church body to understand that this is a legal document, passed by church leadership to be implemented to ALL volunteers working with Youth and Children.  The process and the documents accumulated for each volunteer are for the safety of the children, as well as protecting the volunteers.

If you still have not completed your application package please take the few moments needed to fill out the forms and make this a priority.

We understand that if you have been volunteering at Cornerstone for years it seems strange and frustrating to have to fill out these forms.  Asking you to fill out these forms does NOT mean we don’t trust you as a volunteer.  It is simply the reality of our world today, the reality of running a public facility with children & youth and we are legally responsible for the children placed in our care.

This process does not need to be difficult if we all work together to complete the necessary paperwork!

Thanks again to the majority of our volunteers who have made this a priority!

Web Links for families

Splink is a SIMPLE way to LINK your family together spiritually.It’s a FREE weekly email packed with ideas to help connect your family. Splinks are creative ways of interacting with your children with family devotional starters and ideas for family time. Splinks can also help you use teachable moments to pass along spiritual truths and life lessons while making memories or just having fun together. No matter where you are, it can always be time for a Splink!

Family Times helps parents transfer a spiritual legacy to their children. Family Times is designed to help equip parents with easy to use tools to make the most of everyday moments together. This tool is based on the biblical model that teaches that the home should be the primary place where a child learns about God.
Seeds Family Worship – Worship & Togetherness through music! Planting the seeds of God’s word in the hearts of families.

Quest for Compassion is designed to educate your children about global poverty and help them develop a heart for the poor around the world. When children understand poverty, they grow into compassionate adults.  This is a great interactive online game for kids.

Quality

In the past month or so the Music & Arts department has been talking about the issue of quality.  And by quality, we were talking about it  with respect to attaining a certain degree of  high standards; an approaching of excellence in our trade as musicians.   It all started at a Music & Arts Committee Meeting where we had a chance to reflect a little on how valuable we perceived quality to be.  In that discussion we found that as Arts leadership in Cornerstone, we feel very strongly that quality is important.  We talked about how it demonstrates our investment and commitment to what we do.  It shows that we have a certain healthy amount of satisfaction in what we’re doing.  Often as musicians if we don’t do our best we’re faced with a certain amount of anxiety.  We don’t feel right about giving a substandard effort.  Being fully prepared is a freeing thing.  Our quality standards also reflect on our motivation on service: If God is who we are serving, and God is Holy and magnificent, we should bring to him our very best.

As I though about this more I was reading in Leviticus at the time, and Chapter 22.17-31 gives the Lord’s instructions as to what kind of offerings the Lord finds acceptable.  It lists the kinds of animals and all the possible imperfections that cannot and should not be brought before the Lord.  In verse 31 the importance of quality it is linked to the Holiness of God, and we are to be faithful in bringing our best sacrifices to him.  In verse 32 it says, “Do not treat my holy name as common and ordinary.  I must be treated as holy by the people of Israel.  It is I, the Lord, who makes you holy.”  And so we bring the best to our Lord.

There is an amazing miracle in this.  We cannot attain perfection, and perfectionism can be a trap for artists.  It is up to God to accomplish the work of cleansing us, to make us a suitable offering.  He makes us Holy.  The work of Christ makes us holy,  makes our offerings pleasing to God.  So if we start with a heart offered to Jesus, motivated to serve him, then God will find pleasure in our service of Him and His kingdom.

Its been great to see the worship teams embrace this as we’ve been talking about it.  One of the questions that came out of the discussions was why are we talking about this now?  Is there a problem of quality?  I’m happy to say no, not at all.  I think our musicians are really good, and we’re blessed with a lot of talented people.  But that doesn’t mean we stop pursuing, or stop  challenging ourselves in our pursuit of following God where he calls us.

Lorn
Associate Pastor of Music & Arts