BIOGRAPHICAL DATA
Reverend Dr. William Franklin Buchanan William F. Buchanan was born in Broxton, Georgia – the third of four children born to the late Millinease and John L. Buchanan. He spent his formative years in Georgia, but later the family moved to Florida, where he graduated from high school. In 1976, he received a Bachelor of Science degree from Bethune-Cookman College. He later matriculated at the University of Florida’s Business School in Gainesville. In 1983 he received a Master of Divinity degree in Pastoral Counseling from the Morehouse School of Religion-Interdenominational Theological Center. Subsequently, he was a Proctor-Booth Fellow at United Theological Seminary where he earned the Doctor of Ministry degree in 1995.
Dr. Buchanan was ordained into the ministry in 1985 and from 1985 to 1988 served as youth minister at Greenforest Baptist Church in Decatur, Georgia, and as a chaplain intern at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. He was called as the senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Huntington, West Virginia in 1988. In 1994 he was called to the pastorate of the historic Fifteenth Avenue Baptist Church in Nashville, Tennessee. Since coming to Fifteenth Avenue, Dr. Buchanan has transformed Fifteenth Avenue into a beacon of light for ALL persons in the community. Fifteenth Avenue Baptist has become as example of love and brotherhood to humanity – through numerous ministries, which serve the homeless, the elderly, the young, former addicts, and prisoners as well as seasoned saints.
In 2001 Fifteenth Avenue was recognized by a national research team, funded by the Lilly Endowment, as one of 300 “Excellent Protestant Congregations” in America. Also in 2001 Fifteenth Avenue realized a long held dream of enlarging its worship space by moving into a new multi-million dollar sanctuary. The congregation has established an outstanding Community Development Corporation (CDC) that had built over seven million dollars in affordable housing, senior housing, and commercial lease office space since 1999. The church continues to grow spiritually and numerically and serve as a model for 21st century ministry. Dr. Buchanan has received many awards and honors. In 2001 he was named the recipient of the Lily Foundation’s Clergy General Grant, which allowed him to take a brief sabbatical to study at Harvard University’s School of Divinity. In 2013 he was recognized as Pastor of the Year by Operation Andrew, an interfaith, inter-racial group of clergy in the Nashville area.
He is a board member of the Nashville Housing Fund, Saint Thomas Pastoral Care Advisory Board (chairman), Vanderbilt Divinity School Board of Visitors, Operation Andrew Group (former board chairman) and Sunday School Publishing Board. Dr. Buchanan is an adjunct professor at the American Baptist College in Nashville and was a Field Education supervisor at Vanderbilt University’s School of Divinity for 12 years. Additionally, he is a contributor to the Sunday School Publishing Board Commentary. In addition to his busy schedule as a pastor and teacher, Dr. Buchanan is the loving husband of Audrey Cave Buchanan. They are the parents of four children – Kwame, Shani, Dashan and Aubrey Buchanan, and nine grandchildren.
