By Pastor Rocky

As Evergreen Church prepares to hear from special guest Pastor Mark Dever this Sunday, June 19, we thought it would be great for Pastor Rocky to share more about his relationship with Pastor Mark Dever and how much of an encouragement Pastor Mark Dever has been to him personally and to our church.

Who is Pastor Mark Dever?

Pastor Mark Dever is a uniquely gifted man who has a particular passion for the local church. He and his wife Connie moved to Washington DC where he has served as the Senior Pastor of Capitol Hill Baptist Church since 1994. CHBC has been around since 1878! The Lord has used Pastor Mark in a unique way to impact the local church globally. He is also the president and founder of 9Marks Ministries which exists to serve and equip local churches with valuable resources that are all designed to build healthy local churches (www.9marks.org). The ministry produces books, blogs, podcasts, journals, conferences, interviews, etc. The 9Marks is designed to provide resources to help produce healthy local churches. He has authored several books on the church. “Nine Marks of a Healthy Church” is a hallmark book that has heavily impacted me and many other pastors. In it, Pastor Mark offers up 9 distinctives that a healthy church is marked by. The book has given me a clearer picture of how the Lord has designed the church to be.

Please share how you first got to know Pastor Mark Dever?

Providence is the short answer. It goes back to 2003 when Pastor Jeremy Yong moved to Washington DC to live with his future brother-in-law. Capitol Hill Baptist Church became his new church home and he got to know their Senior Pastor. Jeremy would join the first class of interns under Pastor Mark and would be asked to remain on the staff as a Pastoral Assistant. Jeremy would be trained to help oversee discipleship, membership, life groups and adult education at CHBC. We at Evergreen Baptist Church are benefiting from the investments that Capitol Hill Baptist Church made into Jeremy Yong almost 20 years ago. As Jeremy and I became friends, he introduced me to Pastor Mark, which opened the opportunity to develop a friendship.

How has Pastor Mark Dever been an encouragement personally to you? To the church?

Pastor Mark has encouraged me through our friendship. He is extremely passionate about discipling and has been an incredible model of a discipling man. He is intentional in everything that he does to connect people with one another. He has been intentional about contacting me whenever he came to Southern California, and he allows me to tag along with him. We have been able to FaceTime or text to check in with each other for various things.

He invited me to bring some pastors to join him at the “Weekender” at Capitol Hill Baptist Church. The “Weekender” is an intimate gathering of pastors where we can have a behind the scenes look at the life of Capitol Hill Baptist Church. Therefore, four pastors from our team who were able to attend the “Weekender.”  We were given a living picture to see how the culture of discipleship is lived out in the local church. We observed their Elder meetings and saw how they prayed and cared for the flock. A sizable portion of the meeting is dedicated to discussing and praying specifically for specific church members. The affection that the Elders and congregation have for one another was evident during their membership meeting as they discussed how to care for various church members.

Breakfast with Mark Dever; Elder’s Meeting

What are your hopes for Pastor Mark Dever’s time with Evergreen on Sunday, June 19?

Pastor Mark has agreed to preach at our church, and we are extremely excited about it. I am hoping that our church family will be able to be encouraged by seeing firsthand how the Lord has been caring for Evergreen Church. The Lord shows how much He love us by gifting us with brothers like Pastor Mark into our lives. We will be blessed by strong preaching. I am super grateful to the Lord that our church family can personally see firsthand those who have taken a special interest in our local church. It’s all from the Lord!