Giving to Gospel Mission
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Ben Kreps:
Hey everyone, and welcome to the Mark Prater podcast, where our aim is to connect our global family of Sovereign Grace churches with our Executive Director. Mark, as you well know, and those who read and watch the podcast know, one virtue that has marked Sovereign Grace over our history is the shaping virtue of generosity. We have been a family of churches that is marked by profound generosity. And you have a story for us about someone being very generous.
Mark Prater:
I do. Before I tell that story, first of all, for those that are listening or reading to this podcast who have given financially to Sovereign Grace, thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you for your generous, faithful giving that invests into our mission of advancing the gospel of Jesus Christ. Together, mission requires finances and the people of Sovereign Grace, the pastors of Sovereign Grace, the churches of Sovereign Grace, and as you said, Ben, they have just been consistently generous. And on behalf of the Leadership Team, I thank God for you. I do have a wonderful story of generosity. A member of one of our churches was diagnosed with cancer last year and she went home to be with the Lord in March. A faithful member of one of our churches, someone that I knew and didn't realize at the time, that before her death, she planned her estate and planned to give money to Sovereign Grace, because she supported and believed in our mission of advancing the gospel of Jesus Christ together.
So, we recently received a generous gift from her estate, that was both humbling and encouraging at the same time. It's just a wonderful expression and example of how members of our churches are just so key to our mission. Obviously our pastors do what they do so well, but without faithful members, our mission wouldn't be as strong. And so it's just one expression of that. And when we received our gift, we were talking as a Leadership Team, and just made a decision to take that gift and give it to our church plant fund. Our pastors that are listening or reading might remember that about four years ago, the Council of Elders established a church plant fund, right? And that money is to be used to support church plants throughout the world.
And because we have 20 church plants planned over the next two years in different parts of the world, in Sovereign Grace, we thought that was a wise investment of our money. We've been drawing money out of that fund and haven't replenished it quite as quickly. So we're giving the gift to the church plant fund. And in the way that I knew the member who gave this gift, she would be thrilled, just thrilled, that money is going to that kind of work because she was just a very mission minded woman. So it's a wonderful story. And, yes, again, an expression of not only partnership, but how our members in our churches participate in partnership.
Ben Kreps:
Yeah, it's wonderful to consider that that last act of generosity before she went to be with the savior means the gospel advances. And she arrives before Christ with a pile of treasure in front of her <laugh>. You know, she gave to a future that she would not see. But yet you can easily imagine one day, those who become Christians because of church plants going up to her in the new Earth and saying, thank you, for your generous investment. It's all gain, no loss, when it comes to giving to God and advancing his mission. So if guys or ladies that are reading this or watching this might be interested in that kind of estate planning or might know people in their churches that might be interested in that kind of thing, what do we do? How do we go about doing that?
Mark Prater:
Yeah, we are actually working on that now. I've asked Tommy Hill to work on some estate planning tools, and obviously he's seeking professional counsel and help on how to do that. He's actively involved in those conversations. So it's our hope soon that we can at least make our churches aware, our pastors aware, our members aware, anybody else outside Sovereign Grace, that wants to do estate planning, we have tools that we want to make available to them. That as they begin to think about planning their estate, they may want to invest into the future of advancing the mission of the gospel. They may want to do that in investing into Sovereign Grace and our specific mission. It's just a wonderful thing to think about because it does leave a bit of a gospel legacy in that sense that some of your earthly treasures are being left behind, even though you're gonna get those rewards in heaven that you just talked about then. But you're leaving earthly treasures behind so that on this earth the mission of the Gospel of Jesus Christ can continue. And so you'll be hearing more about that soon. And, so I just encourage anyone that is sort of reaching that age of the founding generation in Sovereign Grace Churches to consider including Sovereign Grace in your estate planning.
And for anyone listening, we not only thank you for your generous giving, but we so much need your generous giving so that we can advance the gospel, for example, by planting 20 churches over the next two years in different parts of the world, which we're excited about. We pray that it leads to reaching people who have not yet repented of their sin and placed their faith in Jesus Christ. And so that's the aim of the giving, is to have more people gathered on that great day around the throne singing with us; Worthy is the Lamb.
Ben Kreps:
Excellent. Well, thanks for that update. I'm so grateful to be part of a family of churches that is marked by generosity. What a joy. And, uh, thank you for the update. We'll look forward to hearing more about, um, the tools that, that you guys come up with in the days ahead. Thank you all for watching or reading. We'll see you here, Lord willing next week. Bye for now.