After he retired, Durham was appointed as a general authority of the LDS Church. He had previously served in the church as a stake president, as a member of the Sunday School general board, and as a regional representative. Durham became a member of the First Quorum of the Seventy in April 1977. Shortly afterward, he became managing director of the LDS Church Historical Department over Church Historian Leonard J. Arrington. In October 1981, Durham became a member of the Presidency of the Seventy and remained in that position until his death. From 1982 to his death, Durham was the church's seventeenth Church Historian and Recorder. He was succeeded in that assignment by Dean L. Larson.