Reverend Dr. Jim Bruner

Rev. Dr. Jim Bruner

Writing an obituary for the Rev. Dr. Jim Bruner is difficult because the facts of his life, remarkable as they are, do not adequately explain the man.

Jim was extraordinarily well traveled, not simply in the places he lived and served, but in the lives he entered along the way. He had a rare ability to extend grace to people others sometimes found difficult to understand or accept. He practiced his faith not merely in words, from a pulpit, for recognition, or as an obligation. He lived it quietly.

He listened. He encouraged. He gave. He prayed. He showed up.

Before Jim was a theologian, pastor, minister, university vice president, or Baptist statesman, he was a friend. His presence had a way of bringing peace to people. His oldest son, Steve, a writer, said that if there were only one word to describe his father, it would be **Grace**.

Grace does not demand recognition. It simply acts. It gives because it has first received.

And that was Jim.

“If You Honor Me, I Will Honor You”

Jim was born in Miami, Florida, and spent his childhood and teenage years living in several places as his family moved, from Cleveland, Ohio, to Greenville, North Carolina, Jacksonville, Florida, and eventually Dothan, Alabama.

He was an athlete and a gifted high school quarterback. Nearly seven decades later, the family was attending a fireworks celebration in Highlands, North Carolina, when Jim

happened to meet a family from Greenville. One of the men remembered Jim from the ninth grade and told the family, with remarkable certainty after all those years, that Jim was one of the best quarterbacks they had ever had.

That was Jim's life. People remembered him.

At 17, Jim committed his life to Christ. At 19, he felt God's call into the ministry. At 20, he married the love of his young life, **Ann**, beginning a marriage that would last 61 years.

Jim enrolled at Samford University with a plan that Ann would work while he attended school. Life quickly changed that plan when Ann became pregnant during their first year and their first son, Steve, was born.

So Jim did what Jim would do throughout his life: he went to work.

He attended classes, worked approximately 40+ hours a week, and preached in rural churches on weekends.

Years later, someone asked Jim whether he had ever actually heard the voice of God.

He remembered one particular Sunday night. He was exhausted after another long week of school, work, and preaching. Without a car, he had hitchhiked back toward Birmingham, at one point catching a ride in an 18-wheeler. Walking the final stretch home, tired and discouraged, he cried out to God:

*"I'm not sure this preaching thing is for me."*

Jim said the answer came simply:

**“Jim, if you honor Me, I will honor you.”**

In many ways, those few words became the story of his life.

**Jim honored God, and God honored Jim.**

A Life of Ministry

Jim graduated from **Samford University** and continued his theological education at

**The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary** in Louisville, Kentucky. While attending seminary, he pastored a church in Indiana. By then, Jim and Ann were raising three children, Steve, Phil, and Sheryl.

Following seminary, Jim was called to serve **First Baptist Church of Shellman, Georgia**. His ministry would subsequently take him to **Britt David Baptist Church in Columbus, Georgia**, and then to **Briggs Memorial Baptist Church in Bethesda, Maryland**, only a few miles from the White House.

His years in the Washington area placed him in an unusual ministry setting. Jim spent time with judges, senators, members of Congress, government officials, and others whose public positions often concealed the same private struggles that everyone else carried.

Jim listened to them. He prayed with them. He became involved in their lives.

His family was privileged to attend significant national events, including presidential inaugurations and Memorial Day ceremonies at Arlington National Cemetery. Yet proximity to power never seemed to impress Jim nearly as much as proximity to people.

Eventually, Jim was called to **Highland Hills Baptist Church in Macon, Georgia**, where he served as pastor for 17 years and became deeply woven into the life of the Macon community.

In his early 50s, Jim entered a new chapter of ministry through higher education. He joined Mercer's administration, serving as a vice president and special assistant to the president. He became a vital member of the university's executive leadership and played an especially important role in Mercer's relationships with Baptists and the broader religious community. He also served as a Mercer Trustee.

His longtime friend and colleague, former Mercer President and Chancellor **Dr. R. Kirby Godsey**, will deliver the eulogy at Jim's funeral.

Throughout his life, Jim was a Baptist statesman and pastor at heart. He was sometimes described as a **“preacher's preacher”** and a **“man's man.”** Both descriptions fit, but neither quite captures him.

He was a man who genuinely liked people.

Ann and Carolyn

For 61 years, Jim shared his life with his beloved wife, **Ann Bruner**. Together they raised their three children and built the family that would become one of the great joys of Jim's life.

Ann died in 2014 following a courageous five-year battle with cancer. Her life, their marriage, and the family they created together remained an inseparable part of Jim's story.

In 2018, Jim found companionship and love again when he married **Carolyn Townsend McAfee Bruner**, a longtime Mercer University trustee whose family name is carried by Mercer's Townsend School of Music.

Carolyn shared the final chapter of Jim's extraordinary journey, and together they continued a life deeply connected to Mercer, faith, family, and friends.

The Killing Preacher

For all the titles Jim accumulated during his life, one of his more colorful ones had nothing to do with theology or higher education.

Jim loved quail and dove hunting and was an exceptional shot.

At dove shoots, his ability eventually earned him the nickname **“the killing preacher.”** He was so good that the standing joke was that Jim could practically shoot the limit for everybody.

It is an image his family and friends will remember fondly: the distinguished pastor, theologian, university vice president, and Baptist statesman standing in a dove field with a shotgun, and taking the competition entirely too seriously. He taught his sons to never kill anything they would not eat.

Jim knew that a faithful life could also be a joyful one.

His Family

Jim is survived by his wife, **Carolyn Bruner**.

He was preceded in death by his beloved wife of 61 years, **Ann Bruner**, with whom he raised their three children and built the family that became one of the defining blessings of his life.

He is survived by his son **Steve Bruner and his wife, Sherry**, and their children,

**Stephen Bruner and his wife, Sarah**, and their five children, **Brooks, Reese, Truitt, Winnie, and Cherish Bruner**; and **Shelli Morrow and her husband, Mike**, and their children, **Graham, Ellie, and Harper Kate Morrow**.

He is also survived by his son **Dr. Phil Bruner and his wife, Amy**, and their daughters, **Kiki Bruner** and **Michelle Gray and her husband, Rev. Jonathan Gray**, and their children, **Brayden, Karis, and Kasen Gray**.

He is further survived by his daughter, **Sheryl Shepard**, and her sons, **Mitch Shepard**, and his daughter, **Adison Shepard**; and **Ben Shepard and his wife, Amanda**, and their children, **Remi Tharpe and Skylar Shepard**.

Jim's family also grew through his marriage to Carolyn. He is survived by his stepson,

**Tom McAfee and his wife, Julie**, and their children, **Zoe and Malin McAfee**.

The family that grew around Jim—his children, stepchildren, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren—was an enduring source of pride and one of the great joys of his extraordinary life.

A Life of Travel and Discovery

Jim's curiosity about people and the world extended far beyond the places where he lived and served. He loved history, and travel became another way for him to experience the people, places, and stories he had spent a lifetime studying. Jim and Ann led groups on numerous journeys throughout Europe and Asia and on trips that literally took them around the world. For them, travel was never simply about seeing another place; it was about understanding its history, culture, faith, and people.

After marrying Carolyn in 2018, Jim's love of travel continued. During their eight years together, Jim and Carolyn traveled extensively, including trips to Europe, Alaska, and multiple riverboat cruises primarily in Europe, and enjoyed spending their winters at Carolyn's condominium in Hawaii. Even well into his later years, Jim remained curious about the world, eager to experience another place, learn another story, and enjoy the remarkable life he had been given.

A Life of Grace

Jim often reminded his children that what we invest in other people does not always come back to us in the ways we expect. God's ways, he would say, are not our ways, and learning the difference makes all the difference.

Perhaps that is why his life cannot finally be measured by churches served, sermons preached, degrees earned, university positions held, important people known, or titles placed before or after his name.

The measure of Jim Bruner's life is found in people.

People he encouraged.

People he prayed with.

People he forgave.

People he listened to.

People he helped when nobody else knew he was helping.

People who walked away from an encounter with him feeling a little more hopeful, a little more valued, and perhaps a little closer to God.

Jim did not merely preach what he believed.

**He lived it.**

At 93, near the end of his life, Jim told his family something that now seems like the fitting conclusion to his story:

**“I have lived an extraordinary life, and I am ready to meet the Lord.”**

He had.

And he was.

Nearly three-quarters of a century earlier, an exhausted young preacher walking home after hitchhiking from another Sunday of preaching believed he heard God say:

**“Jim, if you honor Me, I will honor you.”**

Jim spent the rest of his life doing just that.

And perhaps the greatest evidence that God honored Jim is not found in everything Jim accomplished, but in the extraordinary number of people who are better because he lived.

**He will be deeply loved, profoundly missed, and long remembered.**

The Service will be held at Highland Hills Baptist Church in Macon Georgia, on Friday, August 21, 2026, at 11:00, officiated by Pastor Ethan Brown, and the graveside on Saturday, August 22, 2026, at 2:00 pm in Scaly Mountain, North Carolina.

Please visit www.hartsmort.com to express your condolences.

Hart’s Mortuary at the Cupola, 6324 Peake Road, Macon, Georgia 31210, has charge of the arrangements.