When Illinois Baptists gather this November at Ashburn Baptist Church in the southwest Chicago suburb of Orland Park, they will experience something new. The 2024 IBSA Annual Meeting and Pastors Conference will feature a condensed two-day format, making the mid-week event briefer and easier to attend for pastors and church messengers.
The program for the unified gathering will continue to highlight the dynamic preaching that Pastors Conference attendees have come to expect, featuring five messages from respected national ministry leaders Brian Croft, Mark Croston, and Jeff Iorg as well as Illinoisans Bruce Kirk and Michael Nave. Additionally, the new format will include twenty helpful, ministry-oriented breakout sessions for pastors, pastors’ wives, church planters, and other leaders, led by Croft, Croston, Nave, and others.
“I’m really glad for the return of the breakout sessions,” said IBSA Associate Executive Director Paul Westbrook. “When I served as a pastor, I always felt like breakouts helped me grow to the next level as a leader and provided me with tools that I could take back and put into practice at my church.”
Westbrook is organizing the slate of breakouts to strengthen churches.
In addition to the two days of preaching and worship, ministry breakouts, and reporting and business sessions, Illinois Baptists will also have the opportunity to stay a third day and take part in a Chicago prayer tour or mission project in cooperation with the Send Relief Chicago Ministry Center and the Chicagoland Baptist Association.
The move to the new streamlined format comes as a result of messenger and church feedback received by the Order of Business Committee, which plans and evaluates the annual gathering. The Committee regularly heard that many messengers had difficulty attending all three days of the meeting and would prefer a condensed schedule and expedited business.
Following the 2023 meetings, the Order of Business Committee worked with elected IBSA Officers, Pastors Conference leadership, and Association staff to develop a combined program intended to inspire and edify both pastors and messengers while also conducting the necessary business of the statewide association of nearly 900 cooperating churches. The IBSA Board approved the new plan at their March meeting, moving the official dates of the meeting to Tuesday and Wednesday, November 12-13.
Full details for the meeting, including schedules, speakers, additional gathering opportunities, and registration information, can all be found at IBSAannualmeeting.org.