Browse Authors - O

Brandon J. O'Brien

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:46:36 GMT

Brandon J. O'Brien (PhD, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) is director of content and distribution for Redeemer City to City in Manhattan. He is coauthor, with E. Randolph Richards, of Misreading Scripture with Western Eyes and Paul Behaving Badly, as well as the author of The Strategically Small Church.

Thomas C. Oden

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:44:20 GMT

A Lifetime of Pioneering Theological Scholarship

Thomas C. Oden (1931–2016) was a pioneering theologian and served as the architect and general editor for the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, the first full-scale early Christian commentary on Scripture in the last five hundred years. He was also the general editor of the Ancient Christian Doctrine series and the Ancient Christian devotionals, as well as a consulting editor for the Encyclopedia of Ancient Christianity.

Oden’s self-described mission was “to begin to prepare the postmodern Christian community for its third millennium by returning again to the careful study and respectful following of the central tradition of classical Christianity.” A prolific writer and seasoned teacher, Oden also served as the director of the Center for Early African Christianity at Eastern University in Pennsylvania, and was active in the Confessing Movement in America, particularly within the United Methodist Church.

Find out about Tom Oden's work with the Center for Early African Christianity.

Read IVP's press release: Thomas C. Oden, a Dynamic Figure in 20th and 21st Century Christianity, Dies.

Gil Odendaal

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:34:19 GMT

Gil Odendaal (PhD, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School; DMin, Westminster Theological Seminary) is a missionary, pastor, educator, leader, and public speaker who serves as senior vice president of Integral Mission at World Relief. He previously served as the global director for PEACE Implementation with Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, as well as global director for the HIV/AIDS Initiative under Kay Warren. Odendaal has dedicated more than thirty years to empowering the church around the world to seamlessly integrate word and deed ministries that transform communities, especially through health-related initiatives. He has served as regional coordinator for Africa, Russia, and Eastern Europe with Medical Ambassadors International and he is currently serving on the Lausanne Movement Integral Mission Leadership team and on the boards of Accord (Association of Christian Relief and Development Organizations) as well as Micah Network, which represents 584 member organizations currently registered in eighty-four countries committed to Integral Mission. He and his wife, Elmarie, were born and raised in South Africa and have three adult children and five grandchildren.

Read more about the Odendaal's work at worldrelief.org.

Ryan P. O'Dowd

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:33:20 GMT

Ryan P. O'Dowd is pastor of Bread of Life Anglican Church of Ithaca, New York, and senior fellow at Chesterton House, Cornell University. He also holds adjunct faculty positions at Gordon College and The King's College in New York City. He is the author of The Wisdom of Torah.

Gordon K. Oeste

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:29:19 GMT

Gordon K. Oeste is adjunct professor of Old Testament at Tyndale Seminary in Toronto and teaching pastor at Cedar Creek Community Church, Cambridge, Ontario. He is the author of Legitimacy, Illegitimacy, and the Right to Rule.

Mark Oestreicher

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:16:22 GMT

Mark Oestreicher is a partner in The Youth Cartel, challenging youth ministers through holistic professional coaching, strategic consulting, transformational events, and inventive resource development for youth ministry. He has had a broad experience working in churches in roles ranging from junior high pastor to executive pastor. He has served as vice president of ministry resources and later as president of Youth Specialties in San Diego, an organization that trains and equips church youth workers. Oestreicher has authored or contributed to more than sixty books, including extensive youth ministry curricula and books like A Beautiful Mess: What’s Right About Youth Ministry, Understanding Your Young Teen: Practical Wisdom for Parents, Middle School Ministry: A Comprehensive Guide to Working with Early Adolescents, and Youth Ministry 3.0: A Manifesto of Where We’ve Been, Where We Are & Where We Need to Go. He actively continues in his calling to middle school ministry by volunteering with young teens at Journey Community Church in La Mesa, California, where he leads a small group of middle school students each week. He is married to Jeannie and has two children in high school and college.

Learn more about Mark's ministry The Youth Cartel.

Hazel Offner

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:42:06 GMT

Offner has for many years worked with students in the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship chapter at the University of Illinois. She has also helped to lead and promote hundreds of Bible study groups in the Champaign-Urbana area.

Greg Ogden

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:56:12 GMT

Greg Ogden (DMin, Fuller Theological Seminary) lives out his passion of speaking, teaching, and writing about the disciple-making mission of the church after spending twenty-four years in pastoral ministry. Most recently Greg served as executive pastor of discipleship at Christ Church of Oak Brook in the Chicago western suburbs. From 1998-2002, Greg held the position of director of the Doctor of Ministry program at Fuller Theological Seminary and associate professor of lay equipping and discipleship.

Greg is the author of several books such as Unfinished Business, Discipleship Essentials, Transforming Discipleship, Leadership Essentials(with coauthor Daniel Meyer), and The Essential Commandment. He is a partner in the Global Discipleship Initiative (GDI), which trains, coaches, and inspires pastors and Christian leaders to establish indigenous, multiplying, disciplemaking networks, both nationally and internationally. Greg and his wife, Lily, have been married more than forty-five years and have one adult daughter and two grandchildren.

Kirsten Sonkyo Oh

Thu, 20 Jan 2022 16:16:37 GMT

Kirsten Sonkyo Oh (PhD, Fuller Theological Seminary) on the faculty of Azusa Pacific University in biblical and religious studies and practical theology.

George Ohlschlager

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:06:14 GMT

George Ohlschlager (JD, MSW, University of Iowa) is a psychotherapist, ethicist, and writer. He is a certified Christian counselor with the International Board of Christian Counselors and a certified professional Christian counselor and Christian mediator with the American Association of Christian Counselors. Among Ohlschlager's many books and publications are Caring for People God's Way (coeditor with Timothy Clinton and Archibald D. Hart) and Competent Christian Counseling, Volume One: Foundations and Practice of Compassionate Soul Care (coauthor with Timothy Clinton).

Janette H. Ok

Wed, 24 Jan 2024 16:11:30 GMT

Janette H. Ok is associate professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary. She is the author of Constructing Ethnic Identity in 1 Peter (T&T Clark). She is currently writing a commentary on the Letters of John (NICNT, Eerdmans) and To Be and Be Seen, coauthored with Jordan J. Cruz Ryan (Baker Academic).

Dennis L. Okholm

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:50:31 GMT

Dennis L. Okholm (PhD, Princeton Theological Seminary) teaches in the department of theology and philosophy at Haggard School of Theology, Azusa Pacific University. Previously he was associate professor of theology at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois.

He is also an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church (USA), and an oblate of a Benedictine monastery (Blue Cloud Abbey, SD). He has coauthored and coedited several books, including two collections of papers presented at the annual Wheaton Theology Conference and Welcome to the Family: An Introduction to Evangelical Christianity (all in partnership with Timothy R. Phillips).

Abby Olcese

Wed, 28 Feb 2024 17:41:59 GMT

Abby Olcese is a writer on film, popular culture, and faith. Her work has appeared at Think Christian, Sojourners, Paste, RogerEbert.com, and /Film. She is also the film editor for The Pitch, a website and magazine serving the greater Kansas City, Missouri, area. She lives in Kansas City.

Lindsay Olesberg

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:51:24 GMT

Lindsay Olesberg is a Bible teacher and Scripture Engagement leader with the Lausanne Movement. She has overseen Bible study and exegesis at major evangelical gatherings throughout the world.

David T. Olson

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:47:07 GMT

David T. Olson is a religious researcher, church planting leader, and leadership coach. For the past twenty years, he has served in leadership for church growth and evangelism in the Evangelical Covenant Church. Dave is also the director of the American Church Research Project. His previous book was The American Church in Crisis (Zondervan). Dave and his wife, Shelly, live in Minneapolis.

Roger E. Olson

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:50:04 GMT

Roger E. Olson (PhD, Rice University) is professor of theology at George W. Truett Theological Seminary of Baylor University in Waco, Texas. He is the author of The Story of Christian Theology: Twenty Centuries of Tradition & Reform, The Mosaic of Christian Belief: Twenty Centuries of Unity & Diversity, and The Westminster Handbook to Evangelical Theology. He is also coauthor of 20th-Century Theology: God & the World in a Transitional Age and Who Needs Theology? An Invitation to the Study of God (both with Stanley J. Grenz), and of The Trinity (with Christopher A. Hall).

Sam O'Neal

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:45:30 GMT

As a former managing editor for SmallGroups.com, Sam O'Neal has a passion for seeing discipleship and full-bodied Christian education done right in the local church-especially in the context of small group communities. Sam is currently a content editor for Threads by Lifeway, where he edits books and Bible studies for young adults.

Thomas Jay Oord

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 20:25:55 GMT

Thomas Jay Oord (PhD, Claremont Graduate University) is professor of theology and philosophy at Northwest Nazarene University in Nampa, Idaho. He serves as adviser or on the councils of several scholarly groups, including the Open and Relational Theologies group (AAR), Biologos, Institute for Research on Unlimited Love, Research Theological Fellowship, Wesleyan Theological Society, and the Wesleyan Philosophical Society. Oord has written or edited more than twenty books, including Defining Love: A Philosophical, Scientific, and Theological Engagement, The Nature of Love: A Theology, and Theologies of Creation: Creatio Ex Nihilo and Its New Rivals. He is known for his contributions to research on love, open and relational theologies, postmodernism, issues in religion and science, and Wesleyan, holiness and evangelical theologies. Oord serves as an ordained minister in the Church of the Nazarene and in various consulting and administrative roles for academic institutions, scholarly projects, and research teams. He and his wife, Cheryl, have three daughters.

Amy Orr-Ewing

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:20:01 GMT

Dr Amy Orr-Ewing is an international author, speaker, and theologian who addresses the deep questions of our day with meaningful answers found in the Christian Faith. She is the author of multiple books including Where is God in All the Suffering? and the bestselling Why Trust the Bible?

Over the last twenty years, Amy has given talks and answered questions on university campuses around the world. She has also addressed Parliamentarians in the Speakers Rooms and Chapel at the UK Parliament and staffers on Capitol Hill, and at the West Wing of The White House. She regularly responds to invitations to speak in banks, businesses, and consultancy firms as well as churches and conferences. Amy is interested in the intersection of questions of meaning and faith with the marketplace, education, and policymaking.

Amy holds a doctorate in theology from the University of Oxford. She enjoys broadcasting in the media and giving public lectures. Amy is also the co-founder of REBOOT, an innovative youth initiative aimed at helping teenagers think deeply about faith, which now runs in countries all over the world. Amy lives in Oxford with her husband "Frog" and they have three boys.

Manuel Ortiz

Tue, 04 Oct 2016 18:44:24 GMT

Manuel Ortiz (1938–2017) was professor of ministry and urban mission and director of the urban program at Westminster Theological Seminary. His books include The Hispanic Challenge: Opportunities Confronting the Church, One New People: Models for Developing a Multiethnic Church, and Urban Ministry: The Kingdom, the City and the People of God (coauthored with Harvie Conn).

Ortiz was passionate about integrating urban ministry, education, and the gospel, and he spoke and consulted around the nation. For fourteen years he ministered to Hispanics in Chicago, founding five urban congregations, two elementary schools, and an extension school for theological education. He was also the founder and senior pastor of Spirit and Truth Fellowship (Christian Reformed Church), a multiethnic congregation in Philadelphia, and the codirector of the CRC Philadelphia Initiative for Church Planting.

Read IVP's press release: Remembering Dr. Manuel “Manny” Ortiz.