His father, the late Rev. Louis H. Evans Jr., led the congregation at the National Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C. His grandfather built Hollywood Presbyterian Church into one of the denomination’s largest congregations in the 1950s

The Rev. Jamie Evans, the son and grandson of Presbyterian ministers, took his own life Thursday after struggling with depression. He was 50.

Evans had been senior pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Fresno since 2001. Last November, he took a leave because of exhaustion and burnout, said the Rev. H. Spees, First Presbyterian’s pastor-at-large.

During his leave, Spees said, Evans sought professional help and depended on the support of his family, friends and church family to help him fight severe depression.

“Jamie was fighting it and doing everything he could,” Spees said. “Everybody was doing everything they could to fight this difficult time he was going through.”

On Thursday, however, Evans took his own life. His family declined to disclose details of his death.

On Sunday, between the church’s two regular morning services, members gathered to share their grief over their pastor’s death.

“It was just out of the blue,” said Scott McCallum, First Presbyterian’s clerk of session, the congregation’s governing body. “It’s something that you can’t make sense of.”