David A. Davis

David A. Davis, MDiv '86, PhD '02, is the senior pastor of Nassau Presbyterian Church. He has served the congregation since 2000. Davis earned his PhD in homiletics from Princeton Theological Seminary, where he continues to teach as a visiting lecturer. His academic work has focused on preaching as a corporate act and the active role of the listener in the preaching event. Before arriving in Princeton, he served for 14 years as the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, Blackwood, New Jersey.

He has published two sermon collections, A Kingdom You Can Taste and Lord, Teach Us to Pray, and served on the Board of Directors of the Presbyterian Foundation and the local Princeton YMCA. In addition to preaching in Presbyterian congregations around the country, Davis has preached to congregations in South Africa, Scotland, the Samuel Proctor Child Advocacy Conference of the Children’s Defense Fund, the Calvin Symposium for Worship, and on the campuses of Harvard and Duke universities.

Davis grew up in Pittsburgh and did his undergraduate work at Harvard University where he was a member of the University Choir, singing weekly in Memorial Church and listening to the preaching of Professor Peter Gomes. Davis is married to Cathy Cook, a Presbyterian minister who is associate dean of students and director of senior placement at Princeton Seminary. They have two children, Hannah and Ben.