Partnership In Giving

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, the past few weeks we've been talking about some wonderful developments in mission and global partnership and ministry that's happening here and abroad. The reality is, as we all know, ministry and mission takes money. And so, you've been thinking over the past months about what we do going forward to help fund Sovereign Grace Central and the ministry that's happening there through Sovereign Grace Central. Can you talk to us about that?

Mark Prater:

I have been putting a lot of thought into it. And my first thought is to express gratitude for the giving that comes from our churches. Just to remind everyone, Sovereign Grace Central and our regions have basically two streams of income. The first is giving that comes from our churches and second is giving that comes from our individual donors. And I'm happy to report—and humbled by the fact—that we have more churches in Sovereign Grace now giving at a 10% level than we ever have since we put that giving plan in place when we established our partnership agreement back in 2013. So to all the guys listening who give to Sovereign Grace from your church operating budget, thank you. But I've also been thinking a little bit about how we reach our individual donors more effectively as well.

Benjamin Kreps:

So, what are the new ways that you have been thinking about how we might do that going forward? There's some philosophical shift, I think. I know in the past we had our yearly mission Sunday, typically in a lot of churches and an emphasis there on giving in the local church. But you've been thinking about some different strategies. Can you share them?

Mark Prater:

Sure. And you can still do those Sovereign Grace Sunday mission events and offerings. We hope those do continue. But I'm making two philosophical shifts in how we can more effectively reach individual donors, 95% of which are members in our local churches. So, the first philosophical shift is this we're going to continue to produce quarterly Sovereign Grace mission videos. We get a lot of good feedback on those. Many guys that are listening to this show those videos during a Sunday service, or maybe put them on their website. But what we've done for years annually is to produce a mission fund booklet. And as I looked at that booklet again recently, I just think it's too text heavy, especially in the world that we live in today. I'm not sure that a lot of people are going to read all the way through it, even though it's filled with some good and inspiring stories.

So, the philosophical shift we're making is to produce quarterly shorter mission fund brochures that carry one theme for the year, but includes stories each quarter, different stories, that will cast a vision for what we're doing globally around the world with planting and strengthening churches and I think hopefully inspire giving. So that's the first philosophical shift. I'm hoping that you can get your first quarterly shorter mission fund brochure by the end of March, at least that's our aim anyway.

And then the second philosophical shift is to just target and get to know people who have the gift of giving that are members of our churches. And I just want to get to know them. One illustration is we've got a 30-year member of one of our churches. And as I listened to this man, he just has a burden—he and his wife—to see Sovereign Grace expand in Latin America. So, through several conversations we established a Latin America development fund and he and his wife, through two separate gifts, gave $200,000. It’s stunning, really. $200,000 to establish this fund. And there's categories within this fund for how the money is going to be used. And so, he knew upfront how we were going to use this money. For example, just to do establish a website and social media presence that would get reformed resources into the hands of pastors in Latin America. A fund for church planting. A fund to theologically equip pastors in Latin America are some of the categories.

And I'm in conversations with a donor right now who has a heart for Africa. And we're talking about the possibility—and the key word is possibility whether this happens or not, but about the possibility—of creating an Africa development fund that we would name in honor of Wilbroad Chanda, our friend and fellow pastor who's now in glory. And that fund would be used, at least we're initially thinking, to support Pastors Colleges in Africa. We have one in Zambia because of Wilbroad. We have one in Liberia because of Dyonah. Michael Granger is looking to start one in Ethiopia. And so, it would be a great way to theologically train pastors in in Africa. We'd also have a church planting fund to plant churches in Africa. And then also a plan to care for pastors. And there's just a number of unique ways that church planting has done in some parts of Africa. For example, West Africa, a lot of times what Dyonah will do is to establish a school to provide education. Kids come, and then he can reach their parents with the gospel. So that may be a category in that fund.

All that to say, I'm wanting to sit down and listen to donors about the burdens they have and see if there's a way that we can sort of create something that would sort of fulfill that burden that they could give to Sovereign Grace as we look to expand and advance the gospel globally.

Benjamin Kreps:

Wonderful! Love hearing those reports. I know that I get to tell my church about the things that are happening in Sovereign Grace and communicate to those who give in my church: you are sharing in ministry around the globe, through your giving. So, what a joy it is to be partnered together in the gospel and through our giving and Sovereign Grace. So, thank you, Mark, for putting in the hard work and thinking about this. And we look forward to hearing more in the days ahead. Thank you everyone for watching, and we'll see here soon. Bye for now.