Wise Influence | Proverbs 12:26
Last Saturday Joe, Jennie, John and myself went to a conference in Millis Mass. Millis is southwest of Boston near Medway. The conference was on frontline ministry. Maybe you’re new to Cornerstone and our use of the word “frontline” is new to you. We define our frontline this way: “Your Frontline is the place where you spend the majority of your time outside the church, where you are in contact with non-Christians.” – Life on the Frontline So our frontlines…
Wise Decision Making | Proverbs 16:1-9
Prudence is married, she has three children, and lives in a suburb of Boston. Her oldest boy is a freshman in high school and is doing great. Her youngest is in elementary school and loves it; but her middle child is in middle school and isn’t doing well. She’s hasn’t made any friends, sometimes gets picked on, is bored and uninterested with her education, and she’s begun acting out more at home. Prudence is worried about her daughter’s education as…
Wise Words | Proverbs 18:21
On a Podcast I listened to recently one of the speakers talked about barnacles. Did you know that the U.S. Navy reports Barnacles can slow down nuclear-powered ships by as much as 40%? Barnacles diminish the arrow-dynamics of boats, get inside engines, add weight on the hull, and can even crack the hull with smaller vessels. Barnacles expand and breed constantly and the navy spends $500 million a year to scrape barnacles off ships. Are your words the nuclear energy…
Wise Wealth | Proverbs 10:1-4
I want to kick of today’s sermon in Proverbs by reading you a verse from the gospel of Matthew. Matthew 6:21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (NIV) These are Jesus’ words. They come from the Sermon on the Mount. He taught us to not store up treasurer on earth, where it can be destroyed, but to store it up in heaven, where it’s safe. And then he says, “For where your treasure is…. there…
Politics | Jeremiah 29:4-14 (Faithful Presence)
Today I’m preaching on politics. I was just at my fourth Ockenga retreat at Gordon-Conwell and this was our topic. My goal today is not to convince you to vote for a candidate or issue or to review this week’s news but to help us all process how the Bible calls believers to think about politics. Today’s sermon is not comprehensive, but hopefully you’ll find it helpful, or at least thought-provoking. If you want to have a friendly conversation about…
Wise Parenting | Proverbs 22:6
Introduction A few weeks ago, Jonathan presented in his sermon the Dunning-Kruger Effect. I had never heard of this before, but it resonated with me. It felt true. Then he showed this graphic, and because of this typo, I knew I had to do more research on my own on this topic. I like this graphic is a little better. However, when it comes to the Dunning-Kruger effect, I have done just enough research to end up in the valley…
Wonder Woman | Proverbs 31:10-31
Do you remember when the movie Wonder Woman came out in 2017? Wonder Woman featured a strong, noble, courageous, sometimes insecure, but ultimately heroic female super hero, the Amazon warrior Diana Prince. When this movie came out it inspired little girls everywhere. Right after this movie released in June 2017 this little girl was dressing up as Wonder Woman with a huge grin. She didn’t care it wasn’t Halloween or that it was summer. She was Wonder Woman! This little…
Wise Leadership | Proverbs 31.1-9
Alan can’t for the life of him see why God still has him in this organization. It’s a [cold] place — this big bank — and he’s been thinking about leaving for a while. He’s been brought in to a team that’s being led by a much younger man who right now needs an older [leader] to steady the ship. Alan is that older [leader]. There are 130 in the team, their profitability is plummeting, and their employee engagement numbers…
The Humble Learner | Proverbs 30:1-33
A man walked into a bank with no mask or hat or sunglasses and robbed the bank at gunpoint in broad daylight. Then he did it again that same day at another bank, still with no mask or hat or sunglasses or disguise of any kind. The year was 1995 and there were security cameras. When the police came they examined the footage and showed a nice picture of the robber on the nightly news. They got tips right away,…
The Wise Choice | Proverbs 9:1-18
Sometimes it all comes down to a single choice. You ever watch that old gameshow Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? It finally got cancelled this summer but the concept was pretty simple. The original gameshow host Regis Philbin would ask a contestant trivia questions. The questions were pretty easy at first but they got progressively harder and harder. But that also meant that each question was worth more and more, ranging from $100 to $1,000,000. If you answered all…
Jesus in Proverbs | Proverbs 8:1-36
Christ-centered gospel sermon on Proverbs 8:22-31, Colossians 1:15-17, and Proverbs 30:3-4 explaining Jesus’ relation to woman wisdom and the son.
Wise Speech | Proverbs 3:13-18
Before I was born, my parents bought a small chicken farm. The people before us might have been successful at this but my father grew up in the city. He didn’t have a clue. But, that didn’t stop him. He figured that if those simple people could do it, he could do it better. So, he bought 500 baby chicks and the fun began. Anyone remember the program, “Green Acres?” That was my father, a city businessman who moved to…