James Gray, Liberia

Missionary code: 15150

E-Mail: grayjk@vt.edu

Serving as Vice President for Research, Advancement and Development at United Methodist University (UMU) in the Liberia Annual Conference, James K. (Jim) Gray is a missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church.

In the mid-70s Jim, along with wife Lyn, was in the Peace Corps in Liberia, then worked long term in Somalia, Congo, Niger, and did consulting in several other countries. For the past three years the Grays have been living and working in Liberia.

Mr. Gray was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, the son of Ruth Gray and the Reverend C. Katon Gray, a Methodist minister of the Virginia Conference. Jim is married to Linda Howell Gray, also a GBGM missionary, and they are the parents of one son, Rafael.

Attending Randolph Macon College in Ashland, VA, Jim earned a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics. He continued his education and received his Master of Economics from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. and his Ph.D. in Agricultural and Applied Economics from Virginia Tech.

Although he was not working formally for the church, Jim says his work, especially in Africa, was a result of the influence of the church and his parents.

“I imagine God as having no hands. He relies on us to do his work.” Jim said he sees the verse from Matthew, ‘whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me’ as a “pretty good operating principle whether one works for the church or not.”