The Vital Connection Between Sovereign Grace Music and Sovereign Grace Churches
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Benjamin Kreps:
Hey everyone. Welcome to the Mark Prater podcast, where our aim is to connect our global family of Sovereign Grace Churches with our executive director. This is the Mark Prater podcast. This is not the Sound and Doctrine podcast, but this is the ultimate mashup. The beams are being crossed in Sovereign Grace podcasting.
Bob Kauflin:
I'm kind of surprised it's called the Mark Prater podcast.
Mark Prater:
Yeah, I am too.
Bob Kauflin:
Actually, I don't have one called the Bob Kauflin Podcast, but maybe I should suggest it.
Mark Prater:
Maybe you should. Let me know how it goes.
Bob Kauflin:
Did you run that by a team or anything?
No, I think Ben and I just decided. <laughter>
Bob Kauflin:
Well, it's an honor to be here as part of the Mark Prater podcast.
Mark Prater:
It's an honor and to have you. And by the way, I've wanted to have Bob on this podcast for a couple of reasons. One of them is that this is the most famous man in Sovereign Grace for different reasons. It is a joy to have you on the podcast,
Benjamin Kreps:
And this is a great opportunity for us to talk about Sovereign Grace Music and its vital connection to Sovereign Grace Churches. In fact, I was introduced to Sovereign Grace Churches back 16 years ago through the song "Jesus, Thank You". And then discovered after the fact that there were actually churches involved in Sovereign Grace. And so we wanted to have you on to talk about the vital connection between Sovereign Grace Music and Sovereign Grace Churches. Talk to us about that, Bob.
Bob Kauflin:
Well, Sovereign Grace Music wouldn't exist without Sovereign Grace Churches. That's just the facts. It began because, in the early eighties, we were being taught things about the gospel, about the sovereignty of God, about the doctrine of the church, about our mission, and we looked around for current songs that were being written about this stuff and we couldn't find them, at least not very many of them. So, we started writing songs for our churches, and I remember Mark Altrogge used to send tapes around to different churches, cassette tapes, and we just started doing that on a regular basis that eventually became Sovereign Grace Music. And we've produced over 60 projects, which are intended primarily to serve our churches. But God and his kindness has enabled us to move beyond that and serve churches throughout the world.
Mark Prater:
And we've talked about this a lot, Bob, and how do we continue to strengthen that connection between Sovereign Grace Churches and Sovereign Grace Music? And I think that gets a little bit at the mission of Sovereign Grace Music. So tell us about that.
Bob Kauflin:
Well, the mission of Sovereign Grace Music is to produce Christ exalting songs and training for the church from our local churches. So again, what we do emerges from the teachings we receive, whether that be at pastor's conference or in our local churches through the resources we provide. What kind of response does that engender in us in song? Those are the kinds of songs we're trying to write. So as we write these songs for the church from our local churches, we're also doing something else, which is kind of a second part of our mission statement. We write songs to strengthen and plant churches.
And Devon, my son, came up with that. It just succinctly describes what we're seeking to do. Songs aren't just singing. They're enabling the word of Christ to dwell in us spiritually. Colossians 3:16 says that the word of Christ is the gospel which transforms lives. So as we think about the people in our churches, we want to serve them with songs that will strengthen their connection to God, to Jesus, to the gospel, to each other. And that's what our hope is as we write those songs, that they'll be able to sing them on Sunday mornings and experience the work of the Spirit in building them not only into Christ, but into each other. And the Lord in his kindness often causes our music to go ahead of our church planting efforts.
So, there are a number of stories where, Ben, you just shared one, I hear regularly: "Oh, I didn't even know there were Sovereign Grace Churches, I just know your music." But in Latin America, goodness gracious, we are planning on being in there in Columbia. We've been in Mexico for a long time and praise God for all that's taking place there. And we're now expanding into other parts of Latin America. But a large part of that is due to the success of the music that we've recorded in Spanish, two albums back in early '14 and '15 made with Jonathan and Sarah Jerez, but now recently, thanks to the major help of Fabrizio Rodulfo who heads up our Spanish section, we recorded En Ti Esperamos. And these songs are just being sung in churches all throughout Latin America. So pastors hear about it, they go, what is this? And then they find out we are actually a denomination, a family of churches, which then provides an opportunity to go in, work with pastors, and Lord willing, see them brought into Sovereign Grace.
Mark Prater:
Yeah. Amen. In fact, you've got a trip planned, I believe this spring, to the Philippines.
Bob Kauflin:
Oh, and the Philippines was the other country I thought of where we had been doing some work in the Philippines for many years. And actually we were there in 2013 to put on a conference, a Worship God conference. We had a thousand people come, but there was really no follow-up. We did a concert, had a thousand people come, and there was not much fruit that was visible from that. But because people know our music, Dave Taylor and others went in and started meeting with pastors who knew about the music, didn't know about us, and now we're headed back to the Philippines to be with Jeffrey Jo in Manila. And they've got some big things planned.
Mark Prater:
They Do. We have four partner churches there in the Philippines, and there's another 15 or 16 in the adoption process. So what you did in 2013 wasn't fruitless. It laid a foundation; Dave Taylor went in. And because of the leadership of Jeffrey Jo in the Philippines, now you're going to go and just expand what we're building there because of the impact of Sovereign Grace Music.
Bob Kauflin:
And we're feeling like we're doing exactly what we want to do, using our music to strengthen and plant churches, which is much better than simply trying to write songs to get at the top of the CCM charts. Praise God If our songs get to the top of the CCM charts, but we write them for the purpose of strengthening the body of Christ and along with resources that we provide, the Worship Matters intensive and the Worship God conferences and other things that we do, but the songs are the primary way that we seek to serve our churches for the strengthening and planting of more of those churches.
Mark Prater:
Yeah. Amen. You serve our churches very, very well.
Bob Kauflin:
Trying, Mark. I'm trying with a great team.
Mark Prater:
With the songs that you write and produce that we sing in our churches, and then the way that you train our song leaders, our worship leaders, that has a real impact now that serves churches outside of Sovereign Grace, which we are so glad for. But there's something unique about Sovereign Grace Music in addition to that, as you said, helping us advance the mission of the gospel through the partnership of churches who hear about Sovereign Grace Music and want to be a part of Sovereign Grace. And it does lead to the planting of new Sovereign Grace churches. So it's a wonderful way God has blessed this relationship, I think for what, 30 years or more?
Bob Kauflin:
Well, going back to almost 40 years, around 40 years. And I think people often have the misunderstanding that Sovereign Grace Music could just branch off and do its own thing. And we couldn't. Most of the staff, that would include me, David Zimmer, Fabrizio, Bekah Heid, Grace Nixon, our auto engineer, and then Devon works part-time for Sovereign Grace Music while he's a senior pastor, but we could not do what we do apart from the people in our churches. We work with people who are outside of churches, like with songwriters, but for the most part, they come from within our churches. And we're seeking to train the people in our churches; pastors as well as the music leaders and musicians, to serve our churches more effectively, and in God's kindness there are people outside Sovereign Grace who we want to serve as well. I just want to always make sure that our focus is mostly primarily on our churches because that's the little tribe that God's given us to work with. And that's just no other place we'd rather be.
Mark Prater:
I'm so glad you're here. Listen, if you're a Sovereign Grace pastor listening to or reading this podcast, Bob and I want you to know we thank God for you. Hearing that our songwriters primarily come from our churches, that is the fruit of your faithful preaching Sunday after Sunday, where you teach them sound doctrine or you pastor them with God's word. And that has an effect on every member in your church. But some of those are songwriters, and that's your contribution to this relationship between Sovereign Grace Music and Sovereign Grace Churches. So we thank God for you.
Bob Kauflin:
Amen. Absolutely. I'm excited about the Relay Conference. I don't know if this will be before or after the Relay Conference, but we're hoping to appeal to the younger generation and say, we have our eyes on you and we want to see you fill in these shoes in the years to come. Because I'm excited what the Lord has for us; songs, leaders, churches, that are yet to come, and how God will use the music as a means of supporting all that.
Mark Prater:
Amen. May that happen.
Benjamin Kreps:
Wonderful. Before we go, one way that you also help equip us is through the Worship God conference. I had the joy of attending last year. It'd been a number of years since I went to Worship God. Loved it, including your teaching on a theology of transitions and worship, which I'm confident I've never heard anybody talk about, a theology of transitions, but just fill us in real quick about what we can anticipate for the upcoming Worship God Conference next year.
Bob Kauflin:
Oh, thanks for asking, Ben. It'll be a little different. We have John Piper coming, that's a little different. And HB Charles Jr., Mike Bullmore, Josh Blount, Jared Mellinger. Those are the main speakers. We haven't completed that roster yet, but because we're having it at a different building, we don't have as many seminars, breakouts. So we're doing a lot of stuff in big groups. So we'll have two breakouts, we'll have one for leaders and one for musicians, and then one for general. And so I think the effect is going to be, we're learning stuff to the theme "One with Christ, how our union with Christ affects everything". And I think we're going to be seeing a lot of people coming away with, wow, I didn't realize that Jesus was so much at the center of everything we're doing, not only in our gatherings, but my life.
And when we benefit from our union with Christ, which we should be doing every day, it really addresses so many of the common problems that we come up against; striving, legalism, discouragement, all those things. We are united with Christ, the Son of God, through the Holy Spirit. So I am believing that it's just going to be a fantastic time. We always have a lot of fun. It is for our people primarily, and we have a lot of people outside of Sovereign Grace. But I would love to see as many pastors and musicians come to this and just people from your church, if they want to grow in their understanding of this topic or their appreciation of how the gathering functions to build up their souls, I think they'll be really blessed. And we keep the prices pretty low so that a lot of people can come. 'Love to see you there.
Mark Prater:
And it's important, as you did, Ben, you came as a senior pastor who doesn't lead singing, but you wanted to be there with your worship team just to experience the conference with them. So an encouragement to senior pastors to come to Worship God with your folks.
Benjamin Kreps:
Yes. Amen. Senior pastors that are listening or reading the podcast understand we actually are leading worship each and every Sunday as well, whether or not we're on stage singing or not. So I think every pastor, but especially senior pastors, can definitely benefit and be edified by going to Worship God. So thank you, Bob, for joining us.
Bob Kauflin:
What a pleasure.
Benjamin Kreps:
Good to see you, Mark. And thank you all for watching or listening or reading. We'll see you here, Lord willing, next week. Bye for now.