Sovereign Grace in 10 Years
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, on a previous podcast, you talked to us about a leadership team retreat that was coming up. You were at that retreat as we're recording this last week. And because you guys are not only a team that thinks reactively about what's going on in Sovereign Grace, but you want to think proactively and get out ahead of things. You were having a discussion about what Sovereign Grace Churches might look like in 10 years and you wanted to talk to us about that.
Mark Prater:
Yeah, I put this on the agenda because I really want us to think through this issue. Let me just give you some reasons why I put this on the agenda. And by the way, we had great discussion, which I'll reference in just a moment. In the next 10 years, the next generation of pastors and leaders in Sovereign Grace will be leading our local churches, will be leading regionally, will be leading nationally and globally. That's just due to the ages of the men that are in their sixties and fifties. 10 years from now, they'll be transitioning leadership. In 10 years we will have most of many of our local churches led by the next generation of pastors, which is encouraging. In 10 years, I'm not going to be the executive director, maybe not on the leadership team.
Most likely in 10 years, we will potentially increase the number of churches in Sovereign Grace from the 91 partner churches we have now to 280 partner churches approximately by the year 2034. So that looks a little bit different. In 10 years, we could have more than two ecclesiastical nations. Right now we have the United States and Mexico, potentially an ecclesiastical nation, the Philippines, in East Africa, maybe Ethiopia for example, in Latin America, Costa Rica or Columbia could all be ecclesiastical nations 10 years from now. Because of that, we might have additional clarity on our global ecclesiastical structure, meaning we might have a council of nations that would be sort of like the council of elders, but on a global level. We might have a global leadership team with different leaderships in different nations. And those are just some of the ways that Sovereign Grace might look a little bit different 10 years from now, without being presumptuous, of course. And all dependent upon the grace of God.
And I mentioned all this to the leadership team because I think we have this both wonderful and strategic responsibility right now. It's actually twin responsibilities. So the first one is that we have this obligation to prepare our family of churches for the transition that will occur over the next 10 years. And then the second responsibility is that we have to lead in a way right now that Sovereign Grace is what we would hope for after that transition occurs 10 years from now. So that's why I put this topic on the agenda so that we could plan and strategize and lead well now in a way that impacts the future of Sovereign Grace 10 years from now. And as everyone knows, listening or reading this podcast, 10 years goes by pretty quick. So we've got to get to work as a leadership team.
Benjamin Kreps:
That's excellent. It is thrilling to think about what Sovereign Grace might look like globally in the years ahead, just even thinking about potentially a globally diverse leadership team overseeing things and helping not just in North America but across the globe. And so it sounds like it was a wonderful conversation and an important one to have as well. So Mark, what do you hope Sovereign Grace churches looks like in 10 years?
Mark Prater:
Yeah, I'll give you some of my thoughts and also some of the thoughts from guys on the leadership team that shared during the retreat. I mean, one of the ways I hope Sovereign Grace looks like 10 years from now, I wrote it this way, churches that are led by second and third generation pastors who in the presence of cultural pressures or possibly even persecution, are courageously committed to expository preaching, to being biblically faithful, to being gospel centered, and building with our virtues and values in a way that we remain devoted to the mission that Christ has given us to reach all nations with the good news of Jesus Christ. That's sort of a summary. May we be that in 10 years from now.
Jeff Purswell mentioned that our entire body of elders 10 years from now would be standing firm on our statement of faith and our theological convictions. Jeff also said this, that the continued outworking of our ecclesiology, such that our local practices are increasingly consistent across partnership, pastorally and theologically. In other words, we're wanting to see some degree of methodological consistency while factoring in cultural differences that are going to be obvious in different parts of the world. So we shouldn't have this big variance theologically not only in conviction but in practice as we go from generation to generation in Sovereign Grace. I just thought that was really well said.
Jon Payne mentioned, here's what I hope we look like in 10 years, that we stay true to our core, which he defined as one theological consistency that isn't dependent on Jeff because we need other guys that will take Jeff's place. Second, zeal; that we would continue to have a zeal in our passion for God and zeal for our passion for God's people, a pastoral heart that we want pastors to have. And three, strategic leadership positioning; that we have the right strategic leaders in the right positions throughout the world. And Dave Taylor just mentioned the hope that we are doing a good job of reaching the unreached 10 years from now. So those are just some of the comments that the guys made.
The other thing that we dropped into, just because you can see this in church history, as denominations expand, as they grow, that there can be this vulnerability for factions to actually be created within the denomination, we might call them progressive and conservative wings of the denomination. So how do we lead now in such a way that those don't form in Sovereign Grace? And we've only got a few ideas there. That is a conversation we need to continue as a leadership team.
Jeff had, I thought, a really good observation where he said, what you see is either denominational leadership that is disconnected from seminaries and or denominational leadership that goes astray theologically. That's what you begin to see. And the reason why denominational leadership needs to stay connected to seminaries is seminaries are training future pastors in a lot of denominations. And if they go astray, then the denomination can fracture that way. And so we've got to just remain true to our pastors college as it currently exists so that it doesn't drift in any way, and that requires denominational leadership and we need the right guys on the leadership team so that we don't go astray theologically. So I just thought that was a wonderful observation on his part. Anyway, so just to kind of pull that out, so we've got some ideas on how to lead in a way that we continue to remain faithful to our theological convictions and statement of faith even if God allows for us to expand globally.
One other thing in that conversation that I just briefly touched on and gave to the leadership team is from a chapter in D.A. Carson's book. This is the title of the book, The Gospel and the Modern World, A Theological Vision for the Church. If you don't have that book and you're a pastor, get that book. There's some wonderful chapters in that. The one I'm referencing is a chapter entitled Subtle Ways to Abandon the Authority of Scripture. And what Carson does is he has 10 different ways that we can abandon the authority of scripture and we can basically drift theologically, and as Carson points out, we're not surprised at this observation that theological drift happens subtly. And so I would encourage you to read the whole chapter.
I'm just going to mention a few of those 10 points. Number one, he says, an appeal to selective evidence. Some theological drifts are obvious, others are more subtle. This is what Carson says, the simple refusal to talk about disputed matters in order to sidestep controversy in the local church for the sake of peace, we offer antodine treatments of hot topics like homosexual marriage or gender issues in the forlorn hope that some of these topics will eventually go away. The best antidote is systematic expository preaching for such preaching forces us to deal with texts and those issues as they come up. I just thought that was so well said. Let us be faithful to expository preaching and faithful to the texts and not afraid. Have the courage to address hot topics, as he said, that will keep us from drifting theologically.
Number six, the sixth one he listed: too little reading. So guys, we got to read; pastors and members of our churches got to read, and he says this, especially the reading of older commentaries and theological works. It was interesting he said that. Here's number seven: the failure to be bound by the formal principle and the material principle; the formal principle that constrains us in the authority of scripture, the material principle that constrains us in the substance of the scripture, the gospel itself. And we need both. I just thought, oh, that is so well said. So there's the few points from Carson's 10 points of how you can drift theologically that I shared with the leadership team. And we talked through those a little bit, a great chapter for pastors to read and to be reminded of how we can drift theologically so that we remain committed to our statement of faith, not only now, but 10 years from now, 20 years from now, and 30 years from now, should the Lord allow us to exist for that long.
Benjamin Kreps:
Amen. I'm so grateful for you men and the wisdom and insight that you're communicating to us that you guys experienced in your discussion at your retreat. Thankful for your guys' sacrifice of regularly leaving home to gather, to serve Sovereign Grace. There was a guy at our recent guest reception essentially, who was visiting from a denomination that has drifted completely off of God's will for the church. And he asked me the question honestly. He said, how do you know that won't happen to Sovereign Grace? And I said, that's a good question. We do not want to be self-righteous or prideful in thinking that it couldn't happen to us. And so, how grateful I am to hear, and I'm sure everyone checking on this podcast, to hear how you guys are going to be helping us to stand firm in the days ahead. So thanks, Mark. Thanks for the update. Thank you all for checking out the podcast. We'll see you here, Lord willing next week. Bye for now.