It's a New Year

So I took most of the month of December off from blogging - let's see - 1st week was in Atlanta and Short Course Nationals (a swim meet); working lots with mom to get dad's estate straight and paperwork submitted; sick; Christmas parties; Christmas Eve worships - which were great! Way to go Jim. If you missed Christmas Eve at Cornerstone you missed God's touch. I pray you found it in a church where you were visiting family or friends.

So it's a new year and none too soon for me. But with a new year come new challenges and opportunities, like financial aid forms for college! I can't believe our oldest, Kathryn, is college-bound this Fall. How did that happen?

I'm just back from a restful vacation in Ft. Myers. I didn't check e-mail the whole time - and I survived! It's amazing what you can survive without. I've never had an MP3 player, although that may be about to change. We just replaced our home desktop computer - it lasted 5 years and the techonology was far outdated. But we survived. My children and wife didn't bring their winter coats on vacation so they weren't prepared for the bitter cold we met in northern FL. You'd think after all these years of insisting they bring coats and even boots "just in case" that they would automatically do it. NOT! I had my coat and gloves. But they survived.

So even though I was on vacation the Holy Spirit and I had many conversations. I am excited to share some messages with you this January about what the future holds for us at Cornerstone. God is busy. God is working and we get to be part of that work! This weekend we're going to talk about studying God's Word as a primary transformational tool in God's workshop. We must be a people who are all about God's Word. Without it we cannot grow into the people and therefore the Church He intends for us to be.

The following three weeks we'll be looking at what lies ahead of us in the next 3-5 years as we approach our 15th Anniversary as a chartered congregation. Then on Sunday, January 27th we'll have our annual Cornerstone Summit, laying out a theme for the year (which is "Excellence" in 2008), gathering servants from all the various ministries and anyone who wants to know what Cornerstone is going to be about. The team putting this year's Summit together is working overtime to make it a truly memorable event. You won't want to miss our keynote speaker, Tim Kerwin - former Chief Steward on Air Force One. He has some things to teach us about "Excellence."

Why talk about "Excellence?" Because our God has only given us His very best and His call deserves our very best. Doing things with "Excellence" is first about worshiping God and second about evangelism. We give our best to our Lord and we give our best so that others can come to know Him. I hope you'll plan to be there from 2-5:30.

It's good to be back. I'm glad it's a new year. See you on Sunday Cornerstone as we kick off year number 15.