Strengthening Gospel Partnerships in South Korea

An update from Marty Machowski, Executive Pastor at Covenant Fellowship Church, Glen Mills, Pennsylvania, USA and Emerging Nations Representative to South Korea…

If you traveled to Lord’s Grace in Suwon South Korea, you’d soon discover the only difference between your home church and Lord’s Grace Church is the language. Pastor Songhwan Kang and his wife Miran have given their lives to build a gospel-centered church in South Korea that models the values and virtues we in Sovereign Grace have come to love.

In fact, Yeon Jin Kim, a member of Lord’s Grace Church, recently translated the Sovereign Grace Journals on Our Shared Values and Our Shaping Virtues into Korean. Songhwan gave them away to the nine area pastors and their wives who joined us for our pastor’s seminar on gospel-centered sanctification and counseling.

Songhwan holding copies of the Sovereign Grace Journals on our shaping virtues and shared values that were translated into Korean.

The pastors gathered were amazed as they witnessed the partnership between Sovereign Grace Churches in sending me to support and partner with Songhwan and his wife and Lord’s Grace Church. Most church planters in Korea struggle all alone to build their churches. I am grateful for the support of the Northeast Region of Sovereign Grace for covering the expenses for my trip to South Korea and I am not surprised that this gesture of partnership had such a deep impact. By the end of the pastor’s seminar, the pastors who attended from other churches were asking if I would return again. Privately some of the men asked if I would extend my next trip to visit with their churches also. Some of these pastors have expressed a desire to join Sovereign Grace and are eager for their people to experience gospel-centered teaching and care.

Songhwan and his wife have modeled biblical fellowship in their church. Korean Christians struggle to share their lives with other believers as they work to break free of a strong history of shame culture where you do not share your weaknesses and family trials. By modeling humility and promoting CJ Mahaney’s book on the topic, Songhwan, and Miran have helped the couples in Lord’s Grace Church to begin sharing their struggles with one another.

Couples break down into small groups for discussion after a parenting message. 

We held a day-long family seminar the Saturday of my visit. After the first message on parenting Songhwan divided the couples into small groups where they could share their struggles in parenting with one another. Songhwan strategically included his leaders into each group to model biblical fellowship. Some of the participants came from other area local churches. For them, this was their first time they ever experienced biblical fellowship in a community environment. Later in the Q&A, after the second session on Building a Cross Centered Marriage, the participants opened up their lives and asked specific questions for help with their particular trials. Their openness testified to the effectiveness of the small group discussions. 

Area Pastors and wives with Marty teaching at day-long seminar.

Joining Lord’s Grace church on Sunday morning was a blessing for me. People with smiles and tears filled the room with the familiar melodies of Sovereign Grace songs sung with Korean lyrics. The congregation eagerly received my message on the shaping virtue of encouragement. We ate lunch together and then Songhwan led the whole church in a “Marty Machowski Trivia Contest” with prizes for the children. The kids were all in for the cookie prizes as they shot their hands up to guess the number of my children and grandchildren. Songhwan mixed in a number of strategic questions for me to answer that promoted Gospel living and drew out practical examples from my experience. We began the service at 10:30am and finished the last of the discussions at 4pm.

All in total, we were able to pack in over 30 hours of messages and meetings. Most of the meetings were informal with Songhwan and his wife and the pastoral interns of the church. We spent time together conversing over issues in the church and my experiences back home. I spent my last day before my evening flight relaxing in the Kang’s home, grateful for all the Lord had done in my week-long visit. It was clear that God heard the intercession of the people back home who were praying.

Couples from Marriage and Parenting Seminar.