Listen to the Service

• Sermon: "Thinking About Jesus" (31.3MB)
  The Rt. Rev. Dr. William H. Willimon
• Musical Meditation: Violin Concerto in E minor, Op. 64 (II. Andante) (9.16 MB)
  Elizabeth Martin '10, violin
  Justin Smith '08, piano

The Right Reverend Dr. William H. Willimon was elected in July 2004 as Bishop of The United Methodist Church. He leads the 157,000 Methodists and 792 pastors in North Alabama. For twenty years he was Dean of the Chapel and Professor of Christian Ministry at Duke University, Durham, North Carolina.

Dr. Willimon is a graduate of Wofford College, Yale Divinity School, and Emory University. He has served as pastor of churches in Georgia and South Carolina. He is the author of nearly sixty books. His Worship as Pastoral Care was selected as one of the ten most useful books for pastors in 1979 by the Academy of Parish Clergy. Over a million copies of his books have been sold. In 1996, an international survey conducted by Baylor University named him one of the twelve most effective preachers in the English-speaking world.

In addition to maintaining a blog, A Peculiar Prophet, the Bishop has written articles for many publications including The Christian Ministry, Quarterly Review, Liturgy, Worship and Christianity Today. He is Editor-at-Large for The Christian Century. He has served as Editor and Expositor (with his wife, Patricia) for Abingdon's International Lesson Annual. He has written curriculum materials and video for youth, young adults, and adults. His Pulpit Resource is used each week by over eight thousand pastors in the USA, Canada, and Australia. A 2005 study by the Pulpit and Pew Research Center found that Bishop Willimon is the second most widely read author by mainline Protestant pastors.

Bishop Willimon has given lectures and taught courses at many pastors' schools and at colleges and universities in the United States, Canada, Europe and Asia. These include the Belden Lectures at Harvard as well as lectureships at Princeton, Vanderbilt, Pepperdine, and Oxford. In 1998, he served on the theological faculty of the University of Bonn, Germany and in 1991, he was Distinguished Guest Professor at the University of Muenster, Germany. His books have been translated into eight languages.