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Alissa Jones Nelson

Biography

Alissa Jones Nelson first went abroad as a high school freshman to help build a library in an impoverished community in Mexico. It was Alissa's "first personal encounter with the harsh reality of poverty, the beauty of hope in the face of extreme material hardship, and the particular responsibility of people of faith in the face of social injustice." Her poem about the experience won first prize in a Colorado state poetry contest. Lines include these:

"Her hope for the future is strangled by poverty,

While mine is bolstered by wealth and privilege.

Are we sisters?

I am secure in my life and smug in my accomplishments,

Thankful that my fate is not hers, until I am reminded.

We are sisters."

The experience began to shape what would become Alissa's plan for graduate work in Old Testament studies. She is particularly interested in "divine concern for and human obligation to the marginalized in society." Alissa aims to become an author and professor who helps make the lessons of the Old Testament accessible and relevant as she writes about the relationship between religious belief and action on behalf of the oppressed.

Alissa, who graduated summa cum laude from Azusa Pacific University, has regularly volunteered at rescue missions and food kitchens in the US in addition to her service missions to South America. Soon after her marriage in 2003, she and her husband earned their certifications as teachers of English as a foreign language, teaching first in the Czech Republic and then in Japan.

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