Here is a novel idea, one that God will bless, and one that could alter your life! Stoney Benfield at Prospect Baptist Church in Albemarle, North Carolina is, in connection with the Olford Institute for Expository Preaching, still holding a conference for pastors and their wives. This year’s conference theme is Evangelistic Expository Preaching! Do those two concepts even cohere? I thought evangelistic preaching was shouting at the top of one’s lungs around a graphic story of a deathbed conversion.
Actually, as Benfield and the Olford Institute both recognize, exposition of the Word of God provides the finest evangelistic preaching anyone could attempt. As John said of his own epistle, “These things I have written to you .... that you may know that you have eternal life….” (1 John 5:13). The truth is that the greatest expository sermons are intensely evangelistic, and the most impressive evangelism is invariably accomplished while expounding the Scriptures!
Many would candidly venture that they have precious little idea of where or how to begin on such a journey. Now you know why Pastor Benfield has this conference and features this theme. Prospect Baptist Church is itself an open exposition of this avowal! I have been there and watched the parking lot bustling with parishioners seeking a place to park, dodging Bible-carrying sheep as they hasten to find a pew in which to sit and follow in their Bibles, taking extensive notes while Pastor Stoney exegetes God’s Word. This exact scene is still visible in hundreds of places across America every Sunday. But it needs to be happening in thousands, and that is another reason why Prospect provides this conference! And this year there is an additional reason: a Pastors’ Wives Conference recognizes that this is a two-person assignment! Now, as the Bible says, the man is the pastor, but what is he without a great woman of prayer and counsel by his side?
May 5-8 is the date! A vacation with an eternal purpose! Grapple with the Scriptures, accept the fuel of the Holy Spirit, grow in eloquence, see people come to Christ. If you are one who still believes that God has chosen to use “the foolishness of that which is preached,” this conference is for you. And if you want to minister to other churches also, how about attending Albemarle, learning how it’s done, and expanding your ministry! See more details on the event here.
Paige Patterson, President Sandy Creek Foundation