Today marks the beginning of a new Pastors College academic year. We’ll introduce the students in a moment, but first, here is the class by the numbers.

Of 23 students:

• Ages range from 24 to 56 years old
• Twenty-two are married, with marriages ranging from 3 to 31 years
• Ten states are represented, as well as five countries besides the U.S.: the Philippines, Germany, Bolivia, England, and the Dominican Republic
• 15 of the students have prior pastoral experience and 1 is a senior pastor
• 8 students are in our church-planting track

As you can imagine, the ten-month Pastors College curriculum is an intense experience for these men and for their families, on top of settling into temporary homes and for some a new culture altogether.

Please take a moment to look over the class roster and to pray for these men and for their families.  

This week I sat down in Sovereign Grace’s recording studio to make a video answering some of the pressing questions that pastors and members of our churches have asked over the last two months. They’re good questions that merit more detailed answers, so a video seemed like the best approach. As always, please keep the feedback, questions, and prayers coming. 

Yesterday we received the consultation report from Ambassadors of Reconciliation. It includes three areas where they and others will be involved in helping us:

1. Adjudication of allegations against C.J. Mahaney
2. Group reconciliation with others who have offenses
3. Follow-up consultation and recommendations

We plan on following their recommendations in full. The document is very thorough so for the most part I’ll leave you to review it and ask any clarifying questions.

There is one part, however, that merits some introduction. In our initial communication about this process, we said we would use a panel of outside evaluators to review allegations against C.J., which at the time we were presuming would come from AOR.  In this we were following the external counsel we were receiving as we began our discussions with AOR.  As you’ll see them explain in their proposal, they disagree with that approach. In their assessment, it is the board’s responsibility to do the evaluation. At the same time, they are sensitive to the perceived conflict of interest at play if the board comprised the review panel. To achieve a compromise, they have proposed that a five-person panel—four SGM pastors and one board member—hears and adjudicates the allegations against C.J.

You may note that this is different from what we originally envisioned and requested from AOR. But after hearing their arguments we believe their counsel is sound and we plan on following it. I realize that this constitutes a change from our initial expectations, but I hope you can see in their recommendation a genuine attempt to address potential conflict of interest concerns that we raised with them. They were extremely careful and deliberate about getting to know the details of this situation before issuing their proposal, and I believe they’ve served us very well with this compromise and the rest of the proposal too.

I will keep you posted as we take significant steps in the adjudication and group reconciliation process. Thanks as always for your prayers, input, and support for us as we move ahead with this evaluation.

Hi everyone. Earlier this week I returned from a trip to the Dominican Republic where I had the privilege of joining C.J. and Jeff in teaching at Por Su Causa, a conference attended by 5000+ people from all over Latin America. It was very encouraging to spend time with these brothers and sisters, but it didn’t leave much time to blog. So this post will be a short one. 

We continue to appreciate all of our readers asking good clarifying questions as we walk out this evaluation process. Two recurring themes in questions we’ve heard recently have to do with the purpose of C.J.’s leave from his SGM leadership roles and the reason we formed a preliminary evaluation panel. We’ve updated the evaluation overview page to help clarify both of those issues.

Please continue to ask questions as they occur to you—it’s very helpful to know what’s on your mind!

Here’s the audio of Craig Cabaniss’s message from the final general session of our WorshipGod conference, which concluded on Saturday. Craig is senior pastor of Grace Church (Dallas, TX).

“Gathering to Commission” (1 Peter 2:9)

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Here’s the audio of Bob Kauflin’s message from the fourth general session of our WorshipGod conference. Bob is director of worship development for Sovereign Grace Ministries and serves as a worship leader at Covenant Life Church.

“Gathering to Edify” (1 Corinthians 14:1-33, Ephesians 4:15-16)

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Last week Dave mentioned that we were putting together a webpage to provide details about and an outline of our independent evaluation process. 

Today I posted an initial version of the page which lists the steps we have taken so far with Ambassadors of Reconciliation. There are several important things we still need to add, but I'm publishing it now so that readers can start submitting related questions and suggestions for improvement. As I get your input I'll update it to answer questions and clarify the most common points of confusion. Many thanks to those of you who suggested this to us!

Here’s the audio of Thabiti Anyabwile’s message from the third general session of our WorshipGod conference. Thabiti Anyabwile is senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Grand Cayman in the Cayman Islands.

“Gathering to Hear” (1 Timothy 4:11-16)

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Here’s the audio of Bryan Chapell’s message from the second general session of our WorshipGod conference. Dr. Chapell is president and professor of practical theology at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri.

“Gathering to Rehearse (the Gospel)” (Isaiah 6:1-8)

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Our WorshipGod conference started on Wednesday night and continues through tomorrow. This year’s conference is on the theme “The Gathering”—discovering what it means to build our meetings around the gospel.

Here’s Ray Ortlund’s message from the first general session.

“Gathering to Behold” (2 Corinthians 3:18)

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