Around the World: Global Updates
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Benjamin Kreps:
Hey everyone, and welcome to the podcast, where our aim is to connect our global family of Sovereign Grace churches with our Executive Director. Mark, before we hit record on this podcast, we were talking — you are freshly off a phone call with some of our global leaders in Sovereign Grace. And you want to give us some updates about some wonderful things that God is doing around the globe in our family of churches. But appropriately and rightly so, you were most excited to begin this podcast reflecting on God's goodness to us as a family of churches.
Mark Prater:
That's where I want to start — because from my seat, from my perspective, I can give you so many ways that God is being good to our family of churches, blessing our family of churches. It's a long list. It really is amazing how kind He's being to us, and good to us, and loving toward us — only because of Christ, as we well know.
And when I thought about this particular episode, I realized it's an expression of one of the ways that God is being exceedingly good to Sovereign Grace. And it's really captured in Psalm 67, verses 1 and 2. Verse 1: "May God be gracious to us and bless us, and may His face shine upon us." That's what we've experienced. He's been gracious to us. He's blessed us. His face has shined and continues to shine on Sovereign Grace. But it has a purpose, captured in verse 2: "That your way may be known on earth, your saving power among all nations." And it really is remarkable to step back and see how God Himself has brought about these opportunities for us to plant churches and partner with churches throughout the world. We have very slowly become more of a global family of churches. And as we've said so many times on this podcast, it's the Lord's doing and it's marvelous in our eyes. I just thank God for His goodness and His blessing, and ask that He continues to have His face shine upon us so we can be faithful to steward what He has given us — all for His glory, all for the good of the gospel as well.
Benjamin Kreps:
Amen. Even as you're sharing your thoughts about God's goodness and kindness to us, I'm just sitting here thinking: it's just an endless cause for wonder — that God is consistently kind and good to us. And certainly some of the things you're going to share with us are vivid expressions of God's goodness and kindness toward our family of churches. So go ahead — give us some updates about what God is doing.
Mark Prater:
I was actually planning on using this episode to give a global update anyway. But then, as you just mentioned, I just left — maybe 20 minutes ago — a Zoom meeting that Dave Taylor had just led so effectively. Dave Taylor, our Director of Global Strategy and Development, is a gift from the risen Christ to our family of churches because he is just leading and serving in so many ways, in so many different nations. I just thank God for him. One expression of that leadership was this Zoom meeting we were in with all of our global leaders. We do a retreat with them every other year — we did one in Sydney — but we try to gather with them once a quarter just to connect. Dave had them give a number of updates. So some of the updates I'm giving today are fresh from that meeting. I'm going to walk around the world.
Last week we had the very first Sovereign Grace Churches Asia Pacific Relay Conference — like the Relay Conference we do here, which is for the third generation in Sovereign Grace. There were between 200 and 300 young people there. David Zimmer and Caleb Dirnberger were there to lead the singing and lead worship. Dave Taylor preached and Jeffrey Jo preached. Jared Mellinger and Walt Alexander were also main session speakers. It was such a happy time — that conference went very, very well. And it wasn't just for those in the Philippines. There were 200 to 300 young people from Pakistan, South Korea, Australia, and the Philippines. One of the things Jeffrey was talking about is what happens in an individual's life and in the third generation's life at a conference like that, as God works — and the gospel partnership that is experienced and deepened through a gathering like that. And then the day after Relay ended, they did a Gathering Around the Gospel music event that Caleb and David led, which also went so, so well. Just wanted our folks to know: we are investing into the third generation in the Asia Pacific part of the world.
And then Jeffrey gave an update on his schedule. Please pray for Jeffrey and his wife Jeannie as they serve there. They're doing another Gathering Around the Gospel event October 10th through 11th up in the northern part of the Philippines. Part of the reason they're doing that is a growing number of churches in northern Philippines are expressing real interest in being a part of Sovereign Grace — which is encouraging. And then the week after that, Jeffrey and Jeannie are traveling down to Mindanao, which is south of Manila — I think it's about a five-hour drive — where they're going to do a marriage conference to invest into those folks. So those are just some of the things happening in the Asia Pacific part of the world.
Bart Lipscomb, our area leader, was on this morning's Zoom and is doing such a great job. But we've also identified Amanuel — an Ethiopian Sovereign Grace ordained elder, a vocational pastor at Trinity Fellowship. He is a theologically sharp, pastoral man. And we're beginning to think: could he, sometime in the future, be the Africa area leader? Not because Bart isn't doing a good job — he is, he's doing a great job. But we think it's better to have an African in that role long term. So Amanuel was on the call and gave an update about things happening at Trinity Fellowship in Addis Ababa.
They just graduated their third Pastors College class — ten students. Three of the graduates are returning to Nairobi, Kenya, to our church there that was planted out of Addis Ababa. And then three of the graduates are going to be interns right there in Addis Ababa because they came from Trinity Fellowship. So again, we are investing into the future — the next generation of pastors who are going to be in Africa.
The church there has grown — they're getting at least 225 members on a Sunday morning, which is remarkable given all that they face. And then Amanuel told this story: he did a members interview with a man, I think sometime in the last couple of weeks, who had been radically born again — saved out of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church and now becoming a member of Trinity Fellowship. Which is exactly why we plant churches, why we planted Trinity Fellowship six years ago: to reach people like that. In fact, he mentioned they've had several baptisms recently of new converts. So much is happening there in Ethiopia.
One thing to pray for: if you're tracking the news, there is a degree of civil conflict happening in Ethiopia again, and they're not sure of all the ramifications. Amanuel said it will probably affect the church some, and will definitely affect the economy. So please pray for that — for Ethiopia in particular.
Ed O'Mara, our area leader, was on the call and gave a brief update on his church. They continue to grow — they're regularly seeing 25 people on a Sunday. That might seem very small, but that's actually a good-sized church in Europe, where there are few gospel-preaching churches, and in Italy in particular. They've also found a public meeting place that they can meet in, and it's free — which is really good news. However, they're now packing it out, so they've got to find a different plan. But it's really encouraging to hear what's happening there.
They've also got a mini — Ed called it a mini Worship God conference — in October or November, in England. That's going to gather several churches that are not a part of Sovereign Grace but are showing interest: about four or five churches in England. Ed stepped back and said: when he first stepped into this role, they had one church in Bristol, England. Now they've got six either partner or candidate churches in Europe, with more interested churches — either pursuing adoption or potential church plants. So again, God's face is shining upon us and He's blessing us.
One of the things that really affected me: Ed asked us to pray that there would be a growing tiredness and weariness regarding agnosticism and atheism in Europe — that people would just realize it's not true, and that there would be gospel revival there. I just thought: that's a great way to pray. Let me invite all of Sovereign Grace to pray for that.
Carlos was a part of the call, and there are so many wonderful things happening in Mexico it's hard to limit the list. As I've mentioned before, they plan to plant two churches hopefully in the coming year — one in West Juárez and one in Guadalupe. Please be praying for those church plants and the seeds being planted right now.
They've also got a new Pastors College class in Mexico with three guys. Two of them are going to return to their respective towns — one is replanting in Oaxaca, and the other is in a church that exists in Tucson, and they're hoping that will lead to a church adoption. It's just really encouraging. They're also thinking about planting in Mexicali in the future, and then one other area they're considering in Mexico. So a lot is happening there, most of it church-plant oriented.
And I just wanted to end the updates with an update from the Middle East. I'm not going to use this person's name just for security reasons. But we sent a missionary from a Sovereign Grace partner church in Costa Rica to Lebanon. The goal — the dream, the hope, the prayer — is that people would be reached with the gospel, and his heart is to plant the first Sovereign Grace church in that nation, which would then lead to other church planting there.
He sent me an email last week with a picture. He's started a Bible study and he's doing it in English. He's learned since being there — and after getting some counsel from another reformed Lebanese pastor — that a lot of people speak English, so the language he knows can actually begin to work. They had their first Bible study. They thought five people would come, and he sent a picture with 13 people there — plus a few more saying, "We want to come, we just couldn't make it last week." So that could and will likely grow. That is again seeds being planted — not only for gospel salvation, but potentially for a church plant in an area we've never been before. In an area I would have never dreamed we would plant a church.
It's just another way that God's face shines upon us and that He's blessing us. And you just realize: we don't deserve this. But God is being kind. So may all of these updates move you to pray for them, and may God answer those prayers according to His will — for the good of the gospel, and especially for the glory of God, because His face has shined upon us.
Benjamin Kreps:
Excellent. Just so beautiful to hear those updates — and as you have repeatedly said on this episode, they are expressions of God's goodness toward us. He's blessing us and we don't deserve it. But how happy we are in Sovereign Grace to be a part of what God is doing globally. So thanks for the updates, and thank you all for checking out the podcast. We'll see you here next week, Lord willing. Bye for now.