James Evans, ‘75 M.Div.

A pastor, educator, and scholar, James Evans, Jr., was president of Colgate Rochester Divinity School/Bexley Hall/Crozer Theological Seminary from 1990 to 2000.  Son of a Baptist minister, Evans is a native of Detroit and a graduate of the Cranbrook School and the University of Michigan.  He is currently the Robert K. Davies Professor of Systematic Theology at the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School and founding pastor of the St. Luke Tabernacle Community Church in Rochester, NY.  He completed his doctorate at Union Theological Seminary in New York, where he served as associate pastor of the Chambers Memorial Baptist Church. He holds an honorary doctorate from Colgate University. 

Evans is the author of numerous articles and four books: We Shall All Be Changed: Social Problems and Theological Renewal; We Have Been Believers:  An African American Systematic Theology; Black Theology:  A Critical Assessment and Annotated Bibliography; and Spiritual Empowerment in Afro-American Literature.  He is the author of two forthcoming volumes: Going Home: A Theological Analysis of Back to Africa Movements in the US; and The Church: Models, Motifs, and Mandates. Evans is married to Linda Hickmon Evans and is the father of three children, James, Jamila, and Jumaane, and the grandfather of one, Christian James.