Ben Poage

Appalachian Ministries Director to Deliver Ford Lectures This Week

Erskine Theological Seminary will sponsor the Ford Lectures this week, with speaker Ben Poage, executive director of Appalachian Ministries Educational Resource Center, addressing the seminary community Wednesday, Nov. 1, and Thursday, Nov. 2, at 11 a.m. in Bowie Divinity Hall.

Poage, a graduate of the University of Missouri, worked as an agricultural extension agent in Missouri and an agricultural economist with the United States Department of Agriculture prior to entering seminary. He earned the Master of Divinity degree from Lexington Theological Seminary in 1968, and while in seminary served as a rural pastor and spent an intern year as a fraternal worker, developing agricultural production and marketing programs in Jamaica.

Poage served on the staff of Human/Economic Development with the Commission On Religion in Appalachia (CORA), Knoxville, Tenn., in 1970-74 and as Associate Minister for Domestic Hunger with the National Presbyterian Hunger Program in 1984-85. In 1974-80 he founded the Human/Economic Appalachia Development (HEAD) Corporation, and currently serves as its Board president.

In 1986 Poage was called as an Associate Regional Minister of the Christian Church in Kentucky for Kentucky Appalachian Ministry, a position he held until his retirement in December 1999. He retired in 1989 after 35 years of service as a Chaplain in the Army Reserve.

Poage was awarded the Doctor of Ministry degree at Lexington Theological Seminary in 1992. For his Doctor of Ministry project he completed a manuscript for publication on The Tobacco Church: A Manual for Congregational Leaders.

The Ford Lectures, established in 1995 by an anonymous friend of Erskine Theological Seminary, focus on ministry in the small membership church. These lectures honor Wilborn McCree and Lyllian Virginia Rosen Ford, a Presbyterian couple whose lives were devoted to pastoral ministry for 46 years, and who were especially concerned for the future of the small church in sheltered and remote areas.