A. J. (Adoniram Judson) Gordon (1836-1895) was born in New Hampton, New Hampshire, and died in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1863, after meeting in 1856 while attending Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, Gordon married Maria Hale Gordon (b. Hale). That same year, Gordon graduated from the Newton Theological Institution in Newton, Massachusetts. The Gordons moved to Boston, where Gordon accepted the position of pastor of Jamaica Plain Baptist Church. After six years, he accepted the pastorate of the Clarendon Street Baptist Church in Boston, where he would remain until his death. Starting in 1878, he published a monthly journal titled The Watchword. Gordon wrote many books. One of his most notable, The Ministry of Healing (1882), became a standard work among early Pentecostals. He also composed hymns and edited two hymnbooks. He became a prominent speaker in evangelist Dwight L. Moody's Northfield conventions, and he promoted missionary work in the Congo. Gordon served on the executive committee of the American Baptist Missionary Union from 1871 and became chair after 1888. In 1889, with the help and backing of the Clarendon Street Baptist Church, he founded Gordon Bible Institute (also known as the Boston Missionary Training School). This later became Gordon College and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Gordon served as its first president until his death. Gordon denounced Christian Science in newspaper articles and sermons. At one of Reverend Joseph Cook's lectures at Tremont Temple in 1885, Cook read aloud Gordon's open letter condemning Eddy's teachings and accusing her of being "a mesmerist, a medium, a pantheist, and prayerless." In response to the allegations, Eddy wrote an article that was published in the March 1885 issue of The Christian Science Journal titled, "Defence of Christian Science." This article would eventually be revised and published in 1887 as the book Christian Science: No and Yes.

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