Looking Ahead

It is amazing to me that 2008 has already come and for the most part gone.  I don't want to rush into 2009, with the best days of 2008 still to come, but it is impossible not to be overwhelmed by all the excitement that lies in January of next year.  This month as we have been planning and preparing for the big move to the new auditorium, we are excited to see God working out every detail to His purposes.  We have placed the order for 200 new chairs and the money is in for all but 62 at the time of this post.  We look forward to seeing the people that God is going to sit in those chairs as He continues to use our church to reach this community with the good news of Christ.  The stage is being set for Cornerstone to reach new heights in 2009, as we continue to lift up Christ here in Four Corners.  Here are a few things to look forward to...

This Sunday
If you have been at Cornerstone for any amount of time you know that every weekend is a special event for us.  Our teams have been working hard to put together a service that will usher you into the presence of God and lead you to worship and know Him more than you have before.  We will be going in depth on the angels' announcement of "Good Tidings of Great Joy."


Christmas Weekend Services - December 20th & 21st.
We are planning the biggest Christmas event in our church's history and want you to invite your friends, family and neighbors to come and enjoy Christmas through the eyes of a child.  The program will include drama, music, sign language and even a performance by our new children's puppet team.  There will be three shows in all and we strongly ask that you attend only one show in order for there to be enough room.

December 27 &  28 - Ward Hodges
Our resident missions representative Ward Hodges will be coming to speak for us.  Ward is our representative with World Hope and as we prepare for our first ever missions trip to Nicaragua, Ward will share with us some of the amazing things God is doing through Hope.

January 3 & 4 - Gio Llerena - Major League Baseball Chaplin
I am excited to tell you that my good friend and Tampa Bay Ray Chaplin Gio Llerena will be with us.  Gio has a very special ministry to the players and staff of major league baseball and as the Rays are coming off their best season ever he will share with us the importance of teamwork and keeping our eyes on Christ.

January 10 & 11 - Annual Vision Meeting
Every year we set aside one Sunday to reorient ourselves to the vision God has given us as a church.  We will celebrate the victories of 2008 and look ahead to where we see God taking us in 2009.  This Sunday will amaze you, I promise.

January 18th - The Big Move
We are combining all three of our services on the 18th in order to celebrate our big move to the middle school auditorium.  Not only will our seating capacity triple, but every aspect of our church will take a giant leap forward.  If you regularly come on Saturday, nights we are asking that you find someone to switch shifts with you for this very special day.  We will follow the service with a dinner.

February 1 - Missions Trip to Nicaragua
We have a team from our church leaving just after the 10:45 worship service to head to Nicaragua for 7 days to work with World Hope to build outposts for the mission.  We will be having special dedication services this day as we commit to spreading hope to Nicaragua.

WoW!

I was listening to a good friend, Paul Heier, speak recently and he said his favorite word of worship was "wow." Wow, is a word you say when words escape you or they can do little to express how amazed you are.  In worship it is a response to catching a glimpse of how Great our God is and sensing for a moment how much he does love us.

Right now we are experiencing a "wow" moment in the life of Cornerstone.  In the past few weeks God has been blessing our church and records are falling by the wayside.  What is amazing is that all the growth indicators show that we are just beginning a new stage of growth as a church.  Attendance last weekend was up to 222 from 202 the week before.  A jump of 20 in weekend attendance is not much, but compared to our October average of 175 we are excited to see 50 more people worshiping with us each week.  What is awesome is that small group attendance is the fastest growing indicator on the list.  We are excited to see new small groups forming and it is our goal for everyone to find a group.

Here is what this means for us as a church.  
1. We must all adjust.
     - We are maxing out the 10:45 service so that means come earlier and sit up front filling every available chair.
     - Some of you can make the switch to attend on Saturday night or to the 8:15 making extra room at 10:45.
     - The room will continue to be crowded until we can move to the other auditorium in January.
     - Things will be changing in 2009.  As the church matures, our body will develop and change. Always for the better!

2. We must all go deeper.
     - Everybody needs to belong to a small group.
     - As the church gets bigger, it MUST get smaller.
     - Authentic relationships do not happen in rows.
     - Church is designed for fellowship and that takes place in small group.

3. We must all pray.
     - No question, what is going on has its source in God.
     - This is not a result of anything we have done, but what God has decided to do in and through us.
     - As the church becomes larger and more complex, we need to rely on Him even more for guidance and strength.

4. We must all step up.
     - This is what we prayed for in our 2008 elevate campaign.
     - We must continue to elevate our giving and our serving.
     - Existing ministries are being taxed more and more and now more than ever we could use some help.
     - If you are not volunteering, we need your help in every ministry are within the church.

BIG Money

Last night at our prayer meeting I found out that there is a group of ladies who are specifically praying for God to give us 9 million dollars for the next stage of ministry here in Four Corners.   I was amazed at the specificity of the prayer and its simplicity.    I remember the days of the $25,000 pyramid, and Wheel of Fortune's cry of "Big Money Big Money!"   One's idea of big money I guess changes with time and now I can clearly see God blessing our church with $9,000,000 and not blinking an eye.  As I was driving earlier this morning I began thinking about the faith of those ladies, and pondered where and more specifically how God will answer that prayer.  I truly believe that money does not grow on trees, but that God uses people to finance His work in our community.

What is amazing is that while we were not watching, God has already begun to answer that prayer.  to date, God's people have given almost $950,000 to this community through Cornerstone Baptist Church.  By January, that number will top 1 million dollars of ministry invested into this community!  I think that is stinkin awesome!!!  It is amazing to just pause and reflect on the goodness of God, and the faithfulness of His people.  Meeting in rented facilities, it may appear to some that Cornerstone is some minor player in church world, but if the last 6 years are any indication, the people of Cornerstone believe in giving of themselves for not only changing our community, but the world.  By the way,  every investor will tell you, the first million is the most difficult.  May we all stay faithful in our giving and in the use of those funds for the effective spread of the gospel around the world.

Skoobalon

I ran across this great toy called Wordle.net that takes a document and summarizes it in a beautiful word cloud.  I plugged in my notes from this past weekend's message and voi'la! If you were at church remember and enjoy.  If, you were not there, here is what you missed.  Click on the cloud to go to wordle.net

How Moving!

In the next 90 days Cornerstone will be moving from the Elementary Lunch Room, over to the Middle School. Community of Faith is completing their building and we are hoping to be moving in perhaps even before Christmas.

This move will be one of the biggest opportunities in the life of our young church. As you know, the 10:45 worship service has been pretty full and the ability to bring the whole church together ounder one roof has been impossible for some time. The new worship space will provide us with much more room to grow and expand while also allowing us to expand many of our current ministries.

There is no doubt that this move will present a number of challenges including additional set up and higher rent, but we know that hte benefits will outweigh the costs by far.

Here are some things to begin praying about. 1. Pray that God will allow us to be good stewards of the finances that he provides so that we can adequately absorb the cost of the larger space. 2. If you are not already involved in set up and tear down, come and join us either on Saturdays at 4:30 or on Sundays after the 10:45 service. 3. This move will allow us to take a great leap forward in our children's church. Be part of the team. 4. We will be raising funds this Christmas to make improvements to the way we turn the lunchroom into a sanctuary. (The Tabernacle Project Phase 2).

I am so excited for the opportunity that God has given us to meet at Four Corners. It is such a blessing to be able to minister right there in the heart of the community and I look forward to seeing what God is going to do through this new and improved worship setting.

Elevated Now What?

Last year this time we saw a very disturbing trend at Cornerstone.  Our attendance had increased from 2006 to 2007 by a whopping 1/2 a person for the month of August.  As you can imagine, as a church we were in a crisis.  We had done what is referred to in church world as plateaued.  All churches experience plateaus, but we knew that for us to stop moving forward meant that we would eventually slip back and not accomplish the mission that God has for us.  The decision was made for us to take decisive action and address the problem at hand.

One of the major steps we took was to totally change the way we do our worship services.  To this point we had been blending contemporary praise with hymns.  We moved to give people more options to worship God in a style that is most in line with their culture.  Second, we moved our early worship from 9:30 to 8:15.  Though this is a bit illogical, we had unintentionally de-emphasized our Small Group.  We moved Bible Fellowship to 9:30 and now people can worship on either side of the Small Group time.  This allowed us to continue to make Small Groups the center of church life.  Third, we introduced Saturday night worship.  This by far has been the most influential as in 9 months time this service has grown from 0-over 40 weekly.  Fourth, we stopped everything to emphasize Jesus Christ.  Chapter by chapter through the gospel of John in Church and verse by verse through the Gospel of Luke in Bible Fellowship was a bit all eggs in one basket, but the Gospel is a very capable basket.  Reminding ourselves that Jesus is first, is something every church should do regularly.

So.... Now we have come to the end on John, this Sunday concludes the Gospel of Luke, and for all intents and purposes we have to check the gauges and see what God has done.  The only thing that I can say is amazing!  Looking at our numbers from August 2007 to August 2008 we have grown by 52%.  That means that every week 57 more people are attending church, hearing God's Word, and growing in their faith.    this numerical growth is the direct result of spiritual growth in our leadership, and membership.  God is doing amazing things in our church and we want to keep the momentum going.

Now comes Fall 2008.  This Fall & Winter we will experience some of the most exciting opportunities our church has ever seen.
1. We anticipate moving from the Elementary School Lunch Room to use of the entire Four Corners Campus with the completion of Community of Faith's new church building.  Construction is well under way and by the end of the year they should move out, giving us the ability to expand from a lunch room fire rated to seat 108, into a room large enough to seat 276.  This being said, the door will be wide open for us to continue to grow right where we are planted.
2. Along with this, we will see our rent and facility related expense double.  With additional opportunity, comes added responsibility.  I say this to say, keep on giving.  I know that things are tight, but the work of God through Cornerstone is made possible by your giving.  Yes, God could have decided to provide for ministry through any number of ways but He chose to do His work through your giving.
3. Pray.  Pray that we would continue to keep our focus on the glory of God by elevating Christ, our level of service as well as our community.  Pray that God will enlarge our ministry to meet the growing needs of Four Corners.
4. Get in, sit down and buckle up! - God has some amazing things on the horizon.  As soon as we have taken the step into the new space, we will begin the process of taking Cornerstone's next step and that will be the purchase of property for a building of our own.  Right now we have over $100,000 in the bank, and are ready to make a down payment, but we will shift into high gear on identifying property and gaining a foothold. We also anticipate the ministries of Cornerstone to continue to expand as we continue to grow.  For the first time our church will be taking a missions trip together in January.  I cannot think of a better way to start a new year.  No doubt there will be some bumps along the way, but Oh what a ride!

Camp Electric

The sign of a great leader is how well he leads in his absence.  Our worship pastor, Gabe Dunlap is at Camp electric in Nashville TN checking 1,000 students into their specialized worship band camp.  I am looking forward to spending a few days this week at the camp as well.  Last night Shane Gillespie, who usually plays bass, led worship and then rocked the house with Clay Crosse's "I Surrender All."  Wow!  it was a great service.  In addition we launched a small group Bible Study for Saturday nights that will meet at 5:45 p.m. and following the service one young lady told me she received Christ.  God is so good, and it is 5:00 a.m. on Sunday, and we get to do it all again at 8:15 with Ray Kness, and then at 10:45 with Shane leading. Please pray for me as I catch a red eye to Nashville tonight to meet up with Gabe.  Take some time to check out the website for Gabe's camp too and pray for the instructors and speakers.  It is going to be... (Scratch that) It already is an awesome week!

3H

No, I am not talking about some knock off farming club for kids, or the pro wrestler HHH, or the gas guzzling SUV. The three H's refer to how I approach my preaching. Around 3 this morning as I stared into the darkness I thought it might be something to share on the blog. Though it is a bit formulaic, I think it would help you to know how sermons germinate.

#1 - Heart
Preparation - I ask God to break my heart over a reality that shouldn't be. I may also ask him to fill my heart with a dream that should be. In this way, I am asking God to grip me with a message that must be preached.
Delivery - The first step in a good message (IMHO) is that it touches the heart. I truly believe that the emotions are the gateway to real change and though they can often be manipulated, that is no excuse for abandoning them.
Example - This week my world has been rocked by several deaths. One of members had his son die of an aneurysm, I wept. A classmate from college died unexpectedly of a sinus infection of all things leaving a wife and toddler, another person told me Wednesday night that her ex-husband and his entire family were killed in a car accident, and then news broke yesterday of Steve Curtis Chapman losing his daughter Maria. This has caused a great deal of emotion to well up inside of me. As anyone would, I have been wondering what God's greater purpose might be.
This emotion has opened the door for me to move to the second H.

#2 - Head
Preparation - As I prepare this second part of my message, I am asking God for His Word on my reality. We cannot stay in emotion, we must move to the intellect. I want God to show me what that simple truth is, so that I may understand and know Him more. The only reliable source of God's truth is His Word. That is why all of our preaching must be from the Bible.
Delivery - It is my goal to have the entire sermon summarized in one simple phrase. If someone asks what was church about. I want them to be able to quote it. Getting God's truth into people's heads is my life ambition.
Example - I spoke to a group of students this week and afterward a girl came up to me and said "Eight times" I asked her what she meant and she told me that I had said "choose today who you will serve" 8 times. Now my goal was not for her to count, but for her to get it. I think she did.


#3 - Hand
Preparation - Practicality is the difference between preaching and teaching. Too many churches gather every week to listen to teachers. don't get me wrong, teaching has its place in church, but bang for buck preaching is where it is at.
Delivery - The climax of every sermon for me is the point when we turn the corner and begin to see what we must now do with the emotional energy and intellectual truth from God's Word. We want a message that we can take home and use.
Example - Growing up in church world we had "quiz teams" churches used to compete their kids against each other and took pride in how much details their kids knew of the Bible. I remember studying things about the Bible that were far from practical and again (in my humble opinion) would fall into the endless genealogy category. I am all for Bible study, but let's study something we can use.

Now, why am I showing you my play book? Because we are on the same team. As we gather for worship this weekend, I want you to know that God has burdened me with a message that you need to hear. He has given me an insight into why bad things happen to good people from John 9, and I want so much for you to get this truth into your head. Because I know that armed with this simple story of the man born blind, and the reason for it, that you will be better equipped to deal with your own tragedies and to bring glory to God in the midst of your pain.

I know it is Memorial Day weekend, but you have got to come to church! I have something that I need to tell you. Something that will change the way you deal with tragedies.

Boy! I Missed Cornerstone

• Yesterday, my family and I went to St. Petersburg to speak to Park Street Baptist about the things God is doing at Cornerstone. It is always a fun thing to go back to a church where you worked many years and see faces of people who you ministered to many years ago. It has been six years and a lot has changed there, but some things never change. I love Pastor Dan and he has a great vision for the church and their family life center is almost complete.
• Gavan Searles spoke for us at Cornerstone and did a great job conveying his passion for the unchurched in Clermont. I was able to hear Gavan's message on Saturday night and I am excited to see what we can do as a church to come along side Gavan and Life Church.
• We are going to be hiring a summer intern starting June 1st named Brandon Carmichael. Brandon was in my youth group way back in the 6th grade and now is a senior in college getting a degree in missions. I am looking forward to seeing how we as a church can pour into the life of this young man. - I will be talking more about this later this week.
• I apologize to everyone for the fritz that our wireless mic has been on. Last week we took it to the shop but nevertheless, it still has issues. I am personally embarrassed that Gavan had to speak using a hand held mic.
• One thing about being at another church is that it reminded me of how thankful I am for our staff and volunteers. Gabe has our music program at the quality level of a church of 1,000 and beyond. Beyond the mic issues, Everything went very smoothly in my absence and the offerings were great. I am so happy to know that it really has nothing to do with me.
• I hate not knowing who was there and who was absent. As the church grows, it has become increasingly difficult for me personally to keep track in my head of all our absentees and newcomers. Being a control freak, I wish we had RFID scanners installed to track everyone's movements, but then again, that sounds a bit creepy. Let's just say that I miss,,, missing people.

April's Big Give - Blog

This past Sunday our church distributed $1,000 ($5.00 at a time) to the congregation with the task of making a difference in the life of someone in our community. We believe that as we become more aware of the needs around us that God will help us to meet those needs and Christ will be lifted up. We felt that the best way to tell the stories that come in will be through a separate blog. We have set it up here. I must admit that these real life stories of touched lives are already bringing tears to my eyes as I see our church reach out to our community with the love of Christ. From the April's Big Give site, you will be able to leave comments and to share your story as well. You can also subscribe to have the latest story sent straight to your email in-box. Enjoy.

Easter Update

Hello Everyone, Thank you for praying for our Easter Services. First, I want to thank all of our volunteers who worked to make this our best easter ever. Without your hard work it would have been a very difficult day. Second, I want to thank all of our regulars who got tickets and bathed the day in prayer. God answered those prayers. Finally I want to thank our guests for coming out and worshiping with us. The family of God is an amazing thing and total strangers can seem like life long friends in no time. We finished the day with several folks accepting Christ as Savior, and 344 in attendance. This is more that we could have imagined and we give God all the glory. I will do what I can to upload some Easter pictures over the next few days. Here is a picture Terry Miles took during the third service. I also just returned from the hospital and Mrs. Pauline and Eulin Francis are doing well. Also, Nita, our guest that was taken by ambulance (Chest pain) is still being checked by the E.R. but she is doing much better and wanted to thank everyone for their prayers.

Easter Notes

1. Lots of calls this week about our Easter services.
2. Lunch with Scott Smith from Community of Faith to talk Parking (I love that guy)
3. We are having the Easter Egg hunt before the service on Saturday and after the services on Sunday.
4. I think we are the only Easter Egg Hunt in town.
5. The Reporter (News Paper) did not change our ad to the one we sent.
6. Someone will read that ad and show up for an 8:15 service we are not having.
7. They will be angry and blame us.
8. We will accept credit for their mistake and apologize.
9. Our Team has spent many hours preparing for Easter.
10. Our members have spent many hours preparing for Easter.
11. Our guests would benefit by spending many hours preparing themselves for Easter.
12. We anticipate 300 people to worship with us on Easter.
13. We anticipate 1 person to be our focus on Easter.
14. Some of the Easter Eggs will have cash in them.
15. Only kids are allowed to hunt for Easter Eggs.
16. Additional parking will be available on the Soccer field.
17. Additional seating will be available because of the sacrifice of our regular attenders.
18. The worship will be amazing.
19. The message will be Bible.
20. The church will be friendly.
21. The Lord will be lifted up.

Saturday Night Worship

Our postcards are hitting mailboxes today announcing the launch of our new Saturday Worship Service. Unfortunately, my mailbox came up short. It is always a little troubling when you send out 17,000 cards and your only measure of their actually arriving does not arrive! Well, Pastor Gabe sends regards that his was safe, and my good friend Skip down at the Barber Shop proudly has his displayed by his chair so I guess we are good. Also the phone has begun to ring with people seeking directions. Saturday is fast becoming my favorite worship service. (Please don't tell the Sunday crowd!)

Fusion

This weekend we are launching stage two in our Elevate Campaign. Fusion will be a four week series on building intentional relationships. We will begin this Sunday as we examine the nuclear reaction that took place when God infused the church with the apostle Paul. We will look at some key elements of who we are as a church and look ahead as we recognize that God is in the process of infusing our church with many new people. It will take some big changes at our smallest levels but in the end we believe that God is transforming us from a church of addition to a church that fully realizes his power of multiplication. Here is a graph of the first 5 years of our church attendance. It is obvious that we have some lessons to learn from our last encounter with breaking 150 back in 2006, and that God is already taking us to places that we have never been before.

Out of Africa, for now

Due to the rise in violence in Nairobi, we have been forced to postpone our trip with World Hope to Kenya. Over the weekend the violence returned and incidents as close to 15 miles from the Hope Center. We will reschedule the trip for some time after Easter. Please continue to pray for World Hope and our brothers who are continuing the work their in Kawangwari.

WE

One of the most valuable things in our church is the power of "WE." I think most churches have experienced the frustration of finding small group Bible Study material that is not only scriptural and helpful, but relevant to the DNA of that particular church. Most material out in church world is denominationally driven or written for a specific church and then marketed to the masses. As with most mass produced items, much is lost in flavor and nutrient. "WE" have been writing our own Adult Bible Studies for several years and today we will be taking another step in the development process. A team of our Bible Fellowship Leaders will begin meeting each week to collaborate on the discussions. Our goal is to create discussions that will give us opportunity for iron to sharpen iron and to teach our people to go to God's Word to for relevant answers to today's biggest questions.

Elevating

I have received so much feed back from our church concerning our new elevate campaign. Phone calls, emails and greeting cards. I am just waiting for the singing telegram. It is exciting for me as a leader to know that we are all of the same spirit in the desire to see God do more through our church in the next year. Tonight we will begin our new message series on giving. I will do my best to unapologetically teach the direction of our giving. Churches tend to struggle to find balance in the area of teaching principles of giving. Either they harp on it or they avoid it to a fault. According to some of our leadership, I was avoiding it too much. So beginning this weekend we will take it to the next level. I still fear that we will have that one guy show up and go away convinced that all churches talk about is giving. But I guess that is a risk that we will take, and God will have to help him understand. By the way, I have entitled the message "Give Up!" Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy ride.

Elevate!

You heard it here first. Our theme for 2008 will be "Elevate!" It is our goal this year to take our church to the next level of effectiveness. In order to accomplish this we will seek to elevate Christ, elevate the people of the church, and elevate our community. The story began last fall as our leadership team sat down to discuss making our purchase of land a top priority for 2008. We spent several months evaluating and talking to outside leaders about where we are at as a church and what it will take for us to raise sufficient funds to purchase land in this market. We realized along the way that although land is an important goal, that it should not be the main goal, but only a tool to achieve the main goal. Our main goal as church is to elevate Christ, in our hearts and in our community, and Jesus has promised that if He is lifted up (elevated) He will draw all men unto himself. On Sunday we will have our annual vision meeting, but it is not just any vision meeting. I really see it as a turning point for our church. I believe that if we spent the last 5 years of our infancy focused on surviving, we must spend the next 5 on thriving. We will lay out the 5 year plan that will elevate our church to the next level of effectiveness, and will call us up to a great level of service to our Lord and to our community. If you have anything to do with Cornerstone or the Four Corners Community, you CANNOT miss this Sunday.

"I've never been to your church before but..."

This past weekend was awesome. We began our Saturday night current worship service with a great turn out of our launch team. (It is our hope to go public in February.) We had visitors in both of our worship services on Sunday, and one of them said " I've never been to your church before, but today God woke me up at 6:30 and I decided to come and today was for me." One of the things we strive for is that everyone goes away feeling that the message was for them. When that happens we know that it was a God thing. That the Holy Spirit was leading us as we prepare and then leading people to come and participate in the service. I have not checked the numbers yet, but I think we may have had a record crowd this past weekend. And then, next Sunday we will launch our 2008 theme and I know it will be another great weekend!

Saturday Service Begins

I am so pumped as we anticipate the first of our Saturday night services tomorrow. If all goes well we will begin advertising and our public launch in February. I want to thank our core team of volunteers who are stepping out in faith to make this new service possible. We anticipate being able to minister to those in our community that work on alternative schedules. Gabe and the band have worked up some great music for this Saturday, so come out and take the plunge!