Ph.D. in history, Johns Hopkins University (1999)
Advisor: Dorothy Ross
Dissertation: "'This Holy Hieroglyph': Providence and Historical Consciousness in George Bancroft's Historiography"

M.A. in Hebrew Bible, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (1991)
Advisor: John Sailhamer
Thesis: "'Sing an Old Song to the Lord': 1 Chr. 16:8-36, the Psalter, and the Chronicler's Historiography"

B.A. in history, University of Michigan (1988)
Advisor: David Hollinger
Thesis: "'God's Book, Man's Book': A Prospect on William Rainey Harper's Biblical World"

Professional Development

North Park University
Director of Enrollment Communications (2010– )
Online Media Manager, Admissions (2009–2010)
Adjuct Professor, School of Business and Nonprofit Management (2010– )

InterVarsity Christian Fellowship
Associate Director, Graduate & Faculty Ministries (2003-2009)
Conference Director, Following Christ 2008 (2007-2009)
Web Producer, Information Services (2003–2007)
Program Director, Following Christ 2002 (2001-2003)

North Park University
Adjunct Professor of History (2006)

Encyclopædia Britannica and Britannica.com
Assistant Editor through Senior Editor (1999-2000)

Northwestern University Library
Catalog Management & Acquisitions Library Aide (1998-1999)

Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford University Press
Freelance researcher (1998-1999)

Selected Volunteer Service

Jon's sophomore-year ID from New Trier.

Chair, Church Council, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago (2009– )

Chair, Pastoral Relations Committee, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago (2008)

Council Member and Vice Chair, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago (2004–2007)

Associate Dean of Humanities, Following Christ / Shaping Our World conference (1997-1999)

Member, Board of Directors, Central-Bennett West, Inc. (1997-1999)

Campus Volunteer, InterVarsity Graduate & Faculty Ministries, Northwestern University (1996-1998)

Recent Non-Academic Teaching and Presentations

"The Spirit Speaks," guest sermon on Acts 1:12–26, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago, February 4, 2007.

"Higher Education," campus-wide chapel sermon on Daniel 1-6, Covenant College, Lookout Mountain, Ga., November 5, 2004.

Chair of a panel, "Christians in Graduate School," at the biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History, Hope College, Holland, Mich., October 14, 2004.

"All Things in Common," guest sermon on Acts 2:42-47, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago, May 23, 2004.

"Contentment and Vision in an Academic Calling: Spiritual Formation throughout the Academic Life," paper presented at the conference, "Christianity and the Soul of the University," Baylor University, Waco, Texas, March 26, 2004.

"Christ Is Proclaimed," guest sermon on Philippians 1:12-30, Grace Evangelical Covenant Church, Chicago, July 13, 2003.

On the theological ideas of Bill Mallonee, University of Chicago Graduate Christian Fellowship, May 10, 2002.

"The Scandal of Particularity," Sunday Morning Seminary, First Presbyterian Church of Evanston, Illinois, April 19, 1998.

On integrating faith and academic scholarship, University of Chicago Graduate Christian Fellowship, October 17, 1997.

Jon circa 1984.
photo: Kurt Ryden

Selected Publications

"Taking Social Media Seriously," Newsletter of the School of Business and Nonprofit Management, North Park University, Fall 2010.

Review of Brewing Justice, by Daniel Jaffee, Ethix, April 2010 (Issue 69).

"The Loss of Brown's Woods: A Letter to Scott Russell Sanders," review of A Conservationist Manifesto, by Scott Russell Sanders, The Common Review 8, no. 3 (Winter 2009), 42–44. (With a response to a letter to the editor in The Common Review 8, no. 4 [Spring 2010].)

"Slow and Slower," review of The Wild Trees, by Richard Preston, and Dirt, by David Montgomery, The Common Review 6, no. 2 (Fall 2007), 44–46.

"Windy City," in The Encyclopedia of Chicago, ed. James R. Grossman, Ann Durkin Keating, and Janice L. Reiff, 882 (University of Chicago Press), 2004.

"If We Ever Needed the Lord Before," Books & Culture 5, no. 3 (May/June 1999): 40-42.

"The Oriole" (poem), Baseball Research Journal 24 (1995): 15-16.

Review of Religious Advocacy and American History, ed. Bruce Kuklick and D. G. Hart, Fides et Historia 29, no. 3 (Fall 1997): 87-89.

Ann and Jon get married (Oct 8, 2000). That's my brother Jim in the background.
photo: Jane Deitrich

Recent Academic and Professional Presentations and Teaching

“Website Principles for the Rest of Us,” half-day workshop at the Axelson Center for Nonprofit Management, North Park University, December 2, 2010.

“Strategies and Tactics for Facebook, Twitter, and Social Media,” graduate course (SBNM 5910), School of Business and Nonprofit Management, North Park University, Chicago, Fall 2010.

“Must-Have Technologies for Nonprofits,” presentation at the Axelson Symposium, North Park University, Chicago, May 13, 2010.

“Mistakes Your Ministry Can Avoid on Facebook and Twitter,” seminar at the annual Midwinter Conference of the Evangelical Covenant Church, Denver, January 27, 2010.

“Getting Started Making Online Videos,” presentation at the annual conference of the HighEdWeb Association, Milwaukee, October 5, 2009.

“The Elements of Twitter Style,” presentation at the annual conference of the HighEdWeb Association, Milwaukee, October 5, 2009.

"Christians, History, and the Environment: A Response," presentation at the biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History, Bluffton University, Bluffton, Ohio, September 19, 2008.

"Providentialism and Christian Historiography," presentation to the History Club, Covenant College, Lookout Mountain, Ga., November 5, 2004.

Commentator for a panel, "The Search for a Christian Interpretation of History," at the biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History, Hope College, Holland, Mich., October 15, 2004.

"Who Says? Musings on Anonymity in Scholarship," paper as part of a panel on "Historiography as if the Incarnation Really Mattered," presented at the conference, "Christianity and the Soul of the University," Baylor University, Waco, Texas, March 26, 2004.

Commentator for a panel, "On the Morality of Providential History," at the biennial meeting of the Conference on Faith and History, Huntington College, Huntington, Ind., October 12, 2002.

"Classical Historicism and George Bancroft's Providentialism," paper as part of a panel on "Divine Languages and Human Authority in the Origins of Academia," presented at the annual meeting of the American Society of Church Historians and American Historical Association, Washington, D.C., January 8, 1999.

"German Historicism in the American Republic: The Providential Nationalism of George Bancroft's Historiography," paper as part of a panel on "Dilemmas of Nationalism in Nineteenth-Century Historiography," presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Historians of the Early American Repulic, Harpers Ferry, W.Va., July 17, 1998.

"'The Slowly Ripened Fruit of Providence and of Time': Historicism and Providentialism in George Bancroft's Historiography," paper presented at the Pew Fellows Conference, Yale University, May 2, 1997.

"Antebellum American-History Schoolbooks and the Subjective Reading of Providence," paper presented at the annual conference of the Society for the History of Authorship, Reading, and Publishing, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass., July 18, 1996.

Interests

Etymology and lexicography, jazz, hiking, maps & landscape, historical fiction, computers and electronic media, data graphics, baseball, brewing traditions, chess, and typography.