Psalm 119 has the dubious honor of being the longest chapter in the Bible.  I’d like to suggest that you read it.  I mean it, go right now and sit down and read it (I can hear the groans already – you don’t really mean all 176 verses !!??!).  To count the verses is to relegate this chapter to mere Bible trivia, and it is so much more than that (and yes, I do mean all 176 verses).  You see, Psalm 119 is actually the climax of the book of psalms.  It’s a 176 verse ode to how great the word of God is.  Verse 105 says : “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path”.  This great Psalm is a discussion of God’s word and how the writer needs to spend time in God’s word.  God’s word is what will help the writer live a live pleasing to God.  Time in God’s word enables a follower of God to obey.  Reading, meditating, and memorizing God’s word is what keeps a person on the path God has for them.  If there is any chance of being discerning in the life of following Christ, it has to do with spending time, lots of time, continually in God’s word.

I may not be a professional baseball player, but I am a follower of Christ.  Baseball is just a game, yet there are people that devote themselves fully to it, and give it their best personal time – all in the service of a game.  And so I’m challenged.  Because being a disciple is far more significant.  I want to develop that kind of discerning sensitivity to the word of God.  Only then will I be able to excel in service, and be obedient in every aspect of my life.

It really made me question my commitments; to God and to the service of his name in the church.  It’s all very easy to say one is committed, but what does that look like?  Do I actually demonstrate commitment in my life, or is it just an aspiration?  Is Christ significant enough in my life that I am motivated to action?  Think about the worship gathering.  Do I make it a priority to come to church and worship with other believers?  Do I come engaged and prepared, or am I just looking to be served.  These dancers weren’t there to get tickets, or to be impressed by the show.  They wanted to be a part of it.  And what about serving God?  When an opportunity comes along to serve, do I jump at the chance, or do I have a list of reasons why I can’t be involved.  I’ll use music in the church as an example, though we could apply it to any kind of service we offer to God.  Say we had worship team auditions.  We would advertise and set a date and a time. Please come - opportunity to serve God by being on a worship team.  Would people line up outside the building waiting for it to start?  Would people come from near and far just for the opportunity to serve God in the church?  Would we find a person would buy a plane ticket and travel half way around the world just for the opportunity to try serving?  If we weren’t skilled enough would we be challenged to go back and work hard and develop our gifts?

Paul’s letter to the Philippians says “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.” Sometimes I live a very weak version of following Christ.  But there is an alternative: the power of Christ’s resurrection.  While there is so much in this world that can be enjoyed and explored, Paul reminds us that there is nothing more significant than knowing who Jesus is and what he has done.  That is the greatest adventure we can live.  But Paul also says it isn’t an easy road.  Spiritual maturity doesn’t happen over night.  It comes with spiritual discipline and sacrifice.    I need to continue to prioritize God’s word in my life, and be happy when I’m called on to serve.

Nothing is greater than being able to serve God and glorify Him through my life.  I need to be driven to pursue excellence in the service of my God.  And the reward is beyond great.  It is a life that moves me from the sidelines, from observer status, into a life of amazing and complete fullness.

I’ll be on the next plane.

Pastor Lorn

“The average person is awake 112 hours a week (assuming he or she sleeps eight hours a night).  If a person goes to a weekend worship gathering that lasts two hours, then 98.2 percent of their week is not in a weekend worship gathering.  To most people, “church” involves only 1.8 percent of their time.  The rest is supposedly not “church.”  This is pretty crazy because in reality you and I and other Christians are the church 100 percent of the time”  (Dan Kimball in Emerging Worship).

It’s funny then that time always seems to be an issue when it comes to church.  At Cornerstone, give or take, our Sunday morning worship time lasts one hour.  When you look at the hours, it’s a pretty small investment.  But it’s also a pretty large misunderstanding of what the church is.  One hour on Sunday is not Church.   Church is not the building.  Church is not the one hour program.

Church is you and me.  As followers of Christ, once we make a commitment to follow Him, we become the body of Christ.  We are the church.  Every day of the week we wake up in the morning and by the power of the Holy Spirit the first breath we breathe is church.  Christ followers live a life of a worshiper with all aspects of prayer, devotion, commitment and the study of God’s word.  This is our daily joy to live.

When we arrive on Sunday morning, in essence, we are continuing to explore what we have been doing all week.  That means we need to be reading our Bible, preparing our hearts in prayer, working to give, and serving others.  The only way Sunday morning has any corporate meaning is because worshippers are gathered.  Notice the language here.  You don’t come on Sunday to worship.  You already come on Sunday morning as a worshiper.  If we don’t come as a worshipers, then maybe we need to do a little more soul searching.

What God want is for us to be glad; to delight in His presence at every opportunity.  Coming to worship should never be an obligation or a chore.  Neither should other things in this world become more delightful in our eyes so that at the earliest opportunity we opt out of being in God’s presence.  A song written by Chris Tomlin says in the chorus that you and I were made to worship.  Worship is often a word we associate with singing, or with prayer.  It is a much bigger word than that.  Worship is about God in His mercy reaching out to us in relationship, and about us responding in love, adoration, and obedience.  Could life really be any better than joining with other followers of Christ in worship?

Pastor Lorn Gieck

You and I were made to worship
You and I are called to love
You and I are forgiven and free
You and I embrace surrender
You and I choose to believe
You and I will see who we were meant to be

Made to Worship by Chris Tomlin

If you’ve read Russ’s recent blog posting you’ll hear him begin to ask questions about the emphasis we place on Sunday morning.  So much of our time and energy goes into making the Sunday worship experience a well polished, smoothly run production.  We often judge our experience and connection with a church based on what happens Sunday morning.  For us as musicians that’s even more so because we spend a lot of time preparing, rehearsing and practicing for Sunday morning.

Reading Tim Milner’s book again I’m reminded of how God is not seeking our worship.  What God wants is relationship.   Worship is only an expression of our relationship with God.  So the question is: what quality of relationship do we have if it is based only on one hour on Sunday.  We stand up for all kinds of things in Jesus’ name; we occupy ourselves so busily with “the Lord’s work”.

Psalm 46 has this amazing imagery of God putting an end to all the dizzying activity of the nations of the work.  He shouts out “STOP!”  The passage is actually “Be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).  But it’s not the peaceful comforting tone we tend to read into it.  It’s a command to put down our efforts, and take time to just be still before God.  This shouldn’t just be one Sunday morning hour.  This shouldn’t be a weekly religious routine.  Being in relationship with God, worshipping is an amazing blessing we have; to be with our Holy, awesome, creator.

Spend some time this summer being still in the presence of God.  Out of that, Sunday mornings become another opportunity to do what we’ve been caught up in doing all week.  Worship.

Pastor Lorn

1.   Calling means that band rehearsal is another opportunity to be used by God.

2.  Calling means that I’m grateful for constructive feedback so I can serve at my best.

3.  Calling means that I put in my best effort.

4.  Calling means that I look out for the health and interests of the whole group, not just my own.

5.  Calling means that I come prepared and well practiced.

6.  Calling means that I don’t back down when it becomes difficult or challenging.

7.  Calling means that I will allow myself to experience spiritual growth as I stretch my faith and my skills.

8.  Calling means that I encourage and cheer on the other musicians I get to serve with.

9.  Calling means that I resolve conflict and look for opportunities to bless other musicians.

Oswald Chambers said it this way “When God has put His call on you, woe be to you if you turn to the right hand or to the left.  He will do with you what He never did with you before the call came; He will do with you what He is not doing with other people.  Let Him have His way.”

Keep up the good work Music & Arts Volunteers!  Be encouraged knowing that when God has placed the call on your life He will be faithful to equip you and to bless you as you serve with joy his presence.

Lorn Gieck

Out of personal tragedy comes this very remarkable release from veteran artist Steven Curtis Chapman.  Its been a long time since an album has affected me quite like this one has.  In terms of production it has a very intimate and raw feel.  They seem to have left some of polish off of this one, and yet we are rewarded as listeners with a warmth and honesty that comes through in every note.  Musically it is also excellent.  The songs are also really well written, and very creative.  It isn’t a standard rock band style of album, instead taking a more minimalistic approach to instrumentation and arrangement.  Somehow they seem to do more with less.  Lyrically, it has some very dark moments, and there is a tremendous honesty in grappling with both personal pain, and the problems of pain and suffering in the world.  In the face of such big questions Steven continuously goes back to God.  The personal tragedy is somehow enlarged to look theologically at the whole world through the eyes of God.  What’s amazing in this album is that we don’t get answers, instead we receive glimpses, glimpses of the glory of God and His work and His plan.  It’s really remarkable and precious to be able to listen to art like this and have your picture of God enlarged, and be instilled with a greater sense of His glory.  This is a great dose of hope.  I don’t know how he could even sing and play this, yet he does it with such integrity and artistic excellence.  Take time to really stop and listen to this album.

Reviewed by Lorn Gieck

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

Worship leadership & Administration
This is the online software we use to assist with the administration of the worship team here at Cornerstone church. http://www.planningcenteronline.com/

Canadian Centre for Worship Studies – lots of academic papers regarding worship theology, history, technology, and arts. http://www.ccws.ca/

Resources for modern worship, with online store. http://worshiptogether.com/

Sheet music resource, with musical examples, and arrangements for choir and orchestra. http://www.praisecharts.com/

This is the group that make sure the artists receive credit for writing the songs we sing in our churches.  Also has the largest database of worship songs out there.  We get a lot of our print music from their song select service. http://www.ccli.com/

Equipment
My favorite periodical, with lots of artist interviews, and gear reviews. http://www.keyboardmag.com/

Another magazine, also a helpful place for gear reiviews. http://emusician.com/

This site has a large database of user reviews for all kinds of gear.  If you want to see what everyone is saying about an item you’ll find it here. http://harmony-central.com/

I’ve always had great results from Roland keyboards.  Last year I bought a Fantom G6, and still afraid of how much power it has. http://www.rolandus.com/

If you make music on a computer, this is a great place to find quality computer audio interfaces, and studio monitors.  I have a pair of the IE30 in ear monitors; they changed my life. http://www.m-audio.com/

This is my studio recording software, with lots of great synth plug-ins, 64 bit windows support.  Its amazing what you can record with this package. http://cakewalk.com/

Clayton Unruh is on of our gifted sound techs, and just so happens to have a  studio located just outside of Osler.  Our worship team is working on a project there as we speak.  If you need to record your band this would be a great place to be. http://www.mothershipstudios.ca/Home.html

Matt Redman’s songs have been a pretty constant fixture at worship services here at Cornerstone Church.  Probably the best known of his songs is the anthem Blessed be the Name.  Even though we have sung some of his best known songs, its been a long time since I’ve kept up with what he’s been writing lately.  I must say I am really impressed.

Musically it fits into the usual Brit-pop territory with a mixture of mid tempo rock and ballad work, played with pretty standard instrumentation.  There’s not a lot of high gloss production on this.   What does stand out is some of his best song writing, with strong melodic work, and a vocal delivery that is passionate and urgent.

The lyrics are really where this album stands out.  Matt tackles the issues of our day regarding economy and loss of hope and points us as listeners constantly back to Jesus, His cross,  and the hope of salvation.  The title track We Shall Not Be Shaken really helps to correct our focus from our modern issues, to the faithfulness of God.   This theme reappears on the song Through it All which again focuses on God’s strength and power in all situations of life.  Other highlights include Remembrance (Communion Song) written with Matt Maher (we sing a few of his songs as well) and This is How We Know which again points us to the love of God as the starting point of our worship and our will to serve the world (remember Cornerstone, our vision is to change the world).  The album ends with My Hope, a beautiful re-imagining of a classic hymn, in which I really got caught in the moment Matt was creating.

With a focus that is both current and timeless, this is without a doubt one of the best worship Cd’s I’ve heard in a long time.

Reviewed by Lorn Gieck