Joel Hunter

Joel Hunter

Joel Carl Hunter (born April 18, 1948 in Shelby, Ohio), is the senior pastor of Northland, A Church Distributed, a congregation of 15,000 that worships at four sites in Central Florida and at more than 1,000 sites worldwide via interactive webcast, iPhone, and Facebook. He is the author of A New Kind of Conservative (Regal 2008), Church Distributed (Distributed Press 2008) and Inner State 80: Your Journey on the High Way (Higher Life 2009). Hunter accepted the presidency of the Christian Coalition in 2006, and then resigned before formally acting in that role because the CC board felt that a broadening of agenda to include topics like poverty, justice and other compassion issues would alienate its base.

He delivered the closing benediction on the final day of the 2008 Democratic National Convention, prayed with Senator Obama on the day of the 2008 presidential election and offered a blessing for President-elect Obama at the Pre-Inaugural Worship Service at St. John's Church on January 22, 2009. On February 5, 2009, he was appointed to the President’s Advisory Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. In April 2011, he was named a member of the Commission on Accountability and Policy for Religious Organizations.