Dear Cornerstone family,
Three to four times a year, we have a Cornerstone Family Meeting. These whole church meetings are informational in nature and are designed to provide you important updates on the life and ministry of the church.
Last Sunday, we kicked off 2025 with a deeply encouraging Family Meeting. We shared statistical data on the church’s growth, made notes on changes within our church leadership and staff, provided a midpoint fiscal year financial update, and reviewed the main tenants of our church vision.
By God’s grace, we had lots of positive things to share. One particularly positive point I want to circle back to is the fact that the Lord drew 102 new people into church membership at Cornerstone last year. As one of you said to me after the meeting, “That’s a big bump.” You’re right, it is a big bump, and it’s the kind of bump we’ve seen each year since 2021. In fact, the membership of Cornerstone has more than doubled in three years.
Now, there’s lots of reasons for the growth we’re seeing. For starters, Nashville and Franklin have grown exponentially in that same time frame. By God’s providence, we live in a happening place. People are moving here in droves. That’s certainly a reason for growth.
But another reason more particular to us is the fact that many people are looking for a church like Cornerstone. A church committed to the expository preaching of the Bible, discipleship, and a high view of worship, that also possesses a warm relationality that is born of genuine care. Praise the Lord, Cornerstone is not the only church in our city that is true of, but we are, as my grandfather would say, “a dying breed.” In other words, it’s much harder than it used to be to find churches committed to those distinctives.
Over the last couple of years, we’ve expanded our facility footprint to help better accommodate the growth, but the time has come to begin preparations for our next step as a congregation. As we begin to prayerfully explore what those steps may be, would you covenant to pray with and for your leaders? It’s always true that we feel a desperate need for your prayers, but it’s especially true when we sense the Lord leading us to take new steps of faith and take holy risks for kingdom purposes. It’s exciting and scary all at the same time!
As the months unfold, we will be reaching out to you in different ways. We will need your questions and ideas all along the way. Your input is mission critical as we chart a course forward. But for now, in keeping with last week’s message on becoming a weaker church in 2025—that is, more dependent on Christ—let’s begin on our knees surrendering our hearts and lives to the Lord’s will.
Your servant,
