Investing in Our Global Leaders

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

Benjamin 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, those who are following the podcast know that a number of months ago you hurt your knee, you tore a tendon in your knee. The good news is you're healing nicely right on track. Your doctors are pleased with your progress, but what that also means is that you are back to your regular busy slate of retreats and traveling, which includes next week a retreat for global pastors in Sovereign Grace churches. Talk to us about that.

Mark Prater:

Yeah. First of all, if you prayed for my knee and my recovery, thank you for praying, God answered those prayers. My knee is, I think, where it's supposed to be, the doctor's really pleased, still doing some physical therapy, but very pleased with progress. It does allow me to travel, which I'm looking forward to going to the Global Leaders Retreat.

Myself and other leadership team members will be there. Then a leadership team retreat will follow. It's kind of what we did in February where we had a leadership team retreat and we invited the regional leaders. In this case we're going to the global leaders and starting with their retreat. And that's very strategic for us because we have men in different parts of the world who are leading and building Sovereign Grace with us in their respective nations. And we want to invest into them and care for them and equip them. And that's what this retreat is all about. So in that sense, it's very strategic.

The other purpose of the retreat is really for the leadership team to learn from them. Just like we learned from our regional leaders in February at our retreat, we will take a lot from this retreat that will help us to serve our pastors and churches better, not only here in the States but throughout the world. And so we're looking forward to benefiting from the input and the feedback we hear from them.

So let me tell you just who's going to be there. Not all of our global leaders are able to make it, but Faras from Pakistan is able to come. Barnabas from Nepal, Ed O'Mara and Rocco Dalia from Italy will be there. Michael Granger from Ethiopia, Riley Spring from Sydney, Australia, our leader in Australia. Carlos Contreras, who is our leader in Mexico. Joselo Mercado, as you know, travels throughout Latin America. Jeffrey Jo in the Philippines isn't going to be there. He just didn't have time to get a visa and wasn't able to meet immigration requirements. So we'll miss him, for example. And then some of the guys on the leadership team will be there. As I mentioned in previous podcasts, the February retreat, we have the entire leadership team there. And then I sort of determine who comes from the leadership team to the other two retreats. For this retreat, it'll be obviously Dave Taylor, who's our Director of Global Missions, he's coming from Sydney, as well as Jeff Purswell, Jon Payne, and myself. Jared, his second oldest, his son Ben, is graduating from high school. I want him to stay home because that's more important than a retreat.

So those are the guys that are gathering together next week. And if you think of it, please pray for this retreat and pray for each of those men that I just listed. Not only that God would encourage them and equip them during this retreat, but also continue to pray for them as they lead in their respective nations.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. That is quite a roster that will be gathering at the retreat. So grateful that God has given us the privilege of partnering with these excellent leaders across the globe, around the world. And so eager to hear how that retreat goes. And you actually want to talk to us about what's going to happen at that retreat.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I want to just because I think it's just good for folks to know. I want folks to know, and it can inform your prayers as well. So we're going to start and really spend the very first day just getting updates from each of those guys. We're asking for updates about their family, about their church and about their nation. And then after they give those updates, we want to hear what are the challenges they're facing in their nation as they build Sovereign Grace in their nation. And I think that'll be just a good day for us as a leadership team just to hear and to learn not only to care for them and to pray for them, but also to think about what we can do to serve them in the challenges that they're facing in ministry. It'll be interesting to see how some of those challenges maybe are the same as the states and how they're different than the states. And so I'm really looking forward to that discussion.

And then we've got some teachings that are planned. There are shorter teachings because we want them to set up a discussion. So I'm going to be teaching a message leading toward godliness. The purpose of that is to encourage our leaders to build godly churches and to lead in a way that we build godly churches. And that will set up a discussion that we'll have about how to do that. Jon Payne is going to be teaching on leading towards team ministry. Jon's got excellent material on team ministry and we want to continue to build plurality in team ministry as we expand throughout the world. So that will be a real important teaching and then conversation.

Jeff Purswell is going to do a sermon or a message on leading toward the future. And really that focuses in on 2 Timothy 2 to develop future men and trust the faithful men, the work of the gospel. So it's identifying and equipping future men. It's really more the weight of that text that Jeff brings across for a pastor, that this must be on his job description, if you can say it that way. Developing future pastors. And then Dave is going to be teaching on leading towards clarity and really what he's going to do, I'm so glad he's doing this one, the subtitle is "just seeing through the fog when life is a lot". And I think for any pastor anywhere, life can be a lot, but you think about places like Pakistan where there's persecution, some things we don't face here in the states in quite the same way. That feels like even more than a lot. And so it'll be a great chance for Dave to speak into that biblically and for us to care for our leaders.

So that's a little bit about what we've got planned and discussions we hope to have with our guys. And again, thank you for praying for this, what I think is, a very strategic retreat for the leadership team with our global leaders.

Benjamin Kreps:

Wonderful. Well, it sounds like an excellent agenda that you're going to enjoy together with these global leaders. It's encouraging that we get to benefit from these men and their particular context across the globe and learn from them. And then that our leadership team can actually bless these men with the excellent encouragement and teaching that we've enjoyed here in North America over many years. So thank you, Mark, for the update. Let's all be praying for this retreat. Thanks for checking out the podcast. We'll see you here next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.