The Reverend Dr. Robert Aaron Craig, 86, often known as Bobby, died October 24, 2020, in Fredericksburg, Virginia, of COVID-19. Bobby was an honorably retired member of North Central Presbytery who served the Cumberland Presbyterian denomination as Director of Development and Deferred Giving for the Board of Finance, Foundation, and Management (now the Board of Stewardship, Foundation, and Benefits) in Memphis, Tennessee.

Robert was born May 7, 1934, to John Conway Craig and Ara Jewel Crawford in Lubbock, Texas. His paternal roots in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church stretch back to the 1830s in Missouri, His ancestor, the Reverend John Craig, was royal chaplain to Mary, Queen of Scots, and an integral part of John Knox’s Reforming Movement in Edinburgh, Scotland, from 1561.

Robert’s mother joined First Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Lubbock, Texas, in 1933. Robert, with his father and two older brothers, joined the Lubbock church August 20, 1944. In the summer of 1951, at Camp Gilmont, Texas Synodical Camp, Robert answered the call to become a Cumberland Presbyterian minister. He came under the care of Lubbock Presbytery as a candidate for the ministry at the fall meeting in 1951.

Robert Aaron Craig and Virginia Robertson, a member of the Fort Worth, Texas, Cumberland Presbyterian Church whom Robert met at synodic camp, were married December 28th, 1954, by the Reverend Brown C. Welch, former pastor of the Lubbock Cumberland Presbyterian Church.

He attended Bethel College (now Bethel University) in McKenzie, Tennessee, graduating in 1955. He then attended the Cumberland Presbyterian Theological Seminary (now Memphis Theological Seminary), while the institution was still located on the Bethel College campus, earning a Bachelor of Divinity degree in 1960.

While at Bethel College as a ministerial student, Robert preached at a number of county churches. The first one was Dry Fork Church north of Nashville. Later came Mason Hall and Morella Churches in Obion and Gibson counties. He was ordained by Lubbock Presbytery at the March meeting in 1954. In the fall of 1956, Robert accepted a call from the Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Odessa, Texas.

Returning to McKenzie for seminary, Robert again preached at Mason Hall and at Shiloh Church near Clarksville, Tennessee. After seminary graduation, Robert accepted a call to Trinity Cumberland Presbyterian Church, Shelbyville, Tennessee, in July 1961. After nearly two frustrating years, he resigned the pastorate and requested that Elk Presbytery drop his name as a minister. A year later the request was granted. Of this time Robert said, “I was not a good Pastor. I wish I had had the necessary skills and discipline to do that. It took me far too long to discover that I was misplaced.”

Robert graduated from Middle Tennessee State College (now University) in 1963 with a major in Guidance and Counseling. He entered the graduate program at the University of Missouri at Columbia. After receiving his doctorate in education in 1969, Robert spent fourteen years in education, primarily teaching educational administration and school finance at Indiana University in Fort Wayne.

In 1983, Robert petitioned Indiana Presbytery for the reinstatement of his ordination which was granted. He believed his best contribution to the Cumberland Presbyterian Church was his work for the Board of Stewardship which began in 1983. Robert worked with the capital campaign “Into the Nineties,” with deferred giving, and with stewardship education. In May 1989, Robert left the Board of Stewardship to become the Business Manager of The First Presbyterian Church in Fort Wayne, Indiana. He retired in 1993.

In 1999, the Craigs moved to Chicago where daughter Cynthia C. Curtis Bates and her family lived. Robert continued on the list of retired ministers of the North Central Presbytery of The Cumberland Presbyterian Church. Virginia died in 2008.