James Russell Lingerfelt grew up on a farm in northeast Alabama helping his dad and brother doctor cattle. Lingerfelt was an average student in high school, and gravitated toward the writers Emerson and Thoreau due to their romantic portrayals of the North American countryside. He was involved in the Student Government and started at point guard on the varsity basketball team.

He first attended a local two year college through a full tuition theatre scholarship, building sets and acting in the Broadway musicals Annie and Big River. He worked as an extra in Dawson's Creek (starring Joshua Jackson, Katie Holmes, James Van Der Beek) and Tim Burton's Big Fish (Ewan McGregor, Steve Buscemi, Danny DeVito, Miley Cyrus). He majored in Psychology and worked part-time on the college maintenance crew, scrubbing toilets and mopping floors. He also worked at his local home bank as a bookkeeper. Having a close relationship with his parents and brother, he studied in-state, journeying to Auburn University where he and his brother were roommates.
    
James Russell's brother is Dewey Wayne Lingerfelt, a chemical engineer and lead singer for the award winning Texas country music group, The Dewey Wayne Band. His mother raised her sons as a stay-at-home mom, and is now a retired middle school math teacher. His father worked as a manager for thirty years at a tire factory, maintained the farm, and even served as their hometown mayor.

At Auburn, Lingerfelt completed a BA in Family Counseling with independent studies in 19th century British Literature and the theolgical writings of CS Lewis. He joined the university lacrosse team and they won two consecutive conference championships. Lingerfelt volunteered with international humanitarian organizations every summer for the next ten years; joining relief teams in Jamaica and Romania, medical teams in Mexico, and a homeless men's soup kitchen in Scotland. In 2005, he spent a summer in Morocco assisting Berbers build village homes while studying Arabic and Islam under Muslim professors to better understand Christian-Muslim dialogue.
    
Lingerfelt wrote his first book as he left Auburn, The Warrior of Ephes Dammim: When Teenagers Overcome their Giants. Written as a pamphlet to instruct teenagers in how to maintain their identity and integrity in high school, the book was published by the small literary press, Choate Publishing. Over a course of two years, the book became one of the highest selling books in the company's history. The following year, when the publisher requested to run a second print of the book, Lingerfelt refused, saying he no longer agreed with most of the book's message.

Lingerfelt completed a Masters in Theology at Pepperdine University with a focus in Classical Judaic and Christian Studies with an emphasis in Hebrew Wisdom Literature and New Testament Exegesis. He volunteered as a counselor at Camp David Gonzales; a juvenile delinquent rehabilitation center in LA County. Writers and theologians who influenced his spiritual life were Jewish scholar Harold Kushner, Oxford scholar and Bishop of Durham, N.T. Wright; the late Yale Chaplain Henri Nouwen; and anti-Nazi, Christian martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. After completing his Masters, Lingerfelt spent a year in residence at Friends University where he studied Patristics (Early Judeo-Christian Literature 100-500CE) and the works of St. Augustine.

After Pepperdine in 2006, he journeyed to East Africa and counseled genocide refugees in Uganda and taught English at Made-in-the-Streets; a street children's rehabilitation farm in Kenya. Upon his return, Lingerfelt completed a low budget documentary titled Made in the Streets of Africa. He then enrolled at Fuller Theological Seminary to begin his PhD in Intercultural Studies where he maintained a 4.0 GPA. After his first year at Fuller, feeling burned out, he resigned from missions and seminary study, and applied to work as a ranch hand in northern Colorado. During his hiatus, he read The Ragamuffin Gospel by ex-Franciscan priest Brennan Manning, and they met at Lake Arrowhead in December 2007. After a lengthy conversation concerning purpose in spiritual and third-world poverty, Lingerfelt re-engaged in humanitarian efforts (Egypt '07, Mongolia '08, Syria, Israel and Palestine '10, Liberia '11) but has not returned to seminary. In Liberia, he wrote and directed a low budget documentary on microlending for the Peachtree Presbyerian Church in Atlanta. The church now uses the documentary People Who Make a Difference at their annual missions fundraiser. 

Lingerfelt serves on the board of directors for LifeBread and taught two years as a visiting adjunct professor in Theological Studies at Lipscomb University ('07-'09). He was awarded the Lily Endowment for his work with street orphans in 2006, and Made in the Streets of Africa is now used as material for human rights and social activist courses in a number of universities across the States including Princeton and Fuller theological seminaries.

In May 2010, Lingerfelt resigned from teaching and lived off $12,000 a year for two years to finish writing his first novel, The Mason Jar. A coming of age love story, The Mason Jar was distributed globally in December 2011 through the publishing division of The William and Keats Group. Lingerfelt spent five years writing the novel. HarperCollins offered Lingerfelt $40,000 plus 20% royalties for The Mason Jar and a sequel novel, but Lingerfelt refused since he couldn't keep the film rights. Best-selling romance author Diana Bold said she was "blown away" by The Mason Jar and award-winning children's book author Nicole Weaver stated in a review, "Lingerfelt's book reads like one long beautiful poem."

In 2012, he finished a producing and directing internship at the Emmy award winning production company Revolution Pictures in Nashville. After studying Hollywood screenwriting instructors (Will Akers, Robert McKee, Blake Snyder, and John Truby), Lingerfelt wrote the screenplay for The Mason Jar which was recently edited by Will Akers and James Breckenridge.

The Mason Jar feature film is scheduled for pre-production in 2015 and will be released in cinemas nationwide. The film is written and will be directed in the same dramatic and romantic tones as The Notebook (Ryan Gosling, Rachel McAdams, 2004) and Pride & Predjudice (Keira Knightley, Matthew Mcfadyen, 2005).

Lingerfelt is represented by The MacGregor Literary Agency and spends much of his time in Franklin, Tennessee where he writes and produces full-time.


If you would like to write James Russell or book him for a speaking engagement, see Connect above.














































-.