Joel D. Heck is Professor of Theology

Theology

Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...

 at Concordia University Texas and Executive Editor of Concordia University Press. He is the author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 or editor

Editing

Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...

 of nine books, most recently editing a reprint

Reprint

A reprint is a re-publishing of material that has already been previously published. The word reprint is used in many fields.-Academic publishing:...

 edition of The Personal Heresy

The Personal Heresy

The Personal Heresy is a series of articles, three each by C.S. Lewis and E.M.W. Tillyard, first published on April 27, 1939 by Oxford University Press and later reprinted, also by Oxford University Press, in 1965. The book has been reprinted in 2008 by Concordia University Press with an...

: A Controversy, a book co-authored by C. S. Lewis

C. S. Lewis

Clive Staples Lewis , commonly referred to as C. S. Lewis and known to his friends and family as "Jack", was a novelist, academic, medievalist, literary critic, essayist, lay theologian and Christian apologist from Belfast, Ireland...

 and E. M. W. Tillyard

E. M. W. Tillyard

Eustace Mandeville Wetenhall Tillyard was a British classical scholar and literary scholar. He was a Fellow in English at Jesus College and later Master of Jesus College , Cambridge. He is known mainly for his book The Elizabethan World Picture, as background to Elizabethan Literature,...

 and originally published in 1939. He teaches courses in Old

Old Testament

The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...

 and New Testament

New Testament

The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

, Reformation history, and the life and writings of C. S. Lewis (see website at www.concordia.edu).

Biography

Born on October 1, 1948, in Seward, Nebraska

Seward, Nebraska

Seward is a city in Seward County, Nebraska, United States. It is part of the Lincoln, Nebraska Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 6,133 at the 2000 census...

, Joel was raised in a pastor

Pastor

The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....

's family in Nebraska

Nebraska

Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....

, South Dakota

South Dakota

South Dakota is a state located in the Midwestern region of the United States. It is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux American Indian tribes. Once a part of Dakota Territory, South Dakota became a state on November 2, 1889. The state has an area of and an estimated population of just over...

, Iowa

Iowa

Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...

, and Wisconsin

Wisconsin

Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...

. His father, Rev. Donald E. Heck (1916–1991), was a pastor of The Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod, who served congregations in Michigan

Michigan

Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....

, Nebraska, South Dakota, Iowa, and Wisconsin. He and his wife, Lucille (1915–2004), raised five children, Joel being the third child and oldest son. His sisters are Barbara Haseley, Doris Sherfy, and Christine Dea, and his brother is Thomas Heck.

He holds the A.A. from Concordia University Wisconsin

Concordia University Wisconsin

Concordia University Wisconsin is a private liberal arts college located in Mequon, Wisconsin. The school is an affiliate of the 10-member Concordia University System, which is operated by the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod ....

, the B.A. from Concordia Senior College

Concordia Senior College

Concordia Senior College was a liberal arts college located in Fort Wayne, Indiana and affiliated with the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod...

, the M.Div. from Concordia Theological Seminary

Concordia Theological Seminary

The Concordia Theological Seminary is an institution of theological higher education of The Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod , located in Fort Wayne, Indiana, dedicated primarily to the preparation of pastors for the congregations and missions of the LCMS...

, Fort Wayne

Fort Wayne, Indiana

Fort Wayne is a city in the US state of Indiana and the county seat of Allen County. The population was 253,691 at the 2010 Census making it the 74th largest city in the United States and the second largest in Indiana...

, the Th.M. from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

Trinity Evangelical Divinity School

Trinity Evangelical Divinity School is an evangelical Christian seminary located in Deerfield, Illinois. TEDS is one of the largest seminaries in the world, enrolling more than 1,200 graduate students in professional and academic programs, including more than 150 in its PhD programs...

, Deerfield, Illinois

Deerfield, Illinois

Deerfield is a village in Lake County, Illinois, United States and is located approximately 25 miles north of Chicago, Illinois. A portion of the village is in Cook County, Illinois, United States...

, and the Th.D. in Exegetical Theology from Concordia Seminary

Concordia Seminary

Concordia Seminary is located in Clayton, Missouri, an inner-ring suburb on the western border of St. Louis, Missouri. The institution's primary mission is to train pastors, deaconesses, missionaries, chaplains, and church leaders for the Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod . The current president of...

, St. Louis. He spent his seminary vicarage year at Trinity Lutheran Church in Bogota, New Jersey

Bogota, New Jersey

As of the 2010 Census, Bogota had a population of 8,187. The median age was 38.6. The racial and ethnic composition of the population was 61.0% White, 9.4% Black or African American, 0.8% Native American, 9.8% Asian, 0.1% Native Hawaiian / Pacific Islander, 14.8% some other race and 4.1% reporting...

.

He served as pastor of Zion Lutheran Church

Zion Lutheran Church

Zion Lutheran Church may refer to:* Zion Lutheran Church * Zion Lutheran Church * Zion Lutheran Church , a National Register of Historic Places listing in Cole County, Missouri...

, Valley Park, Missouri

Valley Park, Missouri

Valley Park is a city in St. Louis County, Missouri, United States. The population was 6,942 at the 2010 census.-History:The town was a Mississippian Indian settlement along the Meramec River as early as the mid-18th century, until it was settled by French and German immigrant farmers in the 1760s...

, from 1975 to 1984, Theology professor at Concordia University Wisconsin from 1984 to 1998, and Chief Academic Officer and then full-time Theology professor at Concordia University Texas from 1998 to the present. During his sabbatical in 2004, he worked with Walter Hooper

Walter Hooper

Walter McGehee Hooper is a trustee and literary advisor of the estate of C.S. Lewis. Born in Reidsville, North Carolina, U.S., he earned an M.A. in education and was an instructor in English at the University of Kentucky in the early 1960s. As a visitor to England, he served briefly as Lewis's...

 on Volume III of Collected Letters, the third and last volume of the letter of C. S. Lewis, by transcribing many letters written by Lewis and doing bibliographical work on the book. Over the course of his ministry, he has developed a passion for teaching, for research and writing, for the Scriptures, and for the works of C. S. Lewis. Heck is an avid sports fans with a variety of sports in his range of interest from baseball

Baseball

Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

, football

American football

American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...

, and basketball

Basketball

Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...

 on both the professional and college levels to more social sports such as table tennis

Table tennis

Table tennis, also known as ping-pong, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight, hollow ball back and forth using table tennis rackets. The game takes place on a hard table divided by a net...

. He is known for his offer to excuse a student from the final exam if that student can beat him at table tennis.

Perhaps the greatest distinguishing feature is the amount of writing, some of which is referenced below. During the decade between 1987 and 1997, he edited a quarterly periodical called Evangelism, devoted to encouraging and equipping Christian people for outreach. While authoring or editing nine books, he has written numerous articles, book reviews, and essays, most notably on topics related to C. S. Lewis. He has donated the Joel D. Heck Collection at the Wade Center, Wheaton College, a collection of letters related to Lewis, the educator, letters originally written to Dr. Heck about the experiences of former students of Lewis. Much of his research is referenced on his own website at http://www.joelheck.com. This website especially contains his research on events in the life of C. S. Lewis, catalogued day by day and year by year throughout Lewis' life. It also contains the military record of Lewis' brother, Warren Hamilton Lewis. More information about these articles appears below. The HarperCollins web site contains four of the articles Heck has written on Lewis.

He and his wife Cheryl have three grown children, Peter, Brenda, and Alan.

Honors

Winner of the Faculty Laureate award at Concordia University Wisconsin, 1994.

Alumnus of the Year, Concordia University Wisconsin, 1998.

Recipient of a Marion E. Wade research award for the research done that led to Irrigating Deserts: C. S. Lewis on Education (2005).

Voted as the Faculty Member of the Year by the athletic teams of Concordia University Texas for the school year 2008-2009 and again for the school year 2010-2011.

Writings

In addition to articles published in The Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, The Journal of Biblical Literature, and Bibliotheca Sacra

Bibliotheca Sacra

Bibliotheca Sacra is the theological journal published by Dallas Theological Seminary. First published in 1844, it is the oldest theological journal in the United States. It originally was published by Union Theological Seminary in 1843, moved to Andover Theological Seminary in 1844, to Oberlin...

, Heck has written many book reviews and several articles for CSL: The Journal of the New York C.S. Lewis Society, Sehnsucht, The Lamp-Post, and The Chronicle of the Oxford C.S. Lewis Society.


Make Disciples: Evangelism Programs of the Eighties (Concordia Publishing House, 1984).

New Member Assimilation (Concordia Publishing House, 1988).

The Art of Sharing Your Faith (Revell, 1991).

All of the Above: Your Choice to Collegiate Success, editor (Concordia University Press, 1992).

264 Great Outreach Ideas (Concordia Publishing House, 2001).

Evangelism and the Christian College, editor and author (Evangelism, 1994).

From Guest to Disciple (Concordia Publishing House, 2001).

Irrigating Deserts: C. S. Lewis on Education (Concordia Publishing House, 2005).

The Personal Heresy

The Personal Heresy

The Personal Heresy is a series of articles, three each by C.S. Lewis and E.M.W. Tillyard, first published on April 27, 1939 by Oxford University Press and later reprinted, also by Oxford University Press, in 1965. The book has been reprinted in 2008 by Concordia University Press with an...

: A Controversy, editor (authored by C. S. Lewis and E. M. W. Tillyard, Concordia University Press, 2008).

History & Literature of the Old Testament (Kendall Hunt, 2010).

Learning at the Foot of the Cross: A Christian Vision for Education (Concordia University Press, 2011).

In the Beginning, God: Creation from God's Perspective (Concordia Publishing House, 2011).