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, Happy New Year.

Mark Prater:

Happy New Year, Ben.

Benjamin Kreps:

It is January 2nd as we're recording this podcast. So it's the first podcast of a new year 2025. Last week or a couple of weeks ago we announced about changes to the podcast, hopefully some improvements coming in this year including fielding questions from folks that are checking out the podcast. We've already started to get some questions.

Mark Prater:

We have, we received three questions, all really good questions. Two of them are from members of different churches and one from one of our pastors. So I was really encouraged to get a quick response and just a reminder to everybody, you can submit questions by going to the markkprater.com website and there's a form right on the homepage where you can submit a question and we will be answering those. We can't promise we'll answer every question, but we will review 'em and those we choose we'll probably devote some episodes to, or we might take an episode and do several questions. It kind of depends on the questions that we get. But I'm really encouraged that we received three already. And if you have questions you would like Ben and I to speak into, please submit those.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yes, please keep the questions coming. Grateful for those who've already submitted some, it will help us we trust to be able to produce content on the podcast that will more helpfully serve folks in our family of churches. But like I said, it is January 2nd as we're recording this at the beginning of a new year. Each year at the pastors conference, and last year was no exception, in November, you shared with us really an envisioning, some ideas to envision us about the upcoming year in Sovereign Grace. Things that God has put on your heart for our family of churches. We don't want to leave those behind as we enter into a new year. And so you have some hopes for Sovereign Grace that you want to share with us this year.

Mark Prater:

I do. These are hopes that I have that I pray about that I'm working in cooperating with the spirit of God to lead us in these directions. But I think the place I want to start is my overall hope is that we would be a family of churches that has an enduring faith for the good gospel work that the Lord gives us this year and in future years, depending on how long God allows Sovereign Grace to exist. And as you well know, Ben, that kind of enduring faith according to Hebrews 11:6, it pleases God. So, may all that we do this year in laboring for the gospel and in future years may it be done with an enduring faith, with an aim to please him as Hebrews 11:6 says. And so all that we would do in 2025 would give God glory. That's our ultimate goal is to glorify God in all that we do.

But that enduring faith really is expressed in some specific ways that I've been praying about. Now I just want to share a few of those for us as we start 2025. First of all, enduring faith to train future pastors and make any generational transfer of leadership that might occur this year in some of our churches and in the coming years. And if you look at scripture, it can be very humbling at times. For example, James 4:14 reminds us that our life is but a mist. We are here for a very short time and then we vanish, we vaporize like a mist. And so for the Christian, for the short time that we are here is given to this task of transferring the gospel to the next generation so that future generations not even yet born will hear the good news of Christ. I mentioned Hebrews 11 before, that's the wonderful chapter in our Bibles known as the Hall of Fame of Faith in that chapter. And Peter T. O'Brien in his commentary makes this wonderful observation about that chapter. He says, "it is noteworthy that in the list of Hebrews 11, attention is given not only to the faith of the Old Testament examples, but also particularly to the salvation historical events themselves. The examples are set in historical sequence so as to provide an outline of the redemptive purpose of God advancing through the age of promise until at last in Jesus' face, pioneer and perfecter, the age of fulfillment is inaugurated."

So we want to take what we do in Sovereign Grace and we want to lay it into redemptive history. And first of all, what you realize is Sovereign Grace is small. I mean we say that, we know that anyway just by numbers. But really we're small in comparison to all that God has done and will do in redemptive history. And yeah, we're playing our small part of advancing the gospel, the promise of God in saving sinners like us as we wait for the culmination of the age of fulfillment. That's where we fit in redemptive history. So let us use the short time we have, including 2025 to just equip the next generation to take this gospel and run with it and to equip future pastors as well.

And as we're recording this, one expression of that is Relay. Our young adults conference actually begins tonight and I'm so excited about it, there's a pre-conference that young men are going to that are interested in pastoral ministry. And then the conference is for 18 to 30 year olds roughly. And I just can't wait to be a part of that just to watch God work in the next generation. So we're taking some efforts that way, but let's continue to pray to invest into the next generation. So that's one expression of enduring faith.

Enduring faith for theological fidelity, which is really important not only because of the cultural influences that any church or any denomination face right now, but also given our current global expansion. And as we expand, we could be vulnerable to losing our gospel fidelity. And what we want to do is we want to have this enduring faith to remain faithful to God's word, which will not only strengthen us as a family of churches, it will help preserve and protect and even strengthen our unity as well. So just a reminder to members and especially to pastors who listen to this podcast, please utilize that Sovereign Grace catechism. We have a plan at our church, we're giving it to every member, every household in our church. And we're going to read through that together as a church family in the next 78 days. And we're going to memorize verses in that catechism as well. So that's not the only way to do it, but that kind of a utilization of the catechism does help strengthen our theological fidelity. So just a reminder on that.

A next expression, enduring faith to continue to plant churches, you know this Ben very, very well. It requires faith to send your best and it requires faith to give generously financially to the work of church planting. And we do all that to obviously reach more people with the good news of Jesus Christ. But it's that kind of faith and those kind of sacrifices that please God. And when a church prioritizes gospel mission and sacrifices for gospel mission and they feel those sacrifices, my experience has taught me that those are the kind of churches that actually flourish in gospel ministry when they do that. And you know that from sending your best just a little over a year ago. And yet how God has blessed your sacrifices at Living Hope. So, enduring faith to continue to plant churches. And please pray; in the next couple of years we plan to plant six churches in the United States, nine outside of the United States, a total of 15 over the next couple of years. So let's have an expression of enduring faith by praying for those church plants.

And then one other thing, enduring faith for joyful generosity. I mentioned this in a previous podcast last year. I just see God doing this wonderful unique work in our family of churches right now. He is stirring members and churches to give not just sacrificially financially, but joyfully. There's just a joy in giving and it's something that I see evidence of that I think is a unique, wonderful work of God that we can't take credit for. But that work of stirring generosity is very timely given the number of gospel opportunities he's giving us throughout the world that need that financial support. So in the coming year purpose to have an enduring faith, to give generously to your church, to your local church, and to our mission in Sovereign Grace.

And let me just wrap up with this. I started with just as a family of churches, us having an enduring faith that would sort of mark our lives. And in doing so in 2025, I want us to think about the generations to come that we will never meet who will be in our churches. And maybe we'll look back and say they had an enduring faith that was compelling. And I'll end with this quote from William Lane who's commenting on Hebrews 11 again. And he says this, "the author of Hebrews brings before his audience, a long series of exemplary witnesses to an enduring faith. The catalog shows that throughout redemptive history, attestation from God has been based upon the evidence of a living faith that acts in terms of God's promise, even when the realization of that promise is not in sight. Such faith is able to move beyond disappointment and the sufferings of this world and to bear a vibrant testimony to future generations regarding the reality of the promised blessings." And so I pray that we would have an enduring faith this year as a family of churches and that would leave a vibrant testimony as Lane says, for future generations to follow. May that mark us as a family of churches.

Benjamin Kreps:

Amen. The new year, there's a sense in which there's sort of an artificial nature to these kinds of evaluations or resolutions. We haven't even talked about that for an upcoming year. But I think a wise Christian, we'll take advantage of moments like a new year to evaluate and to pray and to think about what God has for us in the future. And so just even this beautiful, simple but transcendent category of pleasing Christ through faith-filled study and serving and sacrifice and so forth, that's a thrilling prospect. And my prayer is joining with yours as well, is that we would be a family of churches that we're really just in this upcoming year and in the days ahead, just banking everything on the faithfulness of God because some of these things that we're talking about; church planting, generosity and so forth, they do take faith and there is sacrifice. But we can please the pioneer of our faith, the Lord Jesus Christ, through what may appear to some people to be sort of just ordinary Christian activity done in faith. We can please him and we can see him working in our churches.

So thank you, Mark, for your encouragement in this new year and we look forward to seeing you next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.

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, anybody who checked out the podcast last week knows and is now aware that we have been working behind the scenes in smoke-filled back rooms, seeking to figure out how to utilize this podcast more effectively to serve the folks in Sovereign Grace and anyone else who wants to check it out as well for that matter. And those who have been waiting with bated breath since last week, wondering what are these new changes? They're about to be happily surprised by what you're going to share because we have some new changes coming to the podcast that you want to talk about.

Mark Prater:

Well, I hope they're happily surprised. We'll see. Yeah. We met last week, Ben and I, the week before Christmas. We're recording this on December 26th. We met last week, as I mentioned last time in Denver, Pennsylvania at a diner there. Had lunch together and talked through just all options. In fact, in that conversation, Ben and I, we just threw everything on the table. Do we just end the podcast? Do we cancel ourselves? And by the way, we have chosen not to do that, which is why we're recording this. We just said, should we continue to publish 'em at the same frequency, produce 'em at the same frequency, which is weekly, and try to do that in the 10 to 15 minute range. And we talked through that and thought, let's just keep that same frequency for now. We talked about changing the name of the podcast, and I think we decided not to, just to prevent confusion and probably because we couldn't come up with much better, actually, as we sat there and had lunch, was the main reason why. So we just started by just throwing everything on the table. I think we came up with some good changes though that I'm eager to announce.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. So changes are coming. This is the last podcast of 2024. We're getting ready next week when we record to do our first podcast of 2025. So what are the changes that we can anticipate heading into a new year?

Mark Prater:

Yeah, we've got five of them that we sort of, I think it's best to put 'em in categories. So five new changes that we are eager to announce. First of all, we want to devote an episode somewhat regularly to answering questions. Followers of this podcast have pastors and members of our churches, even those outside of Sovereign Grace. And so you can do that by submitting a question on the markkprater.com website. Right on the homepage (under the contact tab), Erin's got a form in the middle of that page called "Submit a Question (or a Topic) for the Podcast". It's just put your name and your email and your question and submit it. And we would just love to hear what questions that you have. We're eager to take several of those and devote an episode to it. Now, how frequently we do that will depend upon the number of questions we get, but we want to spend some time answering your questions. So it's a bit of a mailbag sort of approach that we're adding into our podcast in 2025.

The second change is we would like to hear what topics you would like us to address. So you can use that same form on the contact page where you submit a question, just put in there your topic and submit that to us and Ben and I will review it. And we want to do that because as Ben mentioned last week, this podcast exists to serve the members and pastors of Sovereign Grace churches. And if it ever stops doing that, we'll cancel it. We'll shut this thing down because that's our desire to serve you.

So tell us what topics you want us to speak into, which leads to the third new change. We've decided to choose some topics that might require a little bit more time and be more conversation between Ben and myself in format. So we've been trying to get into that 10 to 15 minute range in terms of length of time. We're not going to go much longer than that, but depending upon the topic, we might inch up above 15 minutes just so we can treat it fairly again, depending on what topic we do address. And I think on some of those topics, we want to be more conversational, meaning that I'm talking less than I normally do because Ben is talking as well. We're just having a conversation about the topic. So that's the third change that will be coming in 2025.

Number four, we're going to continue to look for guests to join us. We've done that occasionally. I've had Jeff Purswell on this podcast. I've had Steve Whitacre on this podcast, but you and I just kind of listed a whole list of names that of folks we'd like to reach out to and join us now and then, so I'll be looking for guests to join us in the future and in 2025 in particular.

Fiftth and lastly, we are going to give occasional giveaways. Let's go. And we're going to approach that in some different ways. We might make it a competition. We might make it a first responder by using the form on the markkprater.com website. We're not sure yet, but we're going to do some giveaways throughout the year, so be listening for that. And we'll try to make 'em not lame giveaways. Right Ben? We'll make them really good giveaways so that you actually would like to receive what we sent you. That's right.

Thank you for listening to this podcast. It is an honor and a joy for Ben and myself to serve you, the members and pastors of Sovereign Grace Churches. And I've been thinking a lot about that as 2024 begins to just close. I was just thinking about this morning how much I thank God for each of you, and thank you for listening to our podcast.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yes, well, hopefully that is a belated Christmas gift to our tens and tens of followers of this podcast. But seriously, we do hope that going into the new year that these changes will serve to help us be able to do more effective podcasts that really do serve the folks in Sovereign Grace because we love you.

And Mark, I'm so grateful to be a part of Sovereign Grace and grateful for everybody who checks out the podcast. So thank you, Mark, for another year of the podcast. We're a few years in now. Let's do another one by God's grace and for his glory, and we'll see you here next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.

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, good to see you for the second time in two days.

Mark Prater:

Yeah. Come on man.

Benjamin Kreps:

Just had lunch with Mark yesterday. We spent some time together discussing, talking about the podcast because really it's in our hearts to use this podcast as effectively as possible to serve the pastors and members of Sovereign Grace churches.

Mark Prater:

We do. That's why we do it and we love doing it. And if it ever stops doing that, we will end the podcast.

Benjamin Kreps:

That's right.

Mark Prater:

That's our heart. Ben and I met yesterday in Denver, Pennsylvania, which is about halfway between where he lives and I live. Didn't even know there was a Denver, Pennsylvania, but we had a great lunch at a lovely diner there and we talked about some new things we're going to do with the podcast and we will be announcing those soon. Maybe the next episode, if not certainly the following one. So stay tuned for those changes.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yes. Right now I can already hear the excitement rising in every heart. It was wonderful to be with you and to talk about the podcast, which we love doing, and we love hearing encouraging feedback from people from time to time, helping us understand that it's helpful to them because what we want to do, we want to be helpful. But one of the things that we talked about yesterday was using the podcast to serve newer pastors and members in Sovereign Grace who aren't necessarily familiar or as familiar with our history. And that includes books that have shaped us in Sovereign Grace churches. We do recommend books from time to time. I believe the last podcast, a hodgepodge of resources was resource recommendations. And I'm glad that you do that. But there are some books that have left an indelible impression. They have shaped us, they have formed us as a denomination, books that stand the test of time.

And one of the things we talked about was that what are the books that are currently being published that people are going to be reading 50 years from now? And we were having a little trouble identifying those books and perhaps others that think better about those sorts of things than us can come up with a list. But we do know there are some wonderful, really essential books that have been so influential in our history and we don't want to leave those resources behind just because time continues to march on. And you wanted to talk about that.

Mark Prater:

I do. Because if you are a newer pastor in Sovereign Grace, younger, in Sovereign Grace, that may not be as familiar with history as you mentioned, Ben, or a newer member in a Sovereign Grace church, just never heard of Sovereign Grace before, unaware of our history. I think these books are important. First of all, I'm very grateful to our founder, CJ Mahaney, who did an effective job of building a culture of reading, not only into the life of pastoral ministry, but into the life of our churches; that members and pastors would be readers. And there are books that have shaped our entire denomination. And because these books, as you mentioned, Ben, will stand, are standing the test of time and will probably be read another 50 years from now, these are books that will continue or should continue to shape us. And that's why I'm grateful for Jared Mellinger, our Director of Publishing, to devote an entire Journal, the Sovereign Grace Journal, to this topic, our most recent edition.

It was just released, it's entitled The Books That Shaped Us. And Jared says in the introduction, "Our denomination has been deeply influenced by good books. This issue of the Journal is devoted to celebrating the books and authors that have shaped Sovereign Grace Churches: J.I. Packer's, Knowing God, John Stott's, The Cross of Christ, R.C. Sprouls, The Holiness of God and others". He goes on to say, "It was difficult to know where to stop. Charity and It's Fruits by Jonathan Edwards should have probably been included, as should the writings of Sinclair Ferguson. But if we were to exhaustively include everyone who shaped us, the Journal would need to be significantly expanded." So it is not a comprehensive list of all the books that have shaped us, but he did a good job of choosing those that have shaped us. And pastors in Sovereign Grace wrote an article about each of those books. And I really want to encourage, especially younger pastors or newer members of our churches, to get this Journal. It's available for free online and read this edition and then get the books and read the books.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yes, we stand on the sturdy shoulders of those who have gone before us. And so many books have played a significant role in our formation and our theological convictions. And so that Journal is I think, a very helpful introduction, especially if there are books in that Journal that folks haven't read. I mean, so if you have read 'em, wonderful, maybe it's time to dip back in. I know I use a number of those books as research that I regularly dip into. If you haven't read 'em well, you've got something to look forward to. You have edifying books ahead of you that will help you and strengthen your faith and your love for Christ. Talk about a few of the books that are laid out in the Journal specifically.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I would love to talk all about all of them. But this podcast episode would be too long. So I've only chosen a few, which was really hard. The first book, The Holiness of God by R.C. Sproul. Jace Hudson wrote the article on this, and I'll just give a brief mention there, R.C. Sproul, through his preaching on that topic, and he's done that at a pastor's conference for example in the past, but also the book in particular, which will stand the test of time, and is standing the test of time, It shaped our understanding of the holiness of God. And the effect of that was not only was God grander, the gospel was sweeter as a result. So if you've never read that book, read it. When my youngest daughter, Meghan, became a Christian as a teenager, this is the first book I read through with her. I took her through because I wanted her to see the holiness and the grandness of God and understand this gospel that she now knows even better.

Knowing God by J.I. Packer is another go-to book that certainly has stood the test of time, 50 years we know, because Sovereign Grace Music just devoted a whole album to the Knowing God book. And it's wonderful if you haven't listened to that. But Mickey Connolly writes this review and he opens by saying, "and the winner of the most beat up, written in, often referred to book in my library, goes to, drum roll, the envelope, please: Knowing God by J.I.Packer. And when I read that, I thought, I think that's probably the case in my library, too. I go to it a lot. I've got marks all over it. I've got an old edition. So it's like this really bad book cover compared to the newer versions. And it is just a wonderful book. J.I. Packer, who passed away a couple years ago has left us a gem that has shaped our understanding of God. And I think in a comprehensive way, he really lays it out in an accessible way, the attributes of God in a wonderful way.

Benjamin Kreps:

I have a coveted hardcover edition. Very rare. It has been dipped into again and again. His material on adoption is as good as it gets.

Mark Prater:

Yeah. Get the book for just that chapter. It is outstanding. And now I'm jealous that you have that particular cover.

Jeff Purswell did an article, The Towering Influence of D.A. Carson. And we are indebted to Dr. Carson. He just mentions a few of his books that have shaped Sovereign Grace: The Cross and Christian Ministry: Leadership Lessons from 1 Corinthians. I've read that at least twice. It's a go-to book. It's a wonderful book. Also, How Long, Oh Lord? Reflections on Suffering and Evil. Again, that's a go-to book when you are trying to pastor people through suffering or if you're going through suffering, you're a member of the church. You've got to get that book. And Showing the Spirit: A Theological Exposition of 1 Corinthians 12-14. It is one of the finest resources I know on the person and the work of the Holy Spirit in particular, is just wonderful.

And let's see. Oh yeah, this is another book. This may rival Packer's Knowing God in terms of how beat up it is, I go to this book a lot by Carson, A Call To Spiritual Reformation: Priorities from Paul and His Prayers. And if you've never read it or if you have, there's one chapter I go back to a lot. I go to a lot of them. But one is A Passion for People. That particular chapter, it's outstanding and that cover's all wrinkled up and everything. And then Memoirs of an Ordinary Pastor, the Life and Reflections of Tom Carson, a wonderful honoring tribute of his dad, but really skillfully done to speak into ordinary pastor's lives like mine. And then Jeff just ends with this, “Look across Carson's body of work. And one theme appears again and again, and not just repetitively, but in a way that binds his labors together, the DNA that infuses all its parts. And that is the gospel.” So well said, so well written. And then a book that, oh my goodness, it's one of my favorites. It's hard to choose favorites I know, is The Cross of Christ by John Stott. And the pastor who wrote the article for The Cross of Christ is actually you, Ben. So any thoughts on the cross of Christ?

Benjamin Kreps:

Well, you can read a lot, most of my thoughts, in the article for good or ill, but I mean The Cross of Christ, it's an essential resource. It certainly helped me as I came to Living Hope. I'd only been a Christian for a few years when we came around Living Hope and just deepend in my appreciation and gratitude for the cross. But The Cross of Christ is, I think, an important book because in every generation it seems that there's opposition to the doctrine of penal, substitutionary, atonement. And certainly our generation is no different. We've talked about an author recently where the gospel is disconnected from encouragement about following Jesus, for instance, but even more broadly in evangelicalism. I mean, there's something that I talk about in my church, which I refer to as the gospel of change, where it can kind of be like the message of the gospel is you can really level up with Jesus. You can live your best life if you mix him into what you're doing. But again and again, a book like The Cross of Christ helps us reorient ourselves, position ourselves in humility and adoration before the cross upon which the Prince of Glory died as our substitute, bearing our sin and God's wrath that stood against us in our sin in order to bring us to God. And so that's the kind of book that, yes, I've not only read, but reread and have dipped back into many times. And I encourage you, if you haven't read it, get it immediately. If you have read it before, maybe it's time to revisit it.

Mark Prater:

Well said. Yeah, it's just one of my favorites. There are still, there's still places in that book where I can see the pages, where you stop and you weep because of what Christ has done for us in the cross. It's that well written and well done by John Stott.

Alright, let me just mention one other article in the Journal and it's Our Debt to David Powlison and His Colleagues, written by Pete Payne. And obviously David Powlison is a unique and foundational voice in the biblical counseling movement. We want in Sovereign Grace to find ways to preserve his voice and make all of his resources available to our pastors. That's a project that actually Josh Blount and CJ and I are working on right now. So I'm very grateful that this chapter's in the Journal. This is an article in the Journal. I mean, and I thought Pete Payne gave some really good recommendations, especially if you've never read any of Powlison before.

And this is what Pete says, if you're not familiar with the thinking and writing of David Powlison, I recommend that you begin with his books, Seeing With New Eyes. That's the first one. And Speaking Truth and Love, that's the second one. A comprehensive compilation, much of his early thought and teaching on the subject of biblical counseling. And then he says this, he quotes Powlison in the introduction of Seeing with New Eyes. ‘He writes intentionally helpful conversations. That's all counseling is. Look different when you look at them from a perspective of seeing God. You see people and their troubles in a different light. When you include God in the picture, it changes the way you think about problem, diagnosis, strategy, solution, helpful, cure, change, insight, and counselor. When the lights go on, you see God and know that God sees you. My goal is to help us see God in the counseling context.” That's just really well said. That was David's heartbeat in many, many ways. And he also just did this skillful job in a related way, just making these good connections to the gospel. And then Pete says, and after you read those two books, I would follow with a reading of a book that was written near the end of his life: How Does Sanctification Work? And so if you've never read David Powlison, those are good recommendations and you can find those titles of those books not only in the transcript of our podcast, but get the Journal and read Pete Payne's article.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. David Powlison is one of those wonderful teachers who helps pastors care for folks well or definitely better, but also just helps anyone and the members of our churches, not only be cared for, if to read David Powlison, is to have your soul cared for, but also we are all in the business of caring for others and seeking to encourage others. And so Powlison is helpful and needed for all of us, and I'm grateful for those recommendations.

Speaking back to D.A. Carson, which you mentioned, I just saw that he has ceased public ministry and speaking because of Parkinson's. And so for folks like me who owe a great debt of gratitude to Dr. Carson, let's be praying for him and his family. So thank you, Mark for your recommendations. We look forward to announcing some hopefully interesting changes that folks will enjoy in the podcast. But for now, we're going to sign off and we'll see you here next week, Lord willing, so bye for now.

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, as you well know, and you actually set an example, in a wise pastor is a man who is a learner and a reader always seeking to grow in our understanding of scripture and then ramifications, implications, entailments of all of that as we navigate through our culture and what's happening in our churches. And you certainly are a reader and have committed yourself to be a lifelong learner. And so as we've done before, you have a couple of resources that you want to share with us. The first is a book by Dave Mathis.

Mark Prater:

Yep. It's a book entitled Humbled: Welcoming the Uncomfortable Work of God by David Mathis, a book I recently finished and I'm actually taking my Faith in Work group through right now. I am reading this book because I know that in my own life, pride is a lifelong battle, the sin of pride. And so I'm always looking for resources to help me grow in humility. I've benefited from, and many of you have benefited from, CJ's book on humility, just an excellent resource on humility. That's a go-to book for me. I got a go-to section for me in Thomas Watson's book, The Godly Man's Picture. He's got a couple of quotes in there that always help me remind myself of my battle with pride.

But I found this book really, really helpful by David Mathis. Some of you may be familiar with David. He wrote Habits of Grace, a wonderful book. One of the basic premises of this book is that humility and our growth in humility is not primarily at human initiative. It's at God's initiative. He loves us and he wants to see us grow in holiness and in particular Christ-like humility. And it's just an interesting way to think about it. But he begins the book sort of making that statement. He then defines humility and I wanted to read that. He said, "Humility acknowledges and obeys the one who is truly God. Humility entails a right view of self as created by and accountable to God. And this requires a right view of God as creator and as authoritative in relation to his creatures. Humility is not then preoccupied with oneself and one's own loneliness, but first mindful and conscious of God and his highness. Humility becomes conscious of self only with respect to God." And that's a very similar definition that CJ uses in his book on humility. It is just your right understanding of who you are before God. I thought that was just a wonderful way to describe it.

But he goes on to say this, and this is kind of the premise of the book in many ways. He said, "Humility is not fundamentally a human initiative, but a proper God-given response in us to God himself and his glory and his purposes in the world and in our lives." And then says this, "Self humbling is in essence gladly receiving God's person, words and acts when doing so is not easy or comfortable." And so we all have these events in our lives that are difficult, that don't make sense at times, that we really just don't fully understand what God's doing. But in those difficult sovereign events, I think one of the purposes that God has for us is he is just wanting to grow us in humility because he loves us that much. He cares more about our holiness, as we've said before, you've heard before, than our happiness. And that is a loving God.

Just two more quotes, one before I give a specific one, but this is, I think, really well said, "Humility is not our doing without God's initiative and empowering, and it's not something he acts exclusively to do for us which we receive passively." So he talks about humility is really at God's initiative, but he makes a case for our response to that and that we're not passive, that we want to grow in humility, that we want to grow in godliness. And it's very much a Philippians 2 understanding of sanctification; work out your salvation with fear and trembling, so his work that you have for God is at work in you. So there's that combination of our effort and God's initiative and grace at work in our lives. So it's kind of that he's capturing.

And one other quote that really affected me, he has a whole chapter devoted to prayer as an expression, obviously, of one who is being humbled and growing in humility. And he has this great sentence, and I'm going to read a little bit past this, but here's the sentence, "Humility in the worst of times grows out of habits of prayerful desperation in the best of times." I read that sentence and it stopped me. I thought, in the best of times, do I have this prayerful desperation? I don't know that I always do, but if I'm going to grow in humility, I must, so that in the worst of times my humility's fostered, is really what he's saying. He goes on to say this, "For those of us who are under the delusion that we are strong, prayer makes little sense, especially as a pattern of life. But when we freshly realize our fragileness and weakness, we find that the New Testament's emphasis on unceasing prayer (1 Thessalonians 5:17) is not a burden but an unparalleled offer." Really well, really well written. So just a few choice quotes that maybe might interest you or whet your taste for getting this book, Humbled. It's one that I would recommend and benefit from, just another good resource on humility that you can have on your shelf and in your heart and maybe help if you're a pastor, just helping other folks with it.

Benjamin Kreps:

Thanks for that recommendation. I'm definitely going to grab that one. And certainly one of our shaping virtues in Sovereign Grace is humility. And humility really is that cardinal virtue that is sort of the key that unlocks all manner of dependence and joy and godliness. And so definitely a topic for us to be studying regularly and I look forward to studying that. One of the things that you mentioned from that book, not an idea new to David Mathis, but that humility begins with a right understanding of ourselves and a right understanding of God, of ourselves in light of who God is.

And so to connect that, there was recently at the conference, you guys, the leadership team wanted to make sure it was on our radar, a book by John Mark Comer Practicing the Way, I believe it's called, and some concerns that you have with that book. Now I know you guys are not in the business of just naming names and taking down ministries. That's not what we're about. But this is very popular book, very popular author on Amazon, just looked it up this morning in the top five books on discipleship that are being sold on Amazon right now. Also has another book though that came out; God Has a Name, back in October and there's a resource that you want to recommend to help us think about this book as well as we seek to care for the folks in our church that at the rate these books are selling, we shouldn't be surprised if some of our folks are dipping in and checking out his books. So what is the resource that you want to recommend to us?

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I want to recommend this resource because as you just said, I do wonder if we have more younger people reading, Practicing the Way. And again, this is not Red Alert status or anything like that, but it's especially for pastors, being aware of what your people are reading. And I just had a pastor last week in Sovereign Grace contact me say, Hey, you mentioned that book, Practicing the Way at the conference. I just talked to someone who's reading the book. Can you help me with some resources on that, how to reply, which I did. So it's just another reminder, maybe more people are reading it. It's actually an article that you sent me, Ben, that you found and was grateful that you sent; by a man by the name of Wyatt Graham, has more of a theological review of that book that Comer's written and also he references a sermon Comer gave entitled Why?.

And he gives a very thoughtful yet gracious critique, ends by saying because of Comer's view of God, he can't recommend Practicing the Way because obviously his view of God affects and you clearly see it in Practicing the Way how he wrote that book. So the name of the article that you sent me, and I'm hoping that we can get this link into the transcript so that guys can just click on the link and reference it. But here's the title in case we can't do that. How John Mark Comer's View of God Shapes his Spiritual Formation. And again, the author is Wyatt Graham. And it's a very thoughtful review of his view of God. And I think a couple of things just to point out, he certainly presents Comer, I think it's clear, he is as an open theist for example, which will affect how you not only view God, but how you interpret all the events in your life and in the world. And he also, Comer, seems to reject God's impassibility; sort of a doctrine that has historically been held clearly, certainly by reform folks, in the theological world as a right view of God. And it's just a good article to read and be aware of because Practicing the Way is shaped by Comer's view of God. And I don't know, what did you find helpful from the article? Anything you would add?

Benjamin Kreps:

Not a lot I would add. I did find it helpful because I'm not, wasn't very familiar, actually, with Comer until the conference. I'm reading a lot of old books most of the time, so I try to keep up with new stuff that's coming out. But the issue at hand really is one that is so important for the folks in our church because what's being addressed here is where is God, one of the primary things, where is God in my suffering? Which is one of the most fundamental questions that people have struggled with well for time immemorial. And so for us helping the folks in our church to understand, to see God as sovereign over all things, and good, is essential. I mean, we need our best theology when we're navigating through suffering. And so the concern is a book like that or teaching about God, which leans more towards an open theism view, for instance, is going to leave folks that are influenced by that ill-prepared for suffering. Because in suffering that temptation to think hard thoughts about God and begin to make false assumptions about God's faithfulness and goodness, those are all in play when we're talking about this perspective, false perspective, I believe about God. And so I'm grateful for you guys pointing us to some resources and helping us think through what folks in our church very well could be reading. And so we're not policing that, but we want to be prepared to be able to serve the folks in our church that may potentially have questions about something as fundamental as who God is in relation to evil and suffering.

Mark Prater:

Right? Yeah. The other thing that I said at the conference, just a reminder that sort of misunderstanding or false view of God or wrong understanding of God does affect what you see in the book. Riley Spring wrote a wonderful critique for me just saying the book basically it lacks gospel connections. And that's important to us, first of all, as believers, because I know my own heart, we can all have this tendency to try to smuggle our works into the gospel, the true gospel. And as a pastor we have to be mindful of helping people help them not to do that. And so a book on spiritual formation, it's a wonderful topic. We all want to grow and be more like Christ, but how we go about that and remaining connected to the grace of God found in the gospel is vital not only to our understanding and amazement of the gospel, but even of how we understand God himself. So just another thought in terms of just guys being aware of this potential resource being read by folks in your church.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yeah, I mean the reality is there can certainly be a temptation in our more reformed family of churches to believe God is sovereign. But bare sovereignty apart from God's goodness can lead one to despair. Actually, it can be a terrifying thing to consider a sovereign God apart from his goodness, but his sovereign goodness most visibly displayed in the gospel is just essential, can never be divorced from the gospel so that no matter what we're navigating through, what we're experiencing, the north star that orients us toward the goodness and kindness and faithfulness of God, even in the face of the dark clouds of suffering is the cross. And so divorcing any theology that we have, any theological position we have from the gospel or separating it in some way from the gospel is to our peril.

So appreciate the thoughtful way that you guys on the leadership team think about this stuff and seek to serve us, inform us, who may not be as in the loop on some of the resources that are coming out. So thanks for the recommendations, Mark. We'll be checking out that book, especially, I haven't gotten the David Mathis book, but I'm eager to order it. I'll be ordering it after I get off this podcast. Alright, so thanks for thinking of us and for the recommendations. Thank you all for checking out the podcast. We'll see you here next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.

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, at the conference just a few weeks ago, you gave some wonderful updates that included the potential for really exponential growth globally in the next few years. Growth that is happening now actually when it comes to our partnerships globally, not just in the States. And you wanted to give us a few updates about that starting in what God is doing in Sovereign Grace when it comes to Europe.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I want to start in Europe and all these updates I'm going to share during this episode, really it's the Lord's doing. We can't take credit for them. It's his doing and it's marvelous in our eyes. So may God receive all the glory as you listen to these updates or read them if you read our transcript because he's doing a work that we never planned but that he did. And that's what makes it even better because it brings us a lot of joy to give God all the glory.

So I wanted to start with some updates in Europe. We now officially have two more candidate churches in Europe. The first one is Calvary Galway in Galway, Ireland. That is led by Ray Clancy. Ray and Rebecca were at the pastor's conference along with another brother that he brought from his church. They've been relating to Sovereign Grace for a long time. Originally, I think the connection was through Ron Boomsma, if I remember right. And most recently has been interacting with Ed O'Mara, our area leader in Europe. And they just had a wonderful time at the conference. They got back and signed the candidate agreements that makes them a candidate church. And Ray is now in the ordination process. So that was exciting.

And then another church also, Iglesia Gracia Soberana, in Spain. And that church is led by Norman Carlos Pedd. He was at the pastor's conference as well, got back and signed the candidate church agreement. And Norman is also in the ordination process. A wonderful church there in Spain that Ed has been relating to. So that's two more candidate churches that we have currently.

We have two partner churches, one in Italy led by Ed O'Mara and one in Bristol England led by Matt Chapman. And if you were at the conference, you heard an update from Pat and Dana Tedeschi who are moving to London actually next month in January for a number of reasons. One of them is to begin leading Oasis Church, which is in a multi-ethnic area of London. Pat has a background in reaching out to Muslims in London, so that'll be a part of what he does, but he'll be leading the church there. And a part of the plan is to lead that church into Sovereign Grace. So at some point they will be a partner church. And then we still have a church in Sicily, Italy, led by Giuseppe that is interested and probably will become a candidate church.

So in the next two to three years, we could go from having two partner churches to five or six, which is a wonderful work of the Lord. And so if you're listening to this podcast or reading it, please pray for these guys who are in the ordination process, Ray Clancy and Norman Carlos Pedd in particular. And after they get through that, then they will become partner churches. So just some exciting things that are happening in Europe.

Benjamin Kreps:

That is exciting to hear. Like you're saying, what a privilege that God has given us to grow partnership in Europe. But Europe's not the only place where partnership is growing; also in Latin America, you have some updates for us.

Mark Prater:

I do. Juan Jose Solano and his wife Sarah were at the pastor's conference and I had just as meaningful interaction with them there. Juan, Juan Jo is what we call Juan Jo, who leads La Gracia in San Jose, Costa Rica, came up and just said, I want you to know I've passed my ordination, all my ordination exams and I can't wait for the ordination service, which is now planned for March. And Jose La Mercado will be there to participate in Juan Jo's ordination, and he will be the first ordained Sovereign Grace elder in Costa Rica. That will be our first partner church in Costa Rica, as there's two other elders that are with him in leading that wonderful church. And they are also in the ordination process, moving through actually pretty well. So those men may be ordained before too long as well.

So again, just some exciting updates in Latin America. I mentioned in a previous podcast that Jacobis Aldana, who leads a church in Santa Marta, Columbia, also passed his ordination exams and his ordination service is coming up. So that'll be two more partner churches in Latin America, one in Costa Rica and one in Columbia. And thanks to Joselo Mercado and Rich Richardson for all the work that they do in serving those men.

Benjamin Kreps:

All so very encouraging to hear. It is spectacular that once again, those ordination standards, as we use them, apply them wisely, are really serving us globally, not just in the States. And so it's so encouraging to hear about those men. Job well done, gentlemen, with your ordination exams, passing all of those and the growing partnership there. As well, though, there are trips that are happening even now in development as we record this, fill us on on how to pray about those trips.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, it's one of the reasons I wanted to devote this episode to some global updates because there are two trips that are actually happening right now over the next 10 days that I want folks to be aware of that you can please pray for these men and for these trips. The first one is Greg Dirnberger, who is a pastor at Emmaus Road Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, along with Dave Quila, who's a pastor at Covenant Life Fellowship in Roseburg, Oregon. Those two men are flying to Pakistan as we speak, and they will be serving the pastors who are leading candidate churches in Pakistan. It's a very timely trip, I think it's the first time any of us have been there. And so they're not going to teach obviously in terms of equipping them, but they want to spend time with them, get to know them, spend time with their families just as a part of evaluating them for the ordination process. So please pray for Greg and for Dave, pray for safety, pray for protection, pray for strength. So that trip is actually happening right now.

A second one that's actually happening this week as well is a trip to the Philippines. Josh Montague, who's a pastor in Minnesota, also works for TLI Training Leaders International, who we have a wonderful partnership with, is traveling to the Philippines and he's taking with him Nate Treguboff, who leads at Cross of Grace Church in Chaska, Minnesota. And Jordan Strand, who's a pastor at a Emmaus Road Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Those three men; Josh and Nathan and Jordan are traveling to the Philippines to teach and equip pastors that are being trained over there for pastoral ministry and ordination as well. So please pray for those three men. That's a long trip. Pray that God would give them strength, pray that God would protect them and pray that God would just help them to, not just to teach these pastors, but to care for them and get to know them relationally as well. So two timely trips that you can pray for that are happening right now.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yes, we will pray. And once again, I mean, it is just one of the encouraging dynamics in all of this, is just seeing how this really is all rooted in partnership; it's relational, it's pastors from the states collaborating with pastors on the ground and other parts of the world, and we're growing together in that way. And so praise God for the work that he's doing and please be praying for those trips and for the men that we talked about that he gave us updates about in Europe and in Latin America.

So thanks, Mark, for the updates. Thank you all for watching a podcast. We'll see you here next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.

Benjamin Kreps:

Hey everyone and welcome to the Mark Prader podcast where our aim is to connect our global family of Sovereign Grace Churches with our Executive Director.

Mark, we are recording this the day before Thanksgiving in the States. We acknowledge that Thanksgiving is an American holiday, and we have folks from all over the world that check out the podcast because we are a global family of churches. But for every Christian, certainly each day is a fresh opportunity for Thanksgiving. And one of our shaping virtues, of course, in Sovereign Grace is gratefulness. We have so much to be grateful for. But we do enjoy, in the States, this time of year where to set aside specific time to be able to think about how God has been good and faithful to us. And so we're celebrating Thanksgiving over here. You're celebrating Thanksgiving. What's that look like in your house?

Mark Prater:

Well, we gather, in fact tomorrow, on Thursday, Thanksgiving day. All of our kids and grandkids will be there, which will be a lot of fun. It'll be chaos, but it'll be a lot of fun. And one of the traditions we have is that we just go around the table and everyone has to share ways in which they thank God for his work in their life over the last year. And we just have wonderful memories from a conversation like that as a family. There are moments where we're just laughing and moments where in tears because of what is shared.

I always look forward to the Thanksgiving holiday with that tradition in view. And I'm sure other families have similar traditions. It really is just one way for Christian families, I think, to just to live out that consistent excitations to Thanksgiving throughout the New Testament and the consistent example of Paul in particular in his epistles of how he just expressed thanks generally and specifically for those he was writing too. So I love the Thanksgiving holiday for that reason. I can't wait to gather with my family tomorrow and just hear what my family members have to say.

Benjamin Kreps:

Yeah, I'm looking forward to it as well. I mean, is there anything more fitting for those that have been washed by the blood of the lamb than to be grateful and so great holiday including football, American football, and the fact for which I'm very grateful this year and that is the Cowboys stink. And so I will be celebrating as I gather with my relatives who are Cowboys fans tomorrow as we eat turkey and watch the Cowboys hopefully lose.

But on a more serious note, there is so much to be grateful for in our lives, and as we were preparing to record the podcast, you were practically bubbling over with anticipation of sharing specific things you're grateful for in Sovereign Grace Churches. So talk to us about that.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I first just want to express gratitude for the pastors—regardless of whether in the States or not—pastors who pastor faithfully in Sovereign Grace Churches. And I've just been thinking about them a lot this week and just carrying my brothers on my heart and truly thanking God for them just because of their godly character and their faithful labors for Christ and they're friends and I thank God for them.

There's just a long list of things I could thank God for and just praying, “Lord, how do I get this list down into a podcast form?” So three things that I thank God for the pastors of Sovereign Grace. The first is faithfully and accurately preaching God's word.

That can sound like a ho-hum sort of point. But if we believe that God inspired men to write his word, which we do, this is wholly inspired Scripture. And if we believe that when we read the word and when the word is preached to us, it is actually God speaking to us, God using men to speak to us as they faithfully and accurately preaches word, then that point becomes even a little bit more meaningful in that regard. We gather each Sunday to hear from God himself as the word is faithfully preached. I just thank God for the pastors in Sovereign Grace Churches who spend hours on sermon prep. And the reason they're doing that is they want to not be faithful but accurate in exegeting what God has said because there is a fear of the Lord that you have when you preach God's word because you are representing him. It's God speaking to us through his word. So, thank you brothers for working hard in ways that many of your members don't see as you toil over a text and as you prepare each and every week. There'll be pastors preaching this week, thinking about Sunday on the Thanksgiving holiday. So they're thinking about it throughout the week. So, thank you brothers for that sacrifice.

The second thing I thank God for the pastors of Sovereign Grace is how you lead your churches mindful of your members. And what I mean by that is we believe in elder-governed, elder-led churches. And so we feel, as pastors, a responsibility for the church that we want to lead it well, we want to protect it, care for it, and lead it in a direction that God intends. But we don't do that in a vacuum. We lead in such a way that we want to make leadership decisions that best serve the members of our churches, not that best serve us, but best serve them and best serve the church as a whole. And I think that's really important in elder-led, elder-governed polity. And I want to read a quote that can be found in our very first perspectives booklet, Who Governs the Church written by Jared Mellinger. I commend this book to our pastors, read it. You received a copy at the Council of Elders meeting. But if you're a member of one of our churches, I would encourage you to read this booklet as well. It is really, really well done. But he quotes Alexander Strauch in his book Biblical Eldership. This is what he says,

“When issues are brought to the congregation, the elders, as Spirit placed shepherds, take the lead in guiding the congregation in orderly and prayerful decision-making. As the congregation looks to its elders for wise leadership, the elders also look to the congregation, their brothers and sisters for wisdom, counsel, inspiration, creative ideas, health and prayer. Elders who understand the sacred nature and dynamic energy of the Spirit-empowered congregation, know the necessity of congregational participation in all major decisions.”

So, we lead, but we don't lead in a vacuum. And I thought Strauch captures that very well. So thank you for being men who faithfully lead your churches, mindful of your people and getting the input of the members of your church as you do.

The third thing I thank God for are all the way that you serve in ways that are just not seen by the average member of your church. And the first thing that comes to mind is how you pray—how you pray for your church, how you pray for your people, how you pray for specific individuals in your church that may be going through a difficult time that you carry on our heart. Those prayers aren't seen except by the Lord himself who hears them. Thank you for that.

And then just a late-night texts and phone calls you might have because there's a pastoral issue. I was just thinking of this last night. Jill and I were at our community group, and that's a group of pastors and wives where we gathered twice a month to have biblical fellowship. And near the end of the meeting, one of the pastors had to get on a text because there was a pastoral issue in our church. And I just thought so many of the members don't see that, but this is a faithful pastor pastoring in his church. So thank you for pastoring in all the ways that are unseen.

So just a few ways I thank God for the pastors in Sovereign Grace.

Benjamin Kreps:

Wonderful. You're not only grateful for the pastors of Sovereign Grace, you are also full of gratitude for the members of Sovereign Grace Churches. And you wanted to express some of that gratitude as well.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, I do. I just love the members of our churches. As I travel around, I get to know them and they're just dear people. They're just dear believers who sincerely want to follow Christ and love the local church and want to grow in Christ. It's just wonderful to see. So just three ways that I thank the members, which is a much longer list by the way.

Benjamin Kreps:

You're restraining yourself.

Mark Prater:

I am restraining myself. Okay, three ways I thank God for the members of our churches. And, by the way, I'm not trying to be exclusive here. I think these ways mark other churches in other denominations. I just want to thank God for the members of the family of churches we belong to.

So first, and this is related to the first one I gave for the pastors: eager to learn and apply God's Word. One of the things that strikes me as I am in different Sovereign Grace Churches is how are the members of our church, they lean in during the preaching. They want to hear God's word. And they now want to understand it and learn more about it, they really have a desire to apply it desire so that the preaching of the word has this transformational effect in their hearts and souls progressively over time. And a part of the way that they do that is through fellowship and their commitment to participating in regular fellowship through small group ministry.

I mentioned I was at community group last night, and, on the way to community group, just thanking God that he calls us, even commands us, to have regular fellowship because without it we wouldn't be able to grow. And I just began to think about all the small group leaders in Sovereign Grace who are leading meetings, even maybe last night and thanking God for them. So, if you're a small group leader in a Sovereign Grace Church, thank you. Mine and Jill’s group is led by Rob and Gina Flood, and we love being in their group. We just thank God for Rob and Gina Flood. So that's the first one, eager to learn and apply God's word.

Secondly, the members of our churches serve in ways that are unseen. I mentioned that about pastors. I wanted to mention this one regarding members. Just so many ways that on a Sunday morning, if you pay attention, you'll maybe notice, maybe not because so many are serving behind the scenes. Whether that's serving with tech and sound on a Sunday morning, or in children's ministry where you drop off your children, or you're praying before the service with a group in a separate room for the service that day—those are just some of the ways that our members serve not to be seen, or noticed, or thanked, but because they love serving God and they love serving his church. So, thank you for all the ways that you serve.

And then third, there's so many things I could write about this, but thank you for your generosity. You are a generous people who give faithfully and generously each and every week to your church and maybe beyond your church. The church is able to function and do gospel ministry because of your faithful generosity, and many times sacrificial generosity. And I think that's just a remarkable evidence of grace on your life and I just thank God for you and all of those ways and more for the members of our churches.

Benjamin Kreps:

Well, that's wonderful. Thanks for sharing that, Mark. I mean, the things you're highlighting that I love is for pastors and members in our churches. I imagine for many of them, most of them, it can just feel like, “Well, not that big of a deal. Not very meaningful; just trying to glorify God and serve and do my part.” But you're highlighting just what an evidence of grace it is in all of these things—of God's activity throughout our churches, pastors preaching God's word—that is not a given in our culture, and yet our pastors are committed to it—to serving and courageously shepherding the church. And members of our churches serving and giving in partnership together. Man, we do have so much to be grateful for, including you, Mark. So, thank you, Mark and the Leadership Team, including Jared. Thanks for the book on elder governance. We'll be checking that out. And thank you all for checking out the podcast. We'll see you here, Lord willing, next week. Bye for now.

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, we're a couple of weeks away from another wonderful Pastors Conference, still with memories lingering of the enjoyable and edifying time that we shared together in Orlando. Part of the conference each year, though actually before the conference, when we have our Council of Elders, you give something I look forward to, I'm sure we all do. At that Council of Elders, you give a State of the Union address each year and this year was no exception. And so there was a faith-building, encouraging State of the Union address. You want to talk about that, but before we get into that, why do you give a State of the Union address each year?

Mark Prater:

It's a great question and I'm not sure we always think about why do I do this in my role as executive director? Well, first of all, it is a requirement according to our Book of Church Order. It is a unique responsibility that the Council of Elders has given the executive director to report to them annually, basically on the State of the Union in Sovereign Grace. But it's so much more than just a requirement in the way that we have sort of put together a State of the Union and deliver a State of the Union each year.

So here are some other reasons that I think it's important, why it's given annually. First of all, it gives me the opportunity to just provide just a clear vision for our future, casting vision for our future and establishing the priorities for our family of churches over the next year. It's an opportunity to do that and to do that live and in person before the council is just this wonderful experience to do so. So there's that.

I think secondly, if you think just add a theological category to it, if you can do that, just think about the sovereignty of God. And what I mean by that is that things change from year to year. And so the State of the Union really is a response to things that may be changing, whether it's in the culture or denomination. And in that sense, we're following God and attempting to have him lead us, ultimately. And the State of the Union gives us a chance to, gives me a chance, just to talk about that with our pastors. So some other things in terms of changes, there can be theological challenges that are new or that change from year to year that we've got to adapt to and just be aware of and make sure that we're guarding our churches appropriately so we can maintain theological fidelity. There can be cultural issues that change from year to year. And it seems like in the last several years that's happened more rapidly in many ways...

Benjamin Kreps:

On steroids.

Mark Prater:

Yeah, exactly. So there can be these new pressures that our pastors are facing from the culture in leading their churches. And it gives us a chance to speak into those. There are changes that can happen within the denomination. There can be new challenges within our denomination or new things that have just come about that we can now utilize. And so for example, this year we distributed and really released our Sovereign Grace catechism at the conference. And so that now is a tool that I can encourage every pastor to give to every member of their church because they're going to benefit, their soul's going to benefit, from going through that catechism. But it also helps us maintain theological fidelity, which is one of the things I talked about this year in my State of the Union. It also gives me a chance to give updates on things that are happening in Sovereign Grace that not everyone may be aware of and to thank pastors who are serving Sovereign Grace extra-locally in a variety of different ways.

And in that sense, it's also just an attempt to get us all on the same page and moving forward together. The State of the Union does provide that. And also of small benefit, some pastors have told me, usually I give an outline. I also give an executive director update that has a number of stats and you kind of combine those. Some pastors like to take that back and just inform their churches of what's happening in Sovereign Grace. So they wouldn't take my outline, just hand it out, but they might talk about, for example, the number of church plants that we have planned over the next two years and where they're going to be throughout the world, which can really build the church into Sovereign Grace. So those are just a few reasons beyond a BCO requirement of why I give one annually. And in doing so, I think it has strengthened us and helped put us on the same page year after year. And so I'm grateful for the wisdom of putting that in our BCO when it was written 11 years ago.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. Well, this year, once again, you directed us ultimately toward God, which is your main purpose in that Council of Elders meeting. The specifics fall underneath the umbrella of our pursuing God together in Sovereign Grace by faith. And you highlighted a number of priorities for us in 2025 that one can hear if listening to the Council of Elders address on the resources page, which I think you'll talk about, but what are some of the priorities that you highlighted for the upcoming year?

Mark Prater:

Yeah, my first response to that question, if you weren't in the Council of Elders meeting, is to listen to it, to hear those priorities. And as you mentioned Ben, it's on the events page, it's listed below the breakout sessions, the audio is there. There's an outline available that you can just go along to use as you listen to it if you want to. And there should be a transcribed copy of the State of the Union available soon on that same webpage. So I would say listen to it. That's the main way to figure out what are our priorities in the next year. But I do want to highlight a few that I did talk about this year, not all of 'em. I think a lot of what I talked about is to try to prepare us for our future.

And when I say future, I'm thinking about the next 10 to 15 years. And there were a number of priorities under that category, preparing for our future. For example, just preparing young men for pastoral ministry who are aspiring to pastoral ministry. And it gives me a chance to introduce a new initiative by the leadership team, a pastoral development and deployment grant program that churches can apply for to have a pre-pastors college internship grant given to them. Or maybe a grant for pastors college expenses or after pastors college graduation, a grant for a residency post-graduation where they can just get experience in a local church to grow in pastoral ministry, especially before transitions occur from the founding generation to the next generation in the next 10 to 15 years. So things like that in terms of preparing for our future.

Also talked about having faith to maintain our theological fidelity, which is challenging in any year and is probably always going to be a topic for us. But there was something unique this year I just wanted to say about it because I think as things shift theologically, culturally, and even in evangelicalism, we must be a denomination that remains just committed to our theological convictions as found in our statement of faith. And it's one of the reasons the Sovereign Grace catechism I think is so important, not just for pastors, but for every member of our churches. And so just be aware that that resource is available and a little insider baseball, we're thinking about working with a potential publisher that would help just distribute that for us and maybe in doing so, give us bulk rates is something new that we're exploring since the conference.

And then the other thing I talked about is cultivating joyful generosity among our churches and in our churches. And that's because this would be an evidence of God going before us. I just see so many evidences. Now there are anecdotal, but you put 'em all together and I just think, my goodness, God is at work in our family of churches, I think in a very unique way, not unique to Sovereign Grace, but just unique in terms of his work, doing work that men can't do to stir generosity in people. It's something I've just noticed over the last probably year, and I continue to hear stories of people just being generous. And again, they're anecdotal, but the kind of generosity I'm hearing that is divinely inspired. I don't think there's a pastor to take credit for that. And so we kind of want to get behind what God is doing, and I gave four recommendations in my State of the Union of how to cultivate generosity. So just a few of the priorities that I talked about for us as a denomination in 2025.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. Well, I do encourage anyone who hasn't heard that address to go ahead and listen to it. It's a wonderful mix of envisioning and encouragement and is faith building as we look to the year ahead. I know for us here at Living Hope, coming back from the Pastors Conference, we're right in the middle of a stewardship series we do each year because we need to raise money above our general fund to pay our mortgage on this wonderful building that God has provided for us. And it certainly, I found my strength, my faith strengthened coming back from Orlando to press into the grace of giving at Living Hope. And God has been very good to us as well in that regard.

So in case guys aren't aware, you should know that that address each year is the fruit of many hours of Mark praying for you, studying, thinking, considering; working many countless hours and late nights as you care for us through that address each year. So thank you for doing that once again, for building our faith, for leading us. The old leadership adage, if you aim at nothing, you'll hit it every time, we're aiming at something and you're helping us to aim in ways that are God-glorifying for us as a denomination in Sovereign Grace.

So thank you, Mark. Thank you all for checking out the podcast and we'll see you here next week, Lord willing. Bye for now.

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, we're recording this just about a week after the conference from last week, ended. And as come to expect over the years, a wonderful conference and thank you for leading that conference. Thank you for the leadership team and the thoughtfulness you brought to planning the conference. It certainly was enjoyable; it was practical, it was edifying, it was certainly God glorifying and a joyful time that we enjoy every year. And last week was no exception. But what was your take on the conference?

Mark Prater:

My take on the conference was that God was very, very good to us in so many different ways and it was just good to be together. I didn't realize, I think I talked to Erin sometime late in the conference. We had over 800 folks there.

Benjamin Kreps:

Nice.

Mark Prater:

Which was wonderful. And then people from 22 different nations, which adds that global flavor that we love in Sovereign Grace and a mix of different generations. So it's just a picture, a visual picture of, and a reminder that we are a global multi-generational family of churches by God's grace alone and will continue to be that way by God's grace alone. And it was just wonderful. I was telling some of the guys on the leadership team, even told you before we started recording Ben, that this year was especially enjoyable to lead along with the guys on the leadership team. It was just a delight and a joy that I can only give credit to the grace of God for. But it was really enjoyable. And I remember there's so many highlights for me. One was at the very end, the last session's over and Aaron Law, who's the senior pastor of Grace Covenant Church in Jacksonville, Florida, came up with these four really young men, late teens, early twenties, who were just so excited to be there.

And I think all of them are aspiring to pastoral ministry and that gives this old man a lot of hope for our future to have young men like that who want to be Sovereign Grace pastors in the future. So there's just sweet moments like that for me throughout the conference. And God was very, very good to us. One of the ways he was good to us was through the teaching we enjoyed in the main sessions and the breakout sessions. And each of those main sessions and breakout sessions, we think about them in a way that they not only serve in the moment during the conference, but actually can provide ongoing resources for pastoral teams and for leaders and members of our churches. And so I just want to make sure that folks access those, all of the audio and most of the video, I think all the audio and video for main sessions and all the audio for breakout sessions are up online and are accessible on the events page of our Sovereign Grace website. So just want to mention those as solid resources to be accessed over the next several months.

Benjamin Kreps:

Well, I certainly plan on revisiting those resources and some of them I actually haven't even checked out yet. I was in one breakout, can't attend all of them. But those main sessions, man, what a wonderful experience to sit under the preaching of these gifted and godly men that we love and respect. Certainly had some highlights for me personally when it came to the main sessions and the sermons. There's a couple of those that you want to highlight for us and also give us suggestions on how we can benefit from the main sessions.

Mark Prater:

Let me make some recommendations to pastoral teams first. And so senior pastors, if you're a follower of the podcast, listen or read or watch, I would recommend that you ask all the guys on your team to just listen to all the main sessions. Again, I think it's going to be helpful to do that. And you want to do that in a way that you're thinking about your local church and how do you bring application to each of those main sessions.

Some specific recommendations would be that you listen to Jeff's message, which talks about 2 Timothy 2:2, and ask the question, who are the sons in our church and how are we equipping them for pastoral ministry if they have interest in pastoral ministry? Just a wonderful way to begin to think through that. Of course, Jon's message on pursuing godliness is something we want to begin with our own lives as pastors. Jared's message on encouragement, cultivating a culture of encouragement, first of all on your pastoral team and then in the church. And then would really recommend CJ's message to listen to again or for guys who weren't at the conference, I heard a number of people say to me, it was like CJ was pastoring me personally with his message on regret and how he skillfully preached that in ways that I think really helped people. I think that is a message actually that people will go back to and listen to again and again because we will all have regrets in this life.

So just some recommendations for pastoral teams in terms of your leaders, I'd recommend that you send them all the main sessions out to your leaders. And I think that again, CJ's message on regret will be especially helpful to them because they not only have regrets, but if there are small group leaders and they're helping you pastor people in your church, that sermon can be accessed by any member of a church and really be pastored and served. Just all the main sessions to all of your leaders I think could be really, really helpful. So just some quick thoughts on how to utilize the main sessions as a pastoral team.

Benjamin Kreps:

Again, just very grateful for those main sessions and just sort of the broad spectrum that was covered in those main sessions from diagnosing and caring, for pastoring our hearts in a very specific way with that regret sermon to the practical exhortations embedded in, for instance, Jon's and Jared's sermon. So I heartily agree, and that's something your church can benefit from all manner of different kinds of people can benefit from different of those different main sessions.

But we also had breakout sessions. I attended Josh's masterful, that's not an exaggeration, masterful breakout session on counseling and biblical counseling and the state of the therapeutic world and so forth, which is incredibly important for pastors definitely to understand what's happening more broadly speaking in that world because we're caring for folks that are coming into our churches having been affected by the therapeutic world, breathing the air of that world throughout the week. But there were a number of other breakouts as well, each one with an intent to serve in different ways. And so I'm looking forward to hearing them. I've only heard Josh's, looking forward to hearing the other breakouts, but talk to us about the breakout sessions.

Mark Prater:

For the breakout sessions. By the way, all of the outlines, and I think maybe even the transcripts are up on the website, so the audios there, but there's a number of other resources that are important to capture. First of all, for pastoral teams you just mentioned Josh's breakout session, competent to counsel, it was excellent. Just so, so good. That is a breakout session. So filled with good content, you need to listen to it probably a couple of times. I think every pastoral team ought to listen to that one. And senior pastors take responsibility to get the resources that Josh made available; he has counseling and mental health book reviews that are available on the website. And he also has a David Powlison reading list, a separate document that's also on the website. Those are gold. And make sure, senior pastors, make sure that your pastoral teams are aware of all those resources and utilizing them. But I would listen to that and then discuss it as a pastoral team. Similar with Jeff's breakout session on application and preaching, putting God's word to work, the task of application and preaching. I wasn't there, but I've already heard a lot of good comments about how helpful that was.

Benjamin Kreps:

I'm sure.

Mark Prater:

We designed that one because one of the strengths in Sovereign Grace historically has been a good application that helps you apply the gospel to your life in preaching. That is something we don't want to lose. And that's why we asked Jeff to teach a breakout session. Discuss that as a pastoral team. If you are a pastor or you have a leader in your church who's responsible for evangelism, make sure you have them listen to Jim Donohue's breakout session on the role of an evangelist. That's going to be really, really important to listen to. And as we plan the conference, one of the things we talked about is we don't want to lose this priority of building godly homes, which Is why we asked Brian Chesemore to teach his breakout session, which is a must listen to and his outline is up there, I believe as well. God's glorious vision for the family. That would be one to discuss as a pastoral team and make sure that in your own family, you men are building godly homes as a wonderful example to the church.

And then for the leaders in your church, have them listen to all the breakout sessions, but certainly Josh's breakout session, competent to counsel, especially small group leaders. I think that's really, really important for them. Anybody helping you with evangelism? Jim's breakout session and then Brian's breakout session on building Godly homes could help anyone in your church and make sure that they're listening to that. One other breakout session was Betsy Ricucci's breakout session Lessons from Eve. Just really well done. Of course I wasn't there.

I read the transcript before, and Jill, my wife, was just saying, Mark, that was just so good. That will serve any woman in a Sovereign Grace church. So to pastors, again, have your wives listen to it, you listen to it, discuss it with your wife, and then consider how you can make Betsy's breakout session available to all the ladies in your church. It's just really well done. Again, lessons from Eve is the title of that. So just some recommendations to not just let the conference go by and not utilize it in an ongoing way, these wonderful resources that will strengthen your church and help us to build God-centered churches.

Benjamin Kreps:

Excellent. Well, grateful to you, Mark and the leadership team each year. That conference is the fruit of your prayerful and careful and thoughtful planning as you guys seek to serve us. And you certainly did it again this year and it is always wonderful to hear from just a variety of gifted pastors in Sovereign Grace that are there to serve us, and serve us they did.

So, thanks Mark. We'll certainly be checking out the resources and seeking to utilize them in our churches. If we are wise, we will all do so. And thank you all for checking out the podcast. Let's see you here next week. Lord willing. Bye for now.