I met with Curtis Woods today in his office at the Baptist Campus Ministry of Kentucky State University. What came of it was a video which I have put up on our Facebook page. I carry my Flip camcorder everywhere I go. When I told Curtis about the Flip, he flipped, promising to order one immediately; but I pledged to call his supervisor (Keith Inman, at the Kentucky Baptist Convention) and encourage him to buy one for all forty or so campus ministers in his network!!
But that conversation came after Curtis and I found ourselves in a pleasant groove, swapping ideas, attitudes, and titles, discovering along the way much common ground. He gave me this title: Connecting Points or Correcting Points. “That is my ministry,” he said, “and I find it is much needed here in Kentucky.” I pulled out my ever-at-my-side notebook and wrote it down; and when I got home typed it into the Title line of this article.
The Academy of Preachers is about connecting not correcting. We aspire to connect people who have been called to preach. We do not want to correct their theology (although the interaction of one hundred young preachers will undoubtedly shift a few stereotypes and move a few boundary lines) or entice them away from their faith community; indeed we want each Young Preacher to embody what he or she has been taught, how he or she has been shaped.
Two weeks ago a young man from Trevecca Nazarene University asked me: “Dr. Moody, you know we are holiness people. How should we preach when we come to the Festival?”
My quick and encouraging reply was: “Just exactly like you would preach if you stood in your holiness pulpit.” I suspect that if all one hundred of these Young Preachers do exactly that, we will discover a great many points of connection and not too many places of correction!!