Mary and I have just completed the 2022 Essentials Conference on “Worshipping Our Holy God” for the Grace Community Church in Maryville, Tennessee. About 450 people attended (photo 1) out of a congregation of 550. The congregation, pastored by Chris Riser and Ron O’Dell, has grown by about 200 in the last two years (photo 2). A number of visitors also took in the conference from the surrounding area. They hailed from a wide variety of backgrounds.
The other speakers were two good friends: Jeremy Walker (photo 3) and Brian Borgman (photo 4). Their messages on various aspects of worship were timely and powerful. I spoke six times in all: on public worship, the Puritans on worship, family worship (3x), and a concluding address on worship in heaven.
The attendees were hungry, appreciative, and great book-buyers (photo 5). Luke from Reformation Heritage Books and Mary worked hard at ringing up the sales, while I was busy selling books as I mixed with the people. It was a joy to fellowship with them and the church’s leaders who couldn’t have treated us better. We had a weekend full of good fellowship also among the ministers, and enjoyed our mealtimes with the church’s pastors and their families and friends in their homes on the Lord’s Day.
Today we are driving north to The Ark Encounter where I am to speak twice tomorrow morning to a conference of about 1,200 pastors and church leaders, and then we fly on to Los Angeles for the Puritan Conference that we helped organize to take place in John MacArthur’s church for close to 2,000 people. The MacArthur conference team has done an excellent job of orchestrating all the details of the conference on their end, for which we are most grateful. Pray for us, please, that God will bless these conferences in a mighty way and help us through this intense week so as to serve to His glory and the spiritual enrichment of all the attendees.
