Dear Cornerstone Family,
I am preaching an installation service this morning for a pastor friend, Rev. Wes Strebeck, at Arden Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Asheville, NC. As sad as I am to not be worshipping with you, I’m thrilled you have the opportunity to sit under the ministry of our new Assistant Pastor Candidate, Mr. Sebastian Bjernegård, in our ongoing series, 1 Corinthians: Growing Together in Wisdom.
Now, take a moment to read the heartening report below from our dear sister, Liz Taylor, about our newly established Christianity Explored program. —Nate
Over past serval months, we have watched the Lord build a discipleship and evangelism team that is committed to sharing Christ’s gospel. We are using an evangelistic tool developed by our British ally, Rico Tice, called Christianity Explored (CE). CE uses the Gospel of Mark to explain the identity, mission and call of Jesus Christ.
The CE course is seven sessions long. Each session our guests will read through a section of Mark’s gospel learning about Jesus Christ. The structure of each session is simple: a short Bible study connected to a 15-minute video clip and a discussion based on Rico Tice’s talk. Each week we will cover one topic: the good news, identity, sin, the cross, resurrection, grace, and to come and die.
Cornerstone’s vision encompasses glorifying God in the gospel through worship, fellowship, discipleship, and mission. Lord willing, CE will help us fulfill the vision of Cornerstone by becoming disciples and making disciples for the glory of God. We serve a God who delights to save sinners (Micah 7:18-19)!
I mentioned the Lord is at work building our CE Team. Our team is comprised of eleven members: Austin and Wendy Howell, Lee Davies, David and Leslie Horn, Gabby Shell, Bonnie Snyder, Anna Fieldson, Peggy Lawrence, and Jason Crook.
A brief timeline might prove helpful to let you know where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re going:
June-August 2023 – Pastor Tony Giles led a training group in evangelism and discipleship called, Gospel 101.
January-March 2024 – Pastors Nate and Tony, John Millard, and I begin to discuss the idea of running a seven-week CE course at Cornerstone.
April 2024 – God brought 10 folks together to work through the CE leadership training.
July-August 2024 – Our CE Team met to pray. During our first prayer meeting, Leslie Horn provides a wonderful idea: “Let’s try to think of five friends we can invite to our CE class.” And at the next prayer meeting our we came ready to share specific names.
September 2024 – We will start asking our friends to join us for the CE course. Please pray that God will give us courage to ask our friends to join us!
October-November 2024 – We will run the CE course October 1 to November 19 (6:00-7:15 p.m. on Tuesdays).
We want to extend an invitation to you, the Cornerstone family, to join us. Please reach out with questions (etaylor78@icloud.com). We would love to have anyone join our team! Thank you for letting us a share a bit about what the Lord is doing in our midst.
Your servant,
Liz Taylor