Eight Years of Faithful Service to Oklahoma
When Bishop James G. Nunn retires on Saturday, August 31, 2024, he will complete his eight years of service to Oklahoma and a more than 40-year career as a United Methodist pastor.
He will forever be known by his nine words – “Love God. Love others. Make a difference. Make disciples.” This mantra is as simple as it is wise. And that simple wisdom served Bishop Nunn while he navigated some of the most difficult times for Oklahoma United Methodists in recent memory.
A Man of Many Names
To those who knew him before he was elected, he was Jimmy Nunn, a congregational developer and program director from the conference to our west. He is a husband, father and grandfather -“Papa” to his two grandchildren. He is a deep thinker, a voracious reader and a keeper of his own calendar, using his trusty pencil and eraser.
To those in Oklahoma, he is and will always be Bishop Nunn. On September 15, The Daily Oklahoman will feature him as one of the most influential faith leaders in Oklahoma. What the rest of Oklahoma can find out is what the faithful United Methodists of Oklahoma already know.
Photos in this article are a combination of in-house and submitted photos from the years of Bishop Nunn’s tenure.
Historic Election
Bishop Nunn was elected on the 21st ballot in July 2016 at the South Central Jurisdiction Conference meeting in Wichita, KS. Upon his election, he was the first Bishop elected from the Northwest Texas Conference in five decades.
He grew up in Abernathy, Texas (population 2,800). His calling to ministry is “rooted in a series of events,” including a youth revival. He has also described getting lost in the mountains of New Mexico during a Boy Scout camping trip. He prayed:
God, get me out of this and I’ll even be a preacher. A fisherman returned him to camp.
He and his wife, Mary, whom he met at UM-affiliated McMurray College, married during college and lived in the area around Lubbock, TX, their entire lives.
Focus on the local church and discipleship
From the beginning of his tenure, Bishop Nunn focused on the local church and our task of making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. He describes his passion this way: “I am passionate about making disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. I have been blessed with gifts and graces to make a greater impact on ministries of transformation at the strategic intersections of district, conference, and general church.” He encouraged the conference staff to find ways for pastors to get in smaller, cohort groups for collaborative learning. In 2018, he devoted an entire day of the annual conference session to a keynote speaker and workshop sessions on discipleship and strategic thinking. In 2019, he orchestrated a “reverse special offering” at the conference session so that local churches could obtain Strength for Service devotional booklets for their community’s first
responders.
Never one to shy away from teaching, Bishop Nunn traversed the state in 2019 leading workshops called “CONNECT for a Changing Church” where he shared his own wisdom with local leaders as they planned for new ministries in the changing landscape of religion in the United States. In addition, he was an integral teaching partner for the Academies for Innovative Ministry, which generated new ideas for ministry and provided funds to experiment. Each summer, he could be found at our youth camps, sharing a message of hope and inspiring the next generation of leaders.
During his tenure, new churches were planted and innovative ministry ideas launched in existing churches. A new conference structure was approved reducing the size of the conference teams, but focusing more on the impact for local faith communities. He inspired the Rural Church Commission’s “Tell Your Story” initiative and encouraged the conference to observe Martin Luther King, Jr. Day with a worship service broadcast across the state for those who cannot come to Oklahoma City.
Navigating Crises
A steady leader and strategic thinker were two traits that allowed Bishop Nunn to navigate some significant
crises in the Oklahoma Area. When the conference had to move to a new health care system, he was out front helping communicate the importance of this change.
Using his keen administrative gifts, he ensured the conference’s financial position and accounting procedures were solidified and audits were completed on time. Since then, there has been greater transparency in reporting results of those audits conferencewide. His insights into considerations around the retiree medical benefits and other pension matters during disaffiliation and conference restructuring was invaluable.
When the COVID 19 pandemic was sweeping across the world, Bishop Nunn quickly acted to create a conference response team, empowering them to work with local church leaders on the best way to keep our communities and churches safe while still ministering across the state. He also encouraged the creation of a 30-minute television special which ran across Oklahoma to honor the various
ministries of the conference as well as medical professionals who served so valiantly during the crisis.
He created an Office of Transitional Ministry, one of the first in the denomination, to guide the steps for churches which wanted to disaffiliate from the United Methodist Church. Even when two churches sued him and other conference officials over this process, he maintained a grace-filled spirit and made decisions which were in the best interest of all Oklahomans. The decisions in those cases have been used to protect churches across the denomination from the incursion of courts into ecclesial matters.
Once a Scout … Bishop Nunn is an Eagle Scout and his passion for Scouting was evident throughout his tenure. When the UMC was faced with a lawsuit regarding sexual abuse by Scout leaders, Bishop Nunn encouraged a close working relationship with Scout executives ensuring that this vital ministry continued in our churches. Scout leaders have said that the Oklahoma Area lost fewer scouting units than any other conference in the United States.
In December 2021, Bishop Nunn was honored with the National Eagle Scout Association’s Outstanding Eagle Scout Award, which is presented solely to Eagle Scouts who demonstrate remarkable achievements well beyond their Scouting endeavors by excelling in their
careers/vocations at local, regional, or national levels.
Historic Matters
The persons occupying the position of Assistant to Bishop Nunn made history while working for him. Rev. Dr. Joe Harris is the only United Methodist to preside over the General Conference when it met as a “committee of the whole” in 2019. Rev. Dr. David Wilson of the OIMC was elected in November 2022 as the first Native American Bishop in the United Methodist Church. Historic actions taken by Bishop Nunn during his time here also included:
• Presiding over 20 annual conference sessions during his tenure, 12 in Oklahoma and 8 in OIMC;
• Holding an online ordination and commissioning service during the COVID pandemic to ensure that all candidates were able to be recognized;
• Reducing the number of districts from 8 to 5;
• Appointing the first Korean
American to the Oklahoma UMC Cabinet;
• Appointing the first female Assistant to the Bishop in the Oklahoma Conference and in the OIMC;
• Diversifying the Conference Ministry Center staff while reducing the budget and apportionments for local churches.
A lasting legacy
As our final gift to Bishop Nunn in appreciation for his service to us, the conference will be creating a Maker Space at Lydia Patterson Institute (LPI) this school year. This space will be named after Bishop Nunn and will allow LPI students to engage in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) activities in new and exciting ways. Bishop Nunn will continue to serve on the LPI board of trustees after retiring.
The Conference staff, along with a few special friends, celebrate Bishop Nunn’s last week with a lunch and fellowship.
Regional Workshops Begin in September
During this year’s annual conference session in May, a Day of Learning introduced conference members to the importance of our work with those experiencing poverty in our communities. As a follow-up to that important event, the conference is sponsoring 6 regional workshops which will focus on emotional poverty as well as introduce ministry action planning.
Over $40,000 in grants will be available early next year to churches who participate in training and make proposals for new or expanded ministries.
Workshops will be held around the state and you can register here. Cost is $15 per person which includes all materials and a meal. Please plan to bring at least two people per church. The schedule is as follows:
Enid (Christ UMC) - Sunday, Sept. 15 from 3 to 7 pm
Tulsa (University UMC) - Sunday, Sept. 22 from 3 to 7 pm
OKC (Lakeside UMC) - Saturday, Oct. 5 from 10 am to 2 pm
Weatherford - Sunday, Oct. 6 from 3 to 7 pm
McAlester (First UMC) - Saturday, Oct. 12 from 10 am to 2 pm
Lawton (Centenary UMC) - Sunday, Oct. 13 from 3 to 7 pm
Content and presentations are the same at all workshops so please pick the one most convenient for your church. And added bonus – Bishop Merrill will be at all events.
Listening: A Ministry
Bookending Bishop Jimmy Nunn’s career in The United Methodist Church is a life of listening - listening for God to call him to whatever work he is needed for, listening to his bishops and district superintendents when they sent him to churches, listening to advice to take positions for which he didn’t know he was uniquely qualified, and listening to the call to the episcopacy.
Bishop Nunn’s listening will not stop at retirement. “I’m going to start on a spiritual discipline of, ‘God, what would you have me do next?’ You’ve got to be still and you’ve got to be quiet to do that,” he stated. “In this role as bishop, I have not had time to be still and be quiet. I don’t know how long it will take, but I’m going to try to listen, and see what doors open. Then I’ll walk through them as faithfully as I can.”
Bishop Nunn credits listening to others for his leadership and ministry success.
Master’s in Christian Education. They left seminary with no debt, but little else. “We had a hundred dollars and a broken down car, and that was all we had.”
From his days at seminary through his retirement, Nunn’s approach to ministry has been an exercise in listening. Whether listening for the direction where God was leading him as a young graduate student or a - still young! - bishop of the United Methodist Church, Nunn has spent a career listening to the call of a higher presence.
This listening took him from a small church of 600 people, located in Jayton - 100 miles from anywhere in Texas - to 25 years of preaching in local churches, to serving as a district superintendent, to leadership in church development and connectional ministry, to the episcopacy in 2016.
As Nunn earned his credentials at seminary, his wife Mary earned her
Unusual for a United Methodist pastor, Nunn spent his career in and around his hometown area of Lubbock, Texas. His only real time working outside of Texas has been in his service to the Oklahoma conference. Mary has a successful piano studio, which is a business that relies on stability. Bishops and superintendents were understanding and supportive of Nunn’s need to stay near Mary’s business.
This tradition has passed through his family. Both Jimmy and Mary Nunn grew up in the Lubbock area. Their children, Jaime and Michael, both live in the area. This proximity allows Nunn to see his children and grandchildren several times a week when he’s in town.
Nunn was given many opportunities to learn the responsibilities of the
office of bishop in the UMC. His service in church development, connectional ministries, on the Board of Ordained Ministry, and on the cabinet taught him quickly that much of his job was to organize the work of the bishop and, more importantly, to listen.
In listening to the bishop, Nunn came to understand and anticipate the vision of the bishop. “The work of the bishop is so scattered, you’ve really got to listen to the direction of the bishop. The bishop doesn’t have time to say, ‘do this, do that, organize this way and that other way.’”
Nunn greatly appreciates the work of the cabinet secretary, the dean, the director of connectional ministries, and all those who serve, because he himself was in their shoes, and he knows the work it takes.
Listening, said Nunn, is the best way to relate to people. “That’s probably the thing I do best. I mean, you just kind of listen to people and figure out where folks are. They’ll
tell you their pain, they’ll tell you their dreams. And if we can pull those things together, then we can take a step forward in society, and as the church as well.”
In retirement, Bishop Nunn plans to return to his love of golfing, which he started playing in high school after an injury took him off the basketball court. “I haven’t picked up a club in four years,” he said. He also plans to swim, spend time with his family, work on genealogy, and reconnect with old friends he hasn’t seen in quite some time.
He plans to remain involved in a church - or two - and will continue on several boards. Though this sounds like a busy, busy retirement, one would imagine that removing the load from the past few years will make these tasks easy by comparison.
Some of Nunn’s proudest accomplishments he attributes to those around him. The leadership of the conference negotiated the season of disaffiliation with grace and dignity.
Even before disaffiliations, the capacity of the conference leaders to manage resources was stellar.
“We started several new congregations and ministries,” noted Nunn. “Even those that didn’t make it, I’m proud that we did them.”
He noted particularly his opportunity to get to know the leaders of the OIMC Indian Missionary Conference, which is also located here in Oklahoma. “The Native people are people of dignity. They are leaders.”
He also noted a Spanish-language church where he celebrated their tenth anniversary just a few days ago. Identifying leaders and giving them the authority to lead has been of particular joy to Nunn. “You have to accept the gifts and graces people have and let them flourish. That’s where ministry
happens.”
Nunn has had many opportunities for leadership during this very bumpy tenure, which saw the Covid pandemic and disaffiliations, among many additional changes and challenges that one expects in any episcopal season. “It is time,” said Nunn. “I’m ready. I’m thankful for my ministry, but I’m ready to step aside and let somebody else do that.”
And having fun, of course, like when Bishop Nunn participated in a color war at youth camp.
Bishop Jimmy Nunn: A lesson in leadership
RIGHT: Bishop Nunn, laughing at a children’s moment enacted by a church matriarch and part-time diva, on the not so solemn occasion of St. Paul’s UMC Duncan’s 60th birthday. Our Bishop was warm and engaging, thoughtful and brought his self-deprecating style of humor, a hallmark of a leader with high emotional intelligence. From David Gardner.
There are few, if any, United Methodist Bishops of the past 150 years who’ve had such a tremendous challenge as those who shouldered the burden of fracture and disaffiliation over the past 8 years. Jimmy Nunn did so with grace, poise, determination, and grit. I’m so thankful for his inspired leadership. When he was first introduced as our Bishop, I’ll admit that with his West Texas accent and his self-effacing demeanor, I thought - “well, now THIS is a change!” After all has been said and done, I’d say it was a change for the better. Thank you, Bishop Nunn!
Nathan Mattox
ABOVE, LEFT: Bishop Nunn preaching at Saint Paul, then planting flowers in the chapel courtyard. From Elaine Robinson.
I am grateful for the leadership of Bishop Nunn. He kept us together, focused on God and others as we went through the crucible of a contentious disaffiliation, with a worldwide pandemic thrown in for good measure. I hope he enjoys a great retirement; he has definitely earned several.
Jinx Barber Piedmont UMC
Bishop Nunn preaching and then blessing the mobile food pantry at Grace UMC in Claremore. From Tim McHugh.
Speaking of Retirement....
During General Conference this year, the denomination voted in favor of adopting a new retirement plan for clergy, called Compass.
Compass is designed for a changing UMC environment that includes decreasing membership in U.S. churches (since the 1980s) and increasing financial pressure on annual conferences and local churches. The Compass plan design addresses emerging needs and financial realities, while upholding longstanding Church values to provide an income stream throughout retirement for those who have served faithfully, and to promote equity for clergy at different pay levels.
Click here to learn more.
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Retired Clergy Retreat
How do you spell "RELIEF"? - How about a 24-hour retreat in beautiful Canyon Camp near Hinton OK with friends from across the Conference?
Time for visiting, resting, & relaxing. Friends, fun, campfire, singing, learning.
Cost per person is $123 for a single, or $76.50 for a double (lodge & 2 meals). Contact Brian Bakeman, registrar, at brian405@prodigy.net with questions.
JOIN US SEPT. 30 - OCT. 1
Thomas Hoffman will speak on two topics:
• The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre
• Pilgrimage to Camino de Santiago (The Way of St. James) in Spain
Call to Action
The Ministry Center will be closed Monday, Sept. 2, in observance of Labor Day. We are grateful for the labor of all who work to keep things running. For Labor Day resources, click here.
Now that school is back in session, consider supporting one of our Wesley Foundations. These campus ministries keep young adults engaged while they’re away at school and provide vital support for students as they live away from home.
Click here to find more information about OKUMC campus ministries.
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