First Presbyterian Church - Jackson Mississippi

Dr. J. Ligon Duncan III, a native of Greenville, South Carolina, was born and reared in the home of an eighth generation Southern Presbyterian Ruling Elder. A 1983 graduate of Furman University, he received an MDiv from Covenant Theological Seminary and studied Systematic Theology at the Free Church of Scotland College under Professor Donald Macleod. He earned the PhD from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1995.

He served on the staff of The Covenant Presbyterian Church of St. Louis from 1984-1987, and supplied pulpits in churches of the Presbyterian Association of England, Church of Scotland, and Free Church of Scotland while in Britain from 1987-1990. In 1990 he was ordained in the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA) and joined the faculty of Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS), Jackson, Mississippi where he was Chairman of the Department of Systematic Theology, and the John R. Richardson Professor of Theology. At RTS he was responsible for teaching courses such as Systematic Theology, Ethics, Apologetics, History of Philosophy and Christian Thought, Covenant Theology, Patristics, Evangelism, and Theology of the Westminster Standards. He became the Senior Minister of First Presbyterian, Jackson in 1996.

Duncan is an active churchman and has been involved in the courts of the PCA in various ways for many years. He was appointed to the General Assembly’s Committee on Psalmody, and has served on Committees of Commissioners for Covenant Seminary, MNA, and Bills and Overtures in 2002. He has been a member and Chairman of the Credentials Committee of the Presbytery of the Mississippi Valley (1996-2002). He was the Vice-Chairman of the General Assembly’s Creation Study Committee (1998-2000), a member of the Search Committee for a Coordinator of Reformed University Ministries, and currently is the Chairman of the General Assembly’s Theological Examination Committee, and is also a member of the PCA’s Strategic Planning Committee. Duncan was elected as Moderator of the Presbytery of the Mississippi Valley in 2001. At the annual denominational meeting, held in June of 2004, he was elected the Moderator of the General Assembly of the PCA (2004-2005) – the youngest minister to serve as moderator in the denomination’s history.