July 2024 Letter from the Pastor

June 2024 Letter from the Pastor

May 2024 Letter from the Pastor

February 2024 Letter from the Pastor

January 2024 Letter from the Pastor

Dear Friends, Let’s talk about Christmas. Christmas is the beginning of a journey that can encourage, restore, and change lives.

Dear Friends, Let’s talk about the power of gratitude…

You and I are a part of God’s ongoing story of creation. We, who are rooted in Christ, are empowered by God’s Spirit to branch out into the world touching people with God’s love and grace. This has implications on how we live in relationship with God, with each other, and with all the Earth.

A miracle is not only about the extraordinary. God’s miraculous love is often found in the mundane and normal of our everyday lives. Living in the spirit of the miraculous, people see God in nature, in relationships, in kind acts, and in the power of love.

This week I was so invigorated about Cornerstone’s July calendar that I went to the conference room and mapped out all the exciting events we have planned. Opportunities that extend to the rest of the year!

As we enter the summer season our calendars are full with a harvest of relationships: weddings, graduations, family parties, vacations, sports, and recitals are bringing people together. At Cornerstone, in addition to worship and study, we are preparing for a harvest of summer fun!

Our lives as Christians are filled with questions: How are we invited to live as members of a faithful community? What does it mean to care for others? How can we embrace and share the beauty of the world we live in? The worship series this month, Come and Be, addresses these questions through scripture and the society of honey bees.

Our celebration of Holy Week and Easter is not just a recollection or remembrance of the central events of Christianity— it is a life-giving sacred sign of hope that is realized in our lives each and every year.

The season of Lent is filled with stories of people who are seeking a deeper faith, forgiveness, healing, a different life—in other words, a new beginning.

J Hemphill steps in this month to talk about worship arts at Cornerstone.

In scripture, God reminds us again and again that our Creator makes all things new. How do you long to be made new?

When I was a kid I loved to watch the Charlie Brown Christmas special. Charlie, overwhelmed, depressed, and discouraged by the commercialization of the season and the cruelty of friends cries out, “Does anyone know what Christmas is all about?”

Our November worship series is called Re:newed. This series is designed to help us to Re:gain Our Relationships, learn how to Re:align Ourselves, and Re:frame Our Happiness. In other words, what does it mean for us as Christians to be Re:newed?

Dear Friends, the past few days have been difficult for many reasons. Storms literal as well as spiritual, physical, and emotional have been raging in so many lives. People are without power, food, water, and shelter. People are unable to travel to escape these conditions. As always, the suffering of the poor is made greater by lack of options and resources.

“What does it mean to be a community of faith?” People of faith worship, they pray, they stay in relationship with the people of their church, they serve neighbors, they witness to the love of God for everyone, they see God in each face they encounter and they give of their resources.