Registration for the 2012 National Festival opened in April. Since then almost 60 Young Preachers have downloaded the registration forms and 2 have submitted their completed registration. That means only 123 preaching slots are available for the January 2012 gathering!
The first registrant is Stephen Leon Williamston, Jr. of Raleigh, North Carolina. The second registrant is CJ Childs, of Macon, Georgia (and a student at Trevecca Nazarene University in Nashville). CJ is a member of the Young Preachers Leadership Team and was the first registrant last year.
Rather than enlarge the National Festival each year to accommodate the growing numbers of applicants, the Academy of Preachers (AoP) has decided to sponsor Regional Festivals. Already we are a co-sponsor of a dozen local and denominational Festivals in Ohio, Virginia, Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia, Indiana, and Texas. But the Regional Festivals will have a look and feel more like the National Festival.
The Campus Festival scheduled for November 12, 2011 at the University of Evansville in Indiana will be expanded to include institutions within the Kentucky-Indiana-Illinois region, including Founding Partners Oakland City University and Kentucky Wesleyan College.
A Regional Festival of Young Preachers is also being planned for Texas. In that state, the AoP has four partners: Perkins School of Theology, South Texas School of Ministry, Truett Seminary, and Joel Gregory Ministries and other National Partners are being sought.
In addition, no less than a dozen Young Preachers who have preached at our National Festival either call Texas home or attend school there. These Young Preachers include two members of our Young Preachers Leadership Team: Willie Francois (who is from Houston but attends school in Massachusetts) and Darnell Tingle, who is from Cincinnati but lives in Houston. Other AoP members attend school at Criswell College, Perkins School of Theology, and Truett Seminary.
As to the National Festival, I am pleased to announce that one plenary preacher during the event will be Fr. Jeff Nicholas, newly appointed pastor of the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville, Kentucky. For the last several years, Nicholas has been pastor of the Church of the Epiphany in Anchorage, Kentucky. He is a graduate of St. Meinrad Seminary and Vanderbilt Divinity School and has just completed a doctorate in homiletics at Aquinas Institute in St. Louis.
Other news about the National Festival will be reported on AcademyofPreachers.net and I encourage you to subscribe to our RSS feed. All of the registrants and exhibitors planning to attend the 2012 Festival will be listed on the website as they make reservations. Already, MMBB and LPTS have reserved exhibit space, which means only 38 spaces remain!
Nothing is quite like the National Festival of Young Preachers. I invite you to be a part of it! Visit us online to register your attendance as a Young Preacher, mentor, exhibitor, convener, evaluator, volunteer or guest.
It is unlike anything you have ever attended. Promise!
-Dwight A. Moody, Gospel Catalyst
Meet Nick Joyner, a Pentecostal preacher and 2011 inductee of the Academy of Preachers. Nick recently completed his junior year at the University of Evansville, where he is a double major in Theology and Psychology with a minor in Ethics.
