| Beloved, I intend to get back to fleshing out our core principles next week, but today I want to draw your attention more broadly to the first two of those principles: God-centered Theology: knowing the Triune God of creation and redemption in an ever-expanding way through His authoritative self-revelation in the Scriptures. God-ordered Worship: approaching and exalting our God in a way befitting of His manifold excellencies, having our affections and actions regulated by His word in His worship. These two principles form the bedrock of our life as Christians and as a church, and my conviction of that has only deepened as I have prepared for this coming Lord’s Day. During AM worship, we will begin a new sermon series on knowing God, seeing in the book of Hosea that there is nothing more fundamental and necessary for us than to be pursuing after an increasing and intimate knowledge of God (principle 1). During Sunday school, we will begin a new adult class on worshiping God, thinking in lesson one about what worship is and why it matters (principle 2). If God will see to it to use these upcoming sermons and lessons to expand our zeal to know Him and worship Him aright, I will be most content. Toward that end, I want to encourage you to do three things: First, pray that our congregation would be “increasing in the knowledge of God” (Col. 1:10) as God fills us with “the Spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of him” (Eph. 1:17). Pray it every day. Pray it for yourself. Pray it for your spouse. Pray it for your kids. Pray it for your pastor and elders. Pray it for your fellow brothers and sisters at Cornerstone. Plead with God to cause us to be expanding in our knowing and worshiping of Him! There is no greater prayer you can pray than that, and no prayer God delights to answer more than that. Second, consider inviting a friend, neighbor, or coworker to worship this Sunday. The beginning of a new sermon series and a new Sunday school year serves as a great time to invite others to come to Cornerstone. We had a family and a young couple who both visited our church for the first time last Sunday simply because they were invited. Praise the Lord! Third, reflect upon these words of A.W. Tozer from the preface of his classic work The Pursuit of God: “Sound Bible exposition is an imperative must in the church of the living God. Without it, no church can be a New Testament church in any strict meaning of the term. But exposition may be carried on in such way as to leave the hearers devoid of any true spiritual nourishment whatsoever. For it is not mere words that nourish the soul, but God Himself; and unless and until the hearers find God in personal experience, they are not the better for having heard the truth. The Bible is not an end in itself, but a means to bring them to an intimate and satisfying knowledge of God, that they may enter into Him, that they may delight in His presence, may taste and know the inner sweetness of the very God Himself in the core and center of their being, their spirit.” May God use His word this coming Lord’s Day to draw us into the sweetness of the intimate, expanding, soul-satisfying knowing of Himself! Yours in Christ, Pastor Nick |
