Leadership Team Retreat
Benjamin Kreps:
Hey everyone. And welcome to the Mark Prater podcast, where our aim is to connect our global family of churches with our Executive Director. Mark. I understand next week, you're headed to Nashville for a Leadership Team retreat. Why are you guys gathering for a retreat next week?
Mark Prater:
We have three retreats a year as a Leadership Team, and we find that they're very important for us for just a number of reasons. First of all, we're spread out geographically as a Leadership Team. So we do a lot of our work over screens via zoom. So we have three retreats planned per year, one in the winter, one in the spring, summer and one in the fall. And in such a tumultuous year, the one we had planned for June, we ended up doing via Zoom and, and it went okay. It actually went better than what we thought. But we believe it's time to gather together.
And they're important for a strategic discussion where we can just linger over a topic over time. And second, they're so important to build relationally. As you know, one of our values in Sovereign Grace is to build relationships. That includes the men on the Leadership Team. And given that we're adding some new men on the Leadership Team, those guys will be joining us. All but Dave Taylor, who can't get out of Australia, the borders are closed in that nation. But Jon Payne and Jared Mellinger will be joining us along with Eric Turbedsky. This will only be his second retreat. So it's really important and timely from a relational standpoint, as well.
Benjamin Kreps:
Right. So basically you'll just be hanging out and drinking beer and eating barbecue for a few days? Is that the whole agenda? What actually will you be talking about and thinking through together next week at the retreat?
Mark Prater:
Oh, there'll be guys on the Leadership Team that would just love for that to be the only agenda item.
Benjamin Kreps:
Relational baby. Come on!
Mark Prater:
Yeah, that's right. That's right. But I have a few other things that I've actually already sent out to the team so they could just be prepared. I send out an agenda a few weeks before the retreat. Not only to send along some of the things I want to talk about, but give them a chance to put things on the agenda. It gives me a chance to assign things to them. So the first day that we're together, we're really going to talk about our future. I think I mentioned that in a previous podcast. We put together a five to 10-year strategic plan for Sovereign Grace that represented the Executive Committee. We're just going to work through that as a team.
But I also asked them to come and answer the question, “Over the next five to 10 years, what is it that you hope for, for our family of churches?” I want to hear from them. So that's a conversation I'm really looking forward to.
We're going to talk about leadership development. How do we continue to develop men in our denomination for regional denominational leadership and what changes do we need to make and the approach we've taken and in the men that we've had participating? We're going to talk a little bit about that. Jon and Jared are going to bring a whole proposal about reaching future generations in our churches in a way that inspires them, not only for our mission, but they say, “I'm going to call Sovereign Grace my home,” is really the goal of all of that.
We're going to plan the Council of Elders meeting in a little bit more detail, as well as our November 11th Pastors and Wives meeting (on live stream) that we have planned which we're really looking forward to.
The other thing we're going to spend some time talking about is just how we work together as a Leadership Team. So with adding the new guys onto the team, this is a really good time for us to remember why we even exist. The Leadership Team exists to serve the members, the pastors and churches of Sovereign Grace. We exist to serve them, you as our pastors and members of our churches, you don't exist to serve us. And so it's good just to talk through that. Now we primarily do that through leadership, but we still want to be servant leaders.
The other thing we're going to be talking about just in terms of working together is how do we make decisions because we're spread out geographically, primarily doing things over Zoom meetings. What decisions do we need to make together as a team? What decisions can an individual guiding the Leadership Team make? What decisions can we just give the subcommittees to make, just so that we remain efficient and effective in the way that we serve our pastors and our churches?
Eric is going to be doing some updates on church planting. He wants to talk about church plant funding. Mickey wants to talk a little bit about just some ongoing changes in the future for our BCO that I think will be helpful. And he's thinking about helping you guys think through and plan for retirement, not just in our age group, mine and Mickey’s age group, but even a younger age groups.
And then we always take some time to talk about what are the current theological or evangelical issues that we should be tracking and identify those so that we can equip our pastors to be prepared to address them.
Benjamin Kreps:
That's good. It sounds like it's going to be a profitable time. I would imagine a number of us pastors will be praying for you guys. What's a way, one or two things specifically, that we can pray for you guys as you meet next week?
Mark Prater:
Yep. Thanks for praying. First, we need your prayers. So first pray for wisdom. In any decisions that we make, we just want to be led by God. We want to make decisions that are best for our pastors and churches. And then second, pray that God would continue to build us relationally as a team. I think we're all looking forward to gathering together since we missed our retreat in June. So just pray that God strengthens our friendships.
Benjamin Kreps:
Will do. And next episode, Lord willing, we'll be getting an update about how that retreat went. So looking forward to hearing the report from you. So thanks Mark. Thank you Leadership Team for taking time to gather and to work through ways that you can effectively serve us. And thank you everyone for watching. We'll see you here next time.