Nelly Greisen was born on December 11, 1955. She joined her older sister, Annie Herring

Annie Herring

Annie Herring is one of the pioneers of the Jesus music genre, later to be called Contemporary Christian music. She was more notably a part of the trio, 2nd Chapter of Acts in which she wrote most of the songs and sang lead and harmony vocals with her brother Matthew Ward and sister Nelly Greisen...

, and younger brother, Matthew Ward

Matthew Ward (singer)

Matthew Ward is one of the pioneers of the Jesus music genre, later to be called Contemporary Christian music. He is best known as a part of the trio, 2nd Chapter of Acts in which he sang and performed with his sisters, Annie Herring and Nellie Greisen...

, to form the Jesus Music group 2nd Chapter of Acts

2nd Chapter of Acts

The 2nd Chapter of Acts was a Jesus Music and early Contemporary Christian Music group composed of sisters Annie Herring and Nelly Greisen and brother Matthew Ward. They began performing in 1973 and enjoyed their period of greatest success during the 1970s...

. The group began singing together in 1970, and disbanded in 1988. Nelly then turned her attention to being a full-time mother to her 2 sons, and to supporting her husband, Steve Greisen

Steve Greisen

Steve Greisen is a film maker and the president of Exploration Films, a firm that creates values-oriented faith- and family-friendly movies. He has also produced and directed such films as The Mystery of The Ark of the Covenant and The Search for the Real Mt. Sinai.-Personal life:Greisen was raised...

, in his video business.

Early years

Nelly Greisen was born in North Dakota, the eighth of nine children born to Walter and Kathrine “Elizabeth” Ward. Because of her mother’s deteriorating health, Nelly’s family moved to Rancho Cordova, near Sacramento, California, when she was 7, to be closer to relatives. Her mother eventually died in 1968, as the result of an operation on a benign brain tumor. Her father died only two years later, to the day, in 1970, from leukemia. Nelly was then 14 years old.
When she was orphaned, Nelly and her younger brother, 12-year-old Matthew, went to live with their older sister, Annie Herring, and her new husband, a record producer by the name of Buck Herring. Buck and Annie had been praying for her younger siblings for quite a while, so for the two children to come live with the couple was “a foregone conclusion”. However, there was still some conflict as the two families tried to merge, especially as Buck and Matthew tended not to see eye-to-eye on things, and Nelly’s compassionate heart sided with her brother against their new “father”.

Career years

Soon after Nelly and Matthew came to live with the Herrings, the three siblings began singing together around Annie’s battered upright piano. Annie usually sang lead, Matthew harmonized, and Nelly found the missing notes between the two. Although she rarely sang lead, Nelly’s harmonies tended to be more complicated than her brother’s. From time to time, Nelly would also add to the lyrics of the songs that Annie wrote. The three continued in these roles throughout their career as a music group, although they each also took a turn at singing lead during concerts. Some of the group’s best loved songs, including “Mountain Tops” and “Make My Life a Prayer to You” "My Jesus I Love Thee" were performed with Nelly singing lead.
One of Nelly’s special roles in the group was to speak out during a concert when she sensed that the Lord was healing a certain type of illness, or that He was touching people in a certain way. Sometimes people would come up to her after the concert and tell her that the Lord had healed them; other times, no one would testify to the fact that they had been healed, although they might approach her about it many years after their healing.

Personal life

In 1974, Nelly met a young singer by the name of Steve Greisen who was touring all over the world with a band he founded called 'Family'. The two were married in 1978. In the next few years, 2 sons, Andrew and Jesse, were born to the Greisens. They moved from California to Texas in 1981, and later to Monument Colorado in 1990.

Nelly has never embarked on a solo musical career. Instead, she prefers to support her husband in his film production and distribution business Exploration Films (explorationfilms.com) which has released numerous faith and family based films. Nelly and Steve currently live in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, not far from her brother, Matthew.