Thomas G. Long is Bandy Professor Emeritus of Preaching at Candler School of Theology, ��Emory University. He has taught preaching for over forty years, and his introductory textbook, The Witness of Preaching, has been translated into a number of languages and is widely used in theological schools around the world. Long has served as the president of the Academy of Homiletics and as senior homiletics editor of the New Interpreter's Bible. He has been editor of Theology Today and serves as an editor-at-large at The Christian Century. Long has been honored with the distinction of delivering the Lyman Beecher Lectures in Preaching at Yale Divinity School and was also named by Time magazine as one of the most effective preachers in the English language. A Presbyterian minister, Long has served churches in Georgia and New Jersey.

Leonora Tubbs Tisdale is Professor of Homiletics at Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut. She has authored and edited many books, including Preaching as Local Theology and Folk Art, Making Room at the Table: An Invitation to Multicultural Worship, and three volumes of The Abingdon Women's Preaching Annual.