Thomas A. Robinson received his B.A., cum laude, in both Economics and History in 1973 from Wake Forest University, his J.D. in 1976, from Wake Forest University School of Law, where he served as Managing Editor, Wake Forest Law Review, and his M.Div. in 1989, from Duke University Divinity School. From 1976 to 1986, Tom was in private law practice, focusing on workers’ compensation defense work. In 1986, he and his family moved to Durham, N.C., in order that he could matriculate at Duke Divinity School. Intending to stay in Durham for three years and then return to Western North Carolina, Tom and Jane have lived in the Bull City now for 32 years (and counting).

For the past 30 years, Tom has attempted a delicate balancing act — mixing an active professional “secular” life with the sacred. A nationally-recognized legal scholar and writer in the field of occupational injuries and illnesses, Robinson is co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the preeminent legal treatise on the subject. For many years, he also handled copyright and publication matters for Duke University School of Law, Duke University Press, and the American Institute of CPAs.

Since graduating from Duke Divinity School, Tom has carved out significant time for the sacred, first as a part-time local pastor at Asbury UMC (Durham, NC, 1987-1993), then as pastor/teacher for the Riverside Gathering (a post-denominational congregation without walls, centered in Durham, NC, 1993 to the present), and as an ”ex officio” preaching/teaching resource at Trinity Avenue Presbyterian Church (Durham, NC, 2002 to the present).

Known by friends as a master of the poignant tale, Robinson has rarely met a story that he didn’t love.