SALISBURY  — Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church of Salisbury will host the 43rd Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Birthday Celebration and Humanitarian Awards Program on Sunday, Jan. 19, at 3 p.m.

The guest speaker will be the Rev. Dr. C. Lynn Brinkley who has been serving for the past 12 years as director of church, alumni and student relations at Campbell University Divinity School, where she also serves as an adjunct professor.

Brinkley grew up in Fayetteville and graduated from E.E. Smith Senior High School. She earned her bachelor’s degree from North Carolina State University, a master’s degree in criminal justice from the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, a master of divinity degree from Campbell University Divinity School, and a doctor of ministry degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in South Hamilton, Mass.

Recently, Brinkley accepted a new position as associate director of Baptist Women in Ministry. This is a national organization based in Atlanta. She began her new assignment on Jan. 15, King’s official birthday.

In 2014, Brinkley published “Manners and Money: A Manual on Preaching Etiquette,” which addresses proper pulpit decorum and hospitality towards guest ministers.

Brinkley is an ordained Baptist minister at First Baptist Church in Fayetteville. She also serves as vice-chair on the executive board for the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty based in Washington, D.C. Her previous board appointments have been to the national Baptist Women in Ministry board in Atlanta, and as coordinator for the Women in Ministry component of the General Baptist State Convention of NC. Current Convention president Dr. Leonzo Lynch has appointed Brinkley as vice president of the Minister’s Division of the General Baptist State Convention.

The public is invited to celebrate the work that others are doing to make a difference in Salisbury.  As Dr. King stated, “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”

The 2020 recipients of the Humanitarian Awards are John Daniels, Yvonne Dixon, Mahogany Koontz, John Noble III, the Rev. Anthony and Mrs. Toni Smith, and Gerry Wood.

The church is located at 1920 Shirley Avenue.  For further information, call Dixie Dalton at 704-637-0954.