Jan Payne Pierce
Director of Texian Christian Writers
Christian educator, author, and speaker, Jan resides in Wise County on ancestral land dating back to the James Fannin grant. She is a mother to four adult children and grandparent to seven. A fifth generation Texan, Jan has lived and traveled all over Texas and loves to talk about the experience, especially when she finds God’s hand and footprints along the way.
Jan graduated from Texas Tech University with a Bachelor of Science in Education and later received dance and history certification from Sam Houston State University. Her teaching career includes public, private, and home school academia. As a fine artist, she directed her own school of dance and performing dance companies. She also choreographed for Community Theater. A lifetime aquatics instructor, she continues teaching swimming on a year-round basis in Wise County under the guise of “Mama Fishy.”
After several decades in the Fine Arts, God led Jan and her two youngest children into Christian Education where she was introduced to the Christian History of America. She eventually taught American History and wrote four readers so children could quickly grasp their patriotic, Christian heritage. Later adding Texas History, she exchanged the classroom for a speaker’s forum to spread the word about HisStory in Texas.
A developing curriculum of the Christian heritage of Texas followed with the founding of the Texian Christian Writers, a group of like-minded history buffs. They research and write about Texas and its Godly roots as they travel the state. The phrase, “God and Texas, Victory or Death!” were the last words coming from the Alamo and can be found engraved in stone on the Monument to the Heroes of the Alamo on the State Capitol grounds. The writers have committed themselves to the cause of God and Texas.
Frank Ball
Director of North Texas Christian Writers
frank.ball@ntchristianwriters.com
Frank Ball founded North Texas Christian Writer’s groups, a consortium of some 250 members in the North Texas area, who encourage one another to write and write well. He has worked as a ghostwriter, writer’s coach, e-zine columnist, and copy editor for a trade magazine. As Pastor of Biblical Research and Writing for three years, he wrote sermons, teaching materials, and hundreds of devotionals. His life-changing book is Eyewitness: The Life of Christ Told in One Story, a compilation of all biblical information into one chronological story that reads like a novel. He travels to churches and writer’s conferences across the country to help churches develop writing ministries and show writers how to reach the people who need to read their stories. For more information, visit Frank’s Web sites at NorthTexas Christian Writers and Eyewitness Tools.
When Frank addressed the TCW audience, he encouraged the writer, parent, teacher, or educator, whether new to writing or discovering the Christian heritage of Texas, how they can achieve their goals to communicate what God has put in their heart. He pointed out that Christian writers are needed in every genre–the novelist, historian, romance, playwright, or poet. While students need Christ-centered biographies, text, work, coloring books, readers and historical novels, Frank lights the fire to make sure new writers glorify God.
“Let your dreams soar above the comments of people who question your ability. Rise above the thoughts that say, ‘I can’t,’ and enter the reality that God makes all things possible.”
