Relationship Lessons from the Life of Moses

We are starting a new series of messages entitled “Relationship Lessons from the Life of Moses.  The series focuses on the different kinds of relationship lessons which can be learned from Moses’s life, and how we can apply these lessons to our own lives today.

February 5 – Pastor Russ:  Born During Complicated Times –    Exodus 1:8-2:10

February 12 – Pastor Russ:  Making Life Complicated –    Exodus 2:11-14

February 19 – Pastor Russ:  When God Complicates Your Life –    Exodus 3:1-15

February 26 – Pastor Russ: It’s Complicated When Your Best Friend Blows It -  Exodus 32:1-24

Cornerstone Church Constitution: Information, Questions and Answers

Introduction to the Constitution Process

The mission of the church is of vital importance. Christ’s call to make disciples is the pursuit that we need to passionately engage in as a body of believers in our world.  To accomplish this no detail is insignificant.  We need to constantly evaluate our ministries and their ability to build up the body.   Any barrier that keeps us from accomplishing the mission needs to be held up for examination.  As spiritual leaders we need to pray and ask for discernment that the ministiries of Cornerstone Church come from a place of obedience to God’s kingdom plans.   Scripture teaches us that as leaders we will be called to give account for how we lead.

As we engage in the ongoing  practice of accountability, we find that we have regular evaluations of individual ministries, programs, and staff.  This is important and necessary to ensure the quality of these indivdual areas.  However these are all interconnected in a larger frame work or structure.  And our practice of evaluation should also extend to looking at the bigger structures of leadership and management within the church.

With this in mind Council decided to look at the Constitution and structural organization of the Church and initiated this process by appointing a committee on October 19^th, 2009.  It’s been a prayerful process, and we continue to walk carefully through it.  In this document you’ll find answers to frequently asked questions about the proposed constitutional draft, a list of key leadership values in the proposed structure, as well as testimonials from other churches and organizations that have benefited from going through this process.  If you’d like to explore this further, take the opportunity to examine the proposed documents (they are available to download as .pdf’s at the bottom of this page).

 

Constitution Frequently Asked Questions

Why make these proposed changes?

Our current constitution is limited in its ability to accommodate the needs of a growing ministry at Cornerstone Church.  The desire is to clarify issues of authority and responsibility, as well as providing a framework for the ongoing development of management policies.   We also want to ensure in our leadership structure that our spiritual leaders have greater authority to exercise their gifts of prayerful discernment in directing the overall mission and vision of Cornerstone Church.

Does this model give the pastor too much power?

This is an important concern, because we’ve all seen power abused.  The proposed leadership structure will clarify the power that the lead pastor may exercise, as well as their responsibilities and accountabilities to the board.

Does this remove or minimize the congregation’s voice?

No, if anything this leadership structure affirms the voice of the congregation in a way our current constitution assumes, but never specifically prescribes.  In the proposed documents the congregation is identified as the authority in the church, and it lines out specifically how that authority is exercised.  Further, it prescribes how the board and the lead Pastor are to engage the congregation in more meaningful conversation on the mission and vision of Cornerstone Church.

Is this the perfect system? 

There is unfortunately no perfect system.  We are all human beings prone to sin, and to abusing the systems that are meant to protect.  What this proposed system of leadership does better is clarify responsibilities and accountabilities, thus minimizing the possibility for abuse.  And, if abuse does occur, it gives clear authority in regards to accountability. 

Cornerstone Leadership Structure – Quick Values Check:

The affirmation, involvement and empowerment of every individual and group at all levels is vital to the success of Cornerstone Church

Decision-making proceeds from shared values, vision and mission, not unilaterally from the Board or the Senior Pastor. Decisions are made as close as possible to where they are implemented.

The lead pastor and staff are responsible for management, delivering services on behalf of members in accord with Board-stated priorities and for achieving the strategic goals within the limitations of the authorization and resources available.

Authority, responsibility and accountability are the primary components of all relationships. Limitations (of authority) and expectations (of responsibility) are the secondary components.

Each individual is responsible for creating, owning, understanding and implementing the mission or purpose of Cornerstone Church.

Cornerstone Church is results oriented. Indicators and measurements of strategic results are identified and applied. Monitoring progress towards results and monitoring compliance with limitations form an ongoing process.

Testimonials

“The key benefit of investing in leadership structure is the clarity that can result as roles and responsibilities are discussed and agreed upon.  The introduction of policy governance at Briercrest created an opportunity to clarify the expectation the board had of the president and the expectation the president had of the board.  The conversation was helpful because it enabled a new level of clarity about roles, a new freedom to work in those roles, and a new accountability to deliver in those roles.   It reduced the surprises and frustration that comes about when roles and expectations are not set out and agreed upon.“

Dwayne Uglem, President of Briercrest

 

“The most significant value of a governance approach to church leadership structure is that it allows for the best influence at the best places. In many churches, the staff (especially the lead pastor) gives overall direction to the vision and mission of the church. This is a problem because when the pastor changes, the vision changes. Often the board (or the council) ends up managing the changing vision as staff naturally change. In a governance system, the board is responsible for setting vision, mission and strategic plan. Staff and membership have input into this but it is owned by the board. The primary role of staff (mainly lead pastor) is to implement this vision/mission. A compelling vision can be better embraced by everyone in this case. Also, when pastoral changes happen, the vision doesn’t change. So, the best influence for vision and strategic plan happens at the board level with input from staff. The best influence for membership is to give regular feedback to the board about the vision and mission of the church. The best influence for implementation of this vision and strategic plan happens at the staff level.This make sense because staff have specialized training to do the ministry of the church. Boards generally do not have this specialized training.

When governance works, the board engages membership to set visionary direction and the staff manage and implement that visionary direction.”

Dale Dirksen, Associate Pastor, Forrest Grove Community Church

 

“The most frequent word I hear from churches who use the Relationship Model for their governance is “clarity”. People feel much more confident when they know how authority flows in the church and how much authority they have to make decisions.  The confusion and sense of powerlessness is replaced by a clear sense of direction and clear expectations of responsibility.  The relationship between the pastor and the church board is strengthened with this clarity. It’s been a great pleasure to watch the difference these Biblical principles make for churches.”

Les Stahlke, Church Leadership Consultant, Author of Church Governance Matters

 

“For nearly four decades of pastoral ministry at various levels of church sizes and complexity, I have been struck with the importance of efficient church governance.  How well a church is governed may very well spell the difference between “mission accomplished” and “mission aborted.”  Instituting great church governance is hard work yet with significant payback.  Time invested in assessing and enacting clearly written and articulated leadership and management for churches will prove to be time well spent.”

Dr. Les Somers, Lead Pastor, StoneRidge Fellowship Church, Lower Sackville, Nova Scotia

 Proposed Constitutional Documents

Constitution Draft (.pdf)
Board Governance Manual Draft (.pdf)
Management and Policy Draft (.pdf)

An Unhealthy Attachment

February 25, 2012

Lately on this blog I’ve been going through and highlighting thoughts on personal worship from the book Worship On Earth As It Is In Heaven: Exploring Worship as a Spiritual Discipline.  It’s been a very healthy call to really make worship beyond just a Sunday event that I attend, and discover what the pattern of a worshiper should look like beyond the community worship we experience Sunday by Sunday.  Honestly, we expect a lot from the church worship gathering.  We need it to be this refugee of holy peace, and an escape from the noise of everyday life; we expect to commune our hearts together and to hear the intimate voice of God, and it needs to all happens within the confines of a specifically allotted one hour time.  However, a worshiper lives a life of devotion beyond Sunday morning.  And this book thus far has challenged us to make worship a priority, and to schedule a regular routine of it in our lives.

This leads us to another challenge: surrender.  We need to let go of the idols that compete for our time and attention.  Idolatry is often easily dismissed as an antiquated image.  In our minds we imagine some ancient tribal people group dancing ecstatically around a fire, late at night, bowing down to some carved wooden face, or other kind of statue.  In the Bible we think of the golden calf, or of asherah poles, and idols like the baals of the ancient Canaanites.  We don’t participate in any overt ritual action like that and so we think idolatry is not an issue for us.  But idolatry as theologian A.W. Towzer said is simply “worship directed in any direction but God’s, which is the epitome of blasphemy.”

Worship is anything that is more important to you than God.  It can take the form of many things, whether possessions, relationships, a job, a social cause.  It can really be anything.  I actually have this picture in my mind of the character Linus from the cartoon Peanuts.  He’s a very mature, articulate, and well adjusted young kid, but for some reason he’s very attached to his blanket.  It causes him great anxiety to part with it.  It goes everywhere with him.   That’s kind of how we attach ourselves to idols, and it is an unhealthy kind of attachment.  Idols can be the things that set us off emotionally, that give us a sense of peace and security, and cause us great anxiety when they are taken away.

The thing is, as Christians, holding on to an idol is an insult to God.  In the first two of the Ten Commandments God says we are to have nothing above him, nor are we to worship anything else.  Exodus 20:3-5 says: “You shall have no other gods before me.“You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.   You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God…”  (NIV).   God tells us very clearly there is no room in our lives for anything above him.

And neither can anything replace the satisfaction of placing God first in our lives.  Only God can make our future secure and guide us to true lasting satisfaction.  The Psalmist understands this when he says:

You make known to me the path of life;
   you will fill me with joy in your presence,
   with eternal pleasures at your right hand.
 Psalm 16:9-11 (NIV)

And so worship in our personal lives needs to be expressed in full devotion to God.  We need to be careful to live our lives free of idolatry, and to spend our time enjoying the presence of our God.  If there is anything that hinders us or tempts us away from Christ, we need to examine ourselves, and flee from it.   This will continue to transform us as a congregation when we come together to worship.

Lorn Gieck

Associate Pastor of Music & Arts
lorncornerstone@sasktel.net

The Book of Revelation Classes

This DVD series will be led by Roger & Lisa Braun at Cornerstone Church, in the Mayfair Room, as an adult Sunday School Class, during the 1st service.

All adults welcome, whether you’re in Senior High or a senior who’s 80+…you’re all welcome.

Classes begin Sunday, January 22 at 9:30 am and will be an hour in length.

Sunday Feb. 18th and Sunday Apr. 8th there will be no classes.
There are 13 classes in total and so this study will take us up to Sunday, April 29th, which will be our last class in this series.

 

Jan. 22 – Lesson 1 – The Lost Blessing

Jan. 29 – Lesson 2 – Ephesus: Repent or Else

Feb. 5 – Lesson 3 – Smyrna: The Rich Church

Feb. 12 – Lesson 4 – Pergamous: The Church at Satan’s Capital

Feb. 19 – NO CLASS

Feb. 26 – Lesson 5 – Thyatira: Jezebel’s Church

Mar. 4 – Lesson 6 – Sardis: The Dead Church

Mar. 11 – Lesson 7 – Philadelphia: The Church of Brotherly Love

Mar. 18 – Lesson 8 – Laodicea: The Disgusting Church

Mar. 25 – Lesson 9 – Rapture: Fact or Fiction

Apr. 1 – Lesson 10 – The Two Resurrections

Apr. 8 – NO CLASS

Apr. 15 – Lesson 11 – Who is That Woman?

Apr. 22 – Lesson 12 – The Marriage of the Lamb

Apr. 29 – Lesson 13 – The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

 

We hope you can join us!!

If you have any other questions, feel free to contact us anytime.
rl.braun@sasktel.net

This is the link to the Facebook event page, if you’re interested in seeing additional photos and a couple of videos.

New Sermon Series: Vision Begins With God

We are starting a new series of messages with the new year. The series, entitled Vision Begins with God, explores the topic of what the Church’s vision should be based on what God says through His scriptures.

The Gift (Christmas Eve 2011)

For those of you who missed the Christmas Eve Candlelight service, or for those who just wanted to see it again, here is the encore of The Gift.  This video presentation was part of our Candlelight service, and involved many artists, and musicians in telling the story of one boys search for the true meaning of Christmas.  There is also an accompanying book available, which was handed out at the end of the Christmas Eve service.  If you would like one please contact the church office and we’ll set one aside for you.

The Gift from Cornerstone Church on Vimeo.

There is also an audio only version as well, which can be downloaded by clicking on the link below.

The Gift (.mp3)

Change in Services

Starting January 8, 2012 we will have two services that are slightly different from each other. The 9:30am service will contain less music and more teaching. The 11:00am service will continue on in its current format.

Families will come into the 9:30am service together and the children will be dismissed for their programs during the offering time.

The reason for the change is to advance and enhance our Bible teaching time. Our Advisory Board will review the change after a three month trial period.

Spiritual (and Musical) Discipline – Winter 2012 Music Schedule

I think it’s no surprise to anyone at this point that I am a firm believer in practice.  Rehearsal is extremely important and I am of the opinion that there is never enough time for me to sit at an instrument and enjoy the motion and mind space of making music.  The hours can pass quickly as I lose myself playing around with songs, exercises, scales, drills; I really relish every opportunity I get to improve my skills.  Practicing by myself, or practicing with a group, it’s all something I honestly love.

Of course I wasn’t always that way.  I took piano at the insistence of my parents, and as a young boy practicing was not the highest on my list of priorities.  Time used to move painfully slow as I did my best to fill that half hour with productive bits of music.  Often I’d just stare at the clock convinced that it was unmoving.  As I got older things improved, but even then I could procrastinate with the best, and put off important concepts that I really needed to know.

My darkest hour was when I was in Grade 6 Royal Conservatory Piano.  I wasn’t particularly thrilled with scales and so I put off learning my C# minor scale.  Next week always seemed to be the best time to get started learning it.  The problem was that I procrastinated so long that I was a week away from my piano exam and had still not got around to learning it.  So I tried to learn it furiously as the clock started ticking away (Just for future record, you can’t really cram for piano exams.  You either know it or you don’t).  This led me to the next step of rationalization.  They may not ask me to play it.  Of the several scales I’m supposed to learn, they surely wouldn’t ask for that one.

And so at week’s end I am ushered into my exam.  When it came to the technique section of the exam they asked me to play only one scale; one randomly chosen from a list of five or six.  Can you guess which one they asked for?  C# minor.  And yes, it was an atrocious, messy, non-musical assault, on that poor examiners ear.  When the time came, when it really mattered, I wasn’t prepared.

Now of course, this is a partial encouragement to all of us to continue to practice and rehearse, and to do it well.  Music is a daily discipline that needs to be developed carefully through the coordination of our minds with our instruments.  But I also want us to understand that what we do is not just music, its worship leadership.  And that requires another kind of daily discipline.

I’ve been reading a book by Rory Noland entitled Worship on Earth as it is in Heaven and in the second chapter he talks about worship being beyond a Sunday morning experience.  Worship needs to be a daily habit.

We see an amazing example of this in the life of Daniel.  Daniel is an exiled child from Israel who is bold about God when it really matters.  By the providence of God, and strength of character Daniel becomes an important leader in Babylon.  This made a lot of other powerful men jealous and they looked for a way to get rid of him.  So they convinced the King to pass a law against praying to any other man or God other than the king.  Verse 6:10 of the book of Daniel shows us his response:

 Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been published, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to his God, just as he had done before. (NIV)

So when it really matters, we find that Daniel is well prepared to face what is coming his way.  He has been already in the daily practice of prayer and worship.  Every day without fail he would get down on his knees.  It wasn’t something he fit in when he could.  He prioritized it three times a day regardless of schedule.  And so when Daniel is arrested and thrown to his death at the mouths of hungry lions, God sustains him, and vindicates him.

Just as much as I want us to have a culture of musical excellence, and a commitment to practice and rehearsal, I hope also we cultivate and grow in our pattern of daily worship.  We can’t neglect worship in our lives all week, and then expect to be relevant in worship on Sunday.  Worship really does matter.  In Daniel’s case it was this witness that led the king to acknowledge Daniel’s God as the one true God.  Out of this came a formal declaration to the world that everyone should honour and reverence God.

Maybe this is why we lack influence in our society.  Cornerstone’s vision is to change our world.  I read from scripture that worship is an important part of this.  However, we need to worship like Daniel.  It has to be a daily pattern of our lives, not just a tacked on religious duty at the end of the week.  Let us follow the model of Daniel, and others like him in scripture.  When we make worship a daily priority, we won’t be caught off guard when it really matters.

Just for the record, I can play C# minor now without a problem, and I practice it regularly.  You can test me sometime if you want.

 Lorn Gieck
Associate Pastor of Music & Arts

click here for the Winter 2012 Music Schedule (.pdf)

 

 

Beth Moore 2012

Dates and places:

 

Cornerstone Church (315 Lenore Dr. Saskatoon)

Fridays beginning January 6;2012, 9:15 AM

 

Lisa Braun’s Home (230 McKay Crt. Warman)

Tuesdays beginning January 3; 2012, 7:00 PM

 

Warman Gospel Church (418 Central St. W. Warman)

Thursdays beginning January 5; 2012, 9:15 AM

Worship on Earth as it is In Heaven

I do my best to keep up with current ideas and struggles on the significance and meaning of worship.  There are a lot of great worship theologians and worship leaders doing great things to approach the worship of the church both intentionally and thoughtfully.  I’ve read several books by an experienced church musician named Rory Noland, but his recent book takes a unique approach, and presents to the church a unique challenge.  The book is entitled Worship on Earth as it is in Heaven and in it he approaches the subject in a very personal way, exploring worship as a personal discipline.

As such it’s not a method book about how to make a better worship program.  Rather, it speaks to how should I, or any individual believer, take seriously the spiritual practice of worship in our lives, and what are some ways in which we should put this into practice?  So I’m going to use this and the next few upcoming blog posts to share some observations from his book about the formation of worship in an individual’s life.

The book is divided into two sections, and the first half treats personal or private worship, while the second tackles group, or congregational worship (such as the Sunday morning church gathering).  He encourages us to look to King David as our model for private worship.  And his first observation about the private life of David’s worship is that he made time with God a priority.

David understood that worship was important, and he made it a priority in how he ordered his life and the life of Israel.  He appointed singers and instrumentalists and organized worship.  He brought the Ark to Jerusalem, and made plans to build the temple.  Never was there a king that not only in word, but also in practice, made the praise and glory of God a priority.

Psalms gives some examples of David’s call to worship the one true living God:  “You who fear the Lord, praise him!  All you offspring of Jacob, glorify him, and stand in awe of him, all you offspring of Israel” (Psalm 22:23);  “Praise the Lord!  Praise the name of the Lord, give praise, O servants of the Lord”  (Psalm 135:1); “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord!”  (Psalm 150:6).

We see this focused energy in David’s life and a strong identification of himself with the worship of God.  It motivated him, and gave direction to his life, and influenced all he did.  As Rory Noland observes: “You can always discern your priorities, for better or for worse, by what angers you or stirs you, what frustrates you and what excites you.  Honouring God was the utmost priority for David.”

David’s priority in His life was God, and so worshiping, bringing praise, honour and glory to God, were at the top of his list.  I think it’s good for us to take a look at our priorities, and examine what is important to us.  We are destined to join all the saints in worshiping God for eternity.  Its significant to think about the connection of that eternal reality to our present life and witness.

Next time we’ll talk about making worship a habit.

Lorn Gieck
Associate Pastor of Music & Arts

 

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