The Rev. Bill Combs spent his early life growing up in eastern and central Kentucky. He attended Emory University for his undergraduate education, where he met Jennifer Waddell. He graduated from Emory in 1983, and married his college love, Jennifer, two years later. After college, Bill attended Harvard’s medical and dental schools, graduating in 1988. From there, he and Jennifer moved to Dallas, Texas, where Bill was trained as an oral and maxillofacial surgeon at Parkland hospital. He and Jennifer always wanted to return to Georgia when the training was completed, and they did so in 1992. He practiced surgery in Duluth and Cumming with a wonderful group of people and a very talented senior surgeon until 2000.
In the late 1990’s, Bill began to experience what he can only describe as “a call from God into something very different.” He went through the two-year discernment process offered by the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta for those who are thus afflicted, the outcome of which was a recommendation to ordained ministry. In the fall of 2000, he enrolled at Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria. He graduated from there in 2003, becoming an associate rector at St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Columbus, Georgia. There, he worked primarily with the Children and Youth programs. In 2007, Bill was called to be the rector of St. Gabriel’s Episcopal Church in Oakwood, Georgia. He served there for eight wonderful years. In January of 2016, Bill began his life as the rector of Redeemer, which he has enjoyed tremendously.
Bill’s time away from the church is spent largely with his family. Bill and Jennifer have two children: Emily, 20, who attends the Tisch School at New York University, and Sam, 17, who is a senior at Johnson High School. They have two Labradors: Hoodie, who is still a very energetic 15 year-old, and Mac, who is 3.
