J. Paul Nyquist

DR. PAUL NYQUIST was the 9th president of the Moody Bible Institute in Chicago&#8212a higher education and media ministry founded by evangelist D. L. Moody in 1886. He graduated from the University of Nebraska with a Bachelor of Science degree in Architectural Studies and received a Th.M. and a Ph.D. in Systematic Theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. He is the author of several books including Prepare: Living Your Faith in an Increasingly Hostile Culture.

Michael Rydelnik

DR. MICHAEL RYDELNIK is Vice President/Academic Dean and Professor of Jewish Studies and Bible at Moody Bible Institute. He is also the Host/Bible Teacher on Open Line with Dr. Michael Rydelnik, answering listener Bible questions on over 225 stations nationwide across Moody Radio. The son of Holocaust survivors, he was raised in an observant Jewish home in Brooklyn, New York. As a high school student, Michael became a follower of Jesus the Messiah and began teaching the Bible almost immediately. Besides his work on The Moody Bible Commentary and The Moody Handbook of Messianic Prophecy as coeditor and contributor, Michael is also the author of 50 Most Important Bible Questions, The Messianic Hope: Is the Hebrew Bible Really Messianic?, and Understanding the Arab-Israeli Conflict. Michael and his wife, Eva, live in Chicago, love hiking with their collie and boxer, and have two terrific adult sons, a delightful daughter-in-law, and the cutest grandchildren in the world.

Brenda Cannon

BRENDA CANNON was born in Kansas City, Missouri in 1890. After teaching school for seven years in that city, she attended the Women’s Missionary Union Training School in Louisville, Kentucky. In 1919 she went to North Carolina to serve as secretary of a small mission school, which developed into a home for homeless children and continued to serve the young mountaineers of the area as a school. Except for two years spent as a field worker and young people’s leader in Oklahoma, Cannon remained in North Carolina, teaching school and doing community work. So when she wrote of mountaineers, she wrote understandingly of friends and neighbors. She died in North Carolina in 1965.

William O. Levi

WILLIAM OCHAN LEVI is the founder of Operation Nehemiah Missions International, an organization dedicated to rebuilding the minds, bodies, and spirits of the Sudanese people. He is active in Christian education and humanitarian service in South Sudan and the Ugandan refugee camps. Mr. Levi, a Messianic believer from an African Hebrew tribal group, is a native of Sudan and grew up as a refugee. Following persecution, arrest, and torture, his miraculous escape from jihad forces ultimately led to life in the United States. He has written a book on his story entitled The Bible or the Axe: One Man's Dramatic Escape from Persecution in the Sudan. He is a frequent guest on Christian radio and has told his story nationwide, even testifying before representatives of the United States government regarding human rights abuses in the Sudan. Mr. Levi lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Hannah, and their six children.

Jennifer Hand

JENNIFER HAND, Executive Director of Coming Alive Ministries, founded the ministry in 2012 and loves the honor of traveling nationally and internationally, inviting people to come alive in Christ through conferences, retreats, written resources, and counseling. She has had the joy of serving in over thirty countries. With a Master's degree in trauma counseling, God has opened a unique door for her to respond after natural disasters around the world, providing trauma counseling and the hope of Christ on the holy ground of suffering. She would love to keep up with you in her cozy internet corner of the world at www.comingaliveministries.com or on social media @comingalivejenn or Jenn@comingaliveministries on Facebook.

Barnabas Mam

BARNABAS MAM has been AFCI’s Regional Director for Asia since 2007 and is one of only 200 Christians to survive the Killing Fields of Pol Pot. He joined the Communist party as a teenager and was converted to Christ while spying on a Christian evangelistic meeting in the early 1970's. He was later arrested and sent to the Killing Fields where he spent four years in captivity. After his release Barnabas was forced to flee the country where he spent another eight years in a refugee camp in Thailand where he began the ministry of church-planting. After returning to Cambodia, Barnabas helped rebuild the church in his native land, and over 400 churches have been planted since 1998.

Patricia St. John

PATRICIA ST. JOHN (1919-1993) was a nurse, missionary and author. She earned a nursing degree at St. Thomas' Hospital in London in 1946. In the early 1950s she moved to Tangier, Morocco where she served as a missionary nurse for 27 years. Throughout her life, she travelled extensively in Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East, as the settings of her novels reflect. In 1977, she returned to England, where she cared for elderly relatives and ministered from her home to youths, single parents, and the elderly. Patricia authored numerous books, including Treasures of the Snow, The Tanglewoods' Secret, The Secret at Pheasant Cottage, and Star of Light.

Richard Ellsworth Day

RICHARD ELLSWORTH DAY was born in the United States in 1884. In his early life he was an apprentice at the Terre Haute Gazette in Indiana serving as an associate reporter. His first book was a biography on the famous preacher Charles Spurgeon entitled The Shadow of the Broad Brim, which he published with Judson Press in 1934. The book was an immediate success which led to subsequent biographies on Charles Grandison Finney (1942), D.L. Moody (1944), and Henry Parsons Crowell (1946). Richard Day and his wife Deborah would begin each project with extensive research and study and then retreat to their little cottage in Sunnyvale, California to write. In his day he was a noted Christian biographer, and between projects, traveled around speaking in churches and schools until his death in 1965.

Geraldine Taylor

William Gurnall

WILLIAM GURNALL (1616-1679) was a graduate of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, England, a university under strong Puritan influence. His life's work was as pastor of the Church of Christ, in Suffolk. He authored The Christian in Complete Armour: Daily Readings in Spiritual Warfare.

Colin S. Smith

COLIN SMITH serves as senior pastor of The Orchard with six campuses across Chicagoland. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, Colin received his Bachelor of Arts in Theology and Master of Philosophy from the London School of Theology. Colin is the author of several books including The Ten Greatest Struggles of Your Life and Fly Through the Bible: A Brief Introduction. He can be heard daily on the Open the Bible radio broadcast and at openthebible.org and openthebible.org.uk. Colin and his wife, Karen, have two sons and five granddaughters.

Joe Thorn

JOE THORN is the founding and Lead Pastor of Redeemer Fellowship in St. Charles, IL. He is the author of Note to Self: the Discipline of Preaching to Yourself and Experiencing the Trinity: The Grace of God for the People of God, and has contributed articles to Tabletalk Magazine, the ESV Men's Devotion Bible, The ESV Story Bible, and The Mission of God Study Bible.

E. M. Bounds

EDWARD MCKENDREE BOUNDS (1835-1913) was born in Missouri. He studied deeply in the Scriptures and was greatly inspired by the writings of John Wesley. At the age of 24, he felt called to be a preacher and became a Methodist Pastor around the time of the American Civil War. At the age of 58, and for the next nineteen years (until he went home to be with the Lord at age 77), he began to write books. It is said that he prayed daily, from 4 A.M. to 7 A.M., before he would begin work on his writings. Bounds is author of many books, including Purpose in Prayer, The Weapon of Prayer, and The Reality of Prayer.

Lin Johnson

LIN JOHNSON is Managing Editor of The Christian Communicator, Advanced Christian Writer and Church Libraries and is the author and co-author of more than 60 books, including Christian Education: Foundations for the Future, Extracting the Precious from 2nd Corinthians, Encouraging Others, and The Book of John from The Smart Guide to the Bible Series. Lin specializes in Bible curriculum and is a Gold Medallion Book Award recipient. She also directs the Write-to-Publish Conference in the Chicago area and teaches at writers' conferences across the country and internationally. Lin resides in Elgin, Illinois.

Rene Pache

DR. RENE PACHE, was reared in a Christian home under the guidance of a deeply spiritual mother (his father died when the boy was ten years old). He received his doctor's degree in law at Lausanne, Switzerland. By that time he was an out-and-out unbeliever. As a lawyer he joined the business staff of the big chemical works (CIBA) at Basle, Switzerland. It was there, at the age of 24, that he was converted through reading a Bible he had purchased. He would eventually become one of the founders of the Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship in Switzerland and France. His important works include The Person and Work of the Holy Spirit and The Return of Jesus Christ.

Robert E. Picirilli

ROBERT E. PICIRILLI is the former Academic Dean of the Graduate School at Free Will Baptist Bible College in Nashville. He began teaching in 1955. He is a member of the Research Commission of the American Association of Bible Colleges and served twice as chairman of the southeastern section of the Evangelical Theological Society. Dr. Picirilli is the author of a number of books including Paul The Apostle, The Book of Romans, and Time and Order in the Circumstantial Participles of Mark and Luke. Dr. Picirilli and his wife, Clara, have five daughters, all married.