by Eugene Park
Throughout the years I’ve gone to Argentina, my role has changed. Some years I just go as a team member. Other years I go as the team leader. But one role that has never changed is being the music guy. Each year I try to bring down new music that they can learn and continue to sing even after we leave. What the members of the Tucuman church learn through the teaching time is extremely important. But what is often overlooked is the learning that can also happen through the singing of biblically centered songs that sing the truths of the gospel. This is why I take my role as the music guy seriously, both at home and abroad. Lyrics in music have the opportunity to teach biblical truth. That’s why I’m so thankful for ministries like Sovereign Grace Music that seeks to produce gospel centered songs that the church can sing. In recent years they have produced albums in Spanish. These songs have been a mix of translated songs from English that we sing at LBC and songs written in Spanish. These albums have been a tremendous help to me as I’ve been able to take these songs down to Argentina and share them with the church. Sovereign Grace also puts the music sheets online for free download.
When we arrived in Tucuman, a handful of people kept coming up to me and asking if I had new songs for them. I don’t remember this happening in previous years. But that encouraged me because it showed that they have been enjoying the songs that I’ve been bringing and they wanted more of the same. And during the singing times led by Beto (music leader at the Tucuman church), they would often sing songs that we had taught them in previous years.
I feel a special kinship with Beto as we’re both the music leaders of our churches. Each year we spend time together talking about music, going through songs, and helping each other with our respective ministries. I really appreciate the faithfulness he’s shown over the years. We have seen leaders come and go from the church in Tucuman but he’s been there from the very beginning.
During the teaching sessions throughout the week, we would start out with some singing time led by Beto and someone else. Then they would call me up to sing and teach them a couple of songs. This year I prepared the songs La Gloria de la Cruz (The Glories of the Cross), Gracias Cristo (Jesus, Thank You), Mi Vida es Cristo (All I Have is Christ), Venga Tu Reino (Let Your Kingdom Come), and Contempla A Dios (Behold Our God). All these songs came from the Sovereign Grace album Eres Dios. The church in Tucuman loves to sing so they learned these songs quickly and were soon belting them out. One of the blessings of being up in front is that everyone is facing me and so I get to hear (and sometimes feel) the full brunt of everyone singing.
Equipping them for ministry has always been a priority and it’s no different with the music. This year we left them with a few Eres Dios CD’s as well as the songsheets for all the songs. We give them all the songsheets in case there are other songs on the CD they want to sing.
While I didn’t do any “official” teaching in Tucuman, I know that people were still taught Scripture through the music. I hope they will continue to learn and be shaped by the gospel through the music. Now I gotta figure out what to sing next year!
Editor’s note: This is the first of a series of articles being provided by the 2013 Argentina short-term missions team announced here.