Florence—A leading master planner and designer of churches in America who is known as the “Architectural Evangelist” will keynote the Kentucky Baptist Pastors’ Conference Nov. 14 at Florence Baptist Church, one day prior to the Annual Meeting of the Kentucky Baptist Convention.

Mel McGowan, formerly employed by the Walt Disney Company, is co-founder and chief creative principal of PlainJoe Studies, a multi-disciplinary design firm that works with churches in strategic ideation and branding, interactive media and web, and spatial storytelling and architecture. A highly sought-after speaker, McGowan has won multiple Solomon Awards for “Best Church Architect” and authored “Design Intervention: Revolutionizing Sacred Space.”

Sharing the platform with McGowan on Monday evening will be David Nassar, vice president of spiritual development at Liberty University, whose family fled Iran and sought asylum in the United States. In his testimony, Nassar shares about how experiencing acceptance and grace extended by Christian friends and finding a personal relationship with Jesus led him to rejecting his Muslim culture.

In the afternoon session, two Kentuckians—Curtis Woods, associate executive director of the KBC, and Kenny Rager, pastor of Life Community Church in Owensboro—and LifeWay executive Eric Geiger will address this year’s conference theme, “Full of Grace & Truth,” a description of Jesus found in John 1:14.

“Nothing is as attractive to a lost world as experiencing the fullness of grace and truth,” explains Bill Langley, president of the Pastor’s Conference and pastor of Severns Valley Baptist Church in Elizabethtown.

“It’s in the fullness of grace and truth that people living in a sin-saturated culture experience the life-chaining power of the gospel,” Langley said. “My prayer is this Pastor’s Conference will be a great encouragement to each of us as we ask the precious Spirit of Christ to fill us up and saturate us with His grace and truth.” (WR)