Raising Up Pastors in SGC Philippines
An update from Jeffrey T. Jo, National Leader for SGC Philippines…
In our Sovereign Grace Churches ordination guide, it states that, “The ordination process for the churches of Sovereign Grace is intended to protect the integrity of our doctrinal commitments and values, to guard against being hasty in the laying on of hands (1 Tim 5:22), and to ensure that called and qualified men are filling our pulpits, leading our church plants, and pastoring our churches. All current elders in the churches of Sovereign Grace have a vested interest in the quality of our future elders. The theological maturity and biblical fidelity of our pastors is fundamental to the health of our union of churches.” (p2) This is the essential reason why it is necessary for men, who desire to be pastors/elders of a local church, to go through the process of ordination. The candidate’s doctrine, character and fitness in ministry will be grounded and refined in this ordination process.
God has been so kind to our churches here in the Philippines. He has raised up 19 men who will go through this ordination process. Eleven of these men are already pastors with their own local churches while the other eight have been elders of their local churches, serving alongside their lead pastors but with a heart also to plant churches of their own in the near future.
With this large number of men, I must confess that it’s an exciting year for us but it’s a challenging one as well. Exciting because they know the significance of the said process as they prepare to serve their local churches, or to be sent out as church planters. It is also exciting for us because God is allowing us to have a glimpse of His plan for Sovereign Grace Churches Philippines. On the other hand, it is also a challenging task to oversee these 19 men and to make sure they are encouraged and inspired to finish ‘the race’. In light of all these challenges, it is a non-negotiable task to make sure that they heartfully understand their reading assignments, their required papers and why they need to go through the four sets of exams, namely:
Bible knowledge exam
Theology part 1 exam
Theology part 2 exam
Oral exam
These men love the gospel, their families and their local churches and they know that they need to go through this communal process which will lead to the public confirmation of their ministry call by the church. To ensure this, we’ve assigned 3 ordained men to serve as ‘advisers’ for the 10 candidates from Mindanao, and another 3 for the 9 candidates from Luzon. The advisers will serve as encouragers and prayer partners of the candidates, moreover, they will also act as ‘translators’ of English language to their own native tongue. We thank the Lord as well for the supportive heart of Chris Oswald of SG USA and some ordained pastors from SG Australia who will serve with us in the ordination committee led by Dave Taylor. Indeed, this displays our extra-local church partnership in our family of churches.
I would like to ask you brothers and sisters to pray with us for our 19 candidates that, though most of them have local churches to oversee and families to care for, may depend on the grace of God to sustain them in this process. It’s been my hope to see SG pastors here in our region serve their churches with theological soundness, humility, integrity and accountability. I am confident that God is faithful to complete what He has begun in our region, to the praise of His glorious grace!
