Harold Wayne Hunter

Harold Wayne Hunter, 63, of Bowling Green, Kentucky, passed peacefully into eternal rest on Nov. 18, 2019. 

Born June 2, 1956, to the late Harold and Louise Hunter of Fultondale, Alabama, Wayne was the Greenwood Campus Pastor at Broadway United Methodist Church in Bowling Green. He was a graduate of Asbury College and Asbury Theological Seminary. 

An avid Alabama fan, he tolerated Big Blue Country with the humility of a true winner. He was a teller of bad jokes, but not a bad joke teller. Wayne was many things, from tree surgeon to funeral director, from uncle to friend. Above all, he was a man in possession of a distinctive combination of humility, humor, strength, and peace.

Wayne served for many years as an elder in the Free Methodist Church, in congregations in Gallatin, Tennessee, Johnson City, Tennessee, Huntsville, Alabama, and Bowling Green. For many of those years he was a funeral director and Hospice chaplain. 

Later in life, while serving as chaplain for Hospice of Southern Kentucky, he served as pastor of Chandlers Chapel UMC in Hopkinsville and Duncans Chapel UMC in Auburn. Over the past two years he served on the pastoral staff of Broadway UMC.

Among his many gifts, Wayne had an exceptional ability to lead in humility. His was a quiet charisma. He led by creating space for others to flourish. Unsurprisingly, he was profoundly loved by both his colleagues and congregants. He was a pastor. And he was a pastor’s pastor.

In his final year, as Wayne battled cancer, he continued to serve his congregation and staff. He preached his final sermon just three weeks before he passed. During his final days, with his family, close friends, and the hospice staff, he remained a kind and gracious servant of Christ and of others. Even after his passing, his pictures still decorated the nurses’ stations at Hospice. They are memorials to the time he spent helping others pass into the life to come.

Wayne is survived by his wife of 40 years, Melinda; their sons, Justus, John-Seth, and Jordan; daughter-in-law Ellen; four grandchildren, Justus II, Miles, Lucy, and Rose; four sisters and one brother, Elaine, Aileen, Ann, Kathy, and Don; and nieces, nephews, and myriad friends whom he loved as family.