NATIONAL PRIMITIVE BAPTIST ELECTS ELDER KENNETH DUKE AS VICE PRESIDENT

After the announcement had been made on Thursday night that Elder Bernard Yates had been elected President of the National Primitive Baptist Convention I was having a conversation with a fellow delegate later that night.

"I don't think that Yates should nominated Duke as vice president. Some people are complaining about having the two top officers from the same state." The irony of this statement is that for the last six years the top two officers were from the same state.

The person to whom  I was speaking with said, "Yates should nominate Rainey or some one from Alabama." Rainey is Elder Jeffrey Rainey from Mobile Alabama, a prolific and poetic preacher who thrills the constituency of the convention every year with his impassioned Bible expositions/messages as the convention's Bible Expositor. 

I replied, "Yates is going to nominate Duke tomorrow. That's his choice."

"But people are saying...." I interrupted him.

"It doesn't matter what people are saying we need to hear what God is saying." I said. "Those two are anointed by God for this time. We need to stop looking at this from the wrong perspective, the choice of Kenneth Duke is not about geography, it's about what the Spirit is saying to this convention."

The conversation was over and the person I was speaking with agreed with me.

On Friday August 26, 2011 Elder Bernard Yates nominated Elder Kenneth Duke as Vice President of the National Primitive Baptist Convention. Elder Duke was overwhelmingly elected to the office.

One of the visitor to the convention told me that you could sense the change in the atmosphere that week. What was felt in the atmosphere become manifest on Thursday and Friday of the convention. To this national body change has come.

Who is Elder Kenneth Duke? He is the dynamic pastor of the New Jerusalem Primitive Baptist Church in Miami Florida. When Elder Duke was called to the New Jerusalem Church in 1985 this congregation numbered forty persons. Today it is a congregation of seventeen hundred people with  a plethora of community ministries that is meeting needs throughout the populace of Miami and Dade County. Elder Duke is a dynamic pastor/evangelist who preaches through out the United States and for the last year and a half he has traveled to and given support to a congregation in Petit Guave Haiti.

With the election of Elders Yates and Duke there is an excitement in the National Primitive Baptist Convention, much as it was in the United States in 2008 after the election of Barack Obama. With this sense of renewed hope and unbridled optimism news days are in the horizon.

I ask you to pray for Vice President Duke as you pray for President Yates. Pray these petitions for Elder Duke as you are led to:

1. That God will anoint Elder Duke as he partners with and supports President Yates.
2. That God will give Elder Duke the ability to hear His voice as he counsels Elder Yates and that the two will always walk together in agreement for the unity of the convention.
3. That God will send His angels to protect Elder Duke, his wife Julia, their children Kenneth, Kelon (Tina), Aheisha, granddaughter Kennedi
4. That God will cause Elder Duke to prosper and New Jerusalem to prosper.
5. That God will cause Elder Duke enemies to fall before him.
6. That God will increase Elder Duke's wisdom that he will successfully navigate his duties.
7. That God will protect Elder Duke's health as he travels and ministers in the country of Haiti.