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Grace Matters Program podcast will be updated with a variety of previously aired programs from 2005 to 2009.
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Grace Matters, 2009

Listen to Grace Matters Programs from:  2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009

January | February | March | April

April April 12, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream | Podcast Easter Sunday – with host Peter Marty Hallelujah! He is risen. Jesus lives and resurrection hope beckons. He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Final Broadcast comment:  The Grace Matters staff is ever thankful for the wonderful ministry that has touched so many lives over the years and for the dedicated, talented staff whose sense of mission and vocation helped shape Grace Matters into more than just a program.   April 5, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Kathleen Norris – Dark Despair, Bright Hope Host Peter Marty will be joined by Kathleen Norris. Ms. Norris is the award-winning poet, writer, and author of The New York Times bestsellers The Cloister Walk, Dakota: A Spiritual Geography, Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith, and The Virgin of Bennington. Exploring the spiritual life, her work is at once intimate and historical, rich in poetry and meditations, brimming with exasperation and reverence, deeply grounded in both nature and spirit, sometimes funny, and often provocative. March March 29, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Jonathan Rundman – Music Intended for the Soul Psalm 150 There is no venue where Jonathan Rundman hasn’t performed. Church basements, convention halls, coffee shops, college auditoriums, and church sanctuaries have all formed the backdrop for this talented singer and songwriter. Rundman is well known in the Christian community for his sound theology, his biblical depth, and his creative melodies. A brief taste of his character and life, as this broadcast includes, explains why Rundman is one for the faithful to know.   March 22, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Sondra Wheeler – Love Down to the Bone 1 John 4 The subject of love never gets old, at least for Christian people who want to probe the endless depths of divine love. Sondra Wheeler, professor of Christian Ethics at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C., has authored a book entitled What We Were Made For: Christian Reflections on Love. She joins this broadcast to explore the staying quality of God’s love, and the vulnerability that is required to love well.   March 15, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Tom Gjelten – Everybody Sharing Everything Acts 4:32-35 National Public Radio’s broad listenership knows the name Tom Gjelten well. It is synonymous with reporting that is honest, insightful, and full of integrity. For more than 20 years Gjelten has been a foreign correspondent for NPR, serving in many of the world’s most dangerous hot spots. To his work he brings faith and humility. He understands his life less as a profession and more as a calling. Truly one of radio’s greats!   March 8, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Allan Tibbels – The Staying Power of Focus Luke 21:19 Allan Tibbels does not have a particularly memorable job description title for the important work he does, so host Peter Marty gives him one – urban renewal enthusiast. Tibbels and his all-White family moved into a thoroughly African American neighborhood on Baltimore’s west side. There he embarked with others on an ambitious effort to reverse the run-down image of “Sandtown,” and to face the crime, poverty, and vacant housing problems head on. Tibbels literally rolled into Sandtown two decades ago on a wheelchair. His faith, courage, and resolve just keep on rolling.   March 1, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Don Johnson – Loneliness Luke 22:39-46 The Native American community is often lost from our immediate consciousness. Either relegated to an American past of unjust treatment or to an insignificant present in today’s population base, Native peoples are not well understood or recognized. Don Johnson has an insider’s vantage point that we need to hear. This chaplain to Native American communities is also executive director of the Lutheran Association of Missionaries and Pilots U.S. He joins the program to talk about many facets of life for Native peoples, including a spiritual loneliness. February February 22, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Christine Grumm – A Hard Look at Poverty for Women The Book of Ruth Christine Grumm is president and CEO of the Women's Funding Network, more than 130 organizations devoted to assisting women around the globe. She is a change agent who goes after critical areas of need from combating poverty to achieving advances in health care, education and human rights. Host Peter Marty talks with Christine about the state of women in the world today, and why women bear the brunt of poverty in most nations.   February 15, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Terence Fretheim – God’s Forever Promises to Abraham Genesis 12:1-9 In a world fractured by religious wars, Abraham could be something of a unifying figure. He is central to the world’s three major religions, a defining player in Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Twelve million Jews, at least 1 billion Muslims, and 2 billion Christians position the roots of their faith around his name. So who was Abraham? What exactly constituted his relationship with God? What were God’s promises to Abraham all about? Old Testament scholar Terry Fretheim is special guest on this edition of Grace Matters.   February 8, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Tom Stoner – Sacred Green Spaces Revelation 4:11 Tom Stoner and his wife Kitty do interesting work. They head up a foundation that commits dollars and energy to creating sacred green spaces. Many of these spaces take shape in urban landscapes where vacant lots get reclaimed, drug addicts get moved along, and plants, trees, and water replace concrete rubble. They are spiritually driven people who feel a priority in helping others center their lives in God. It’s quite a story of peace, hope, and civic commitment.   February 1, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Elizabeth Marquardt – Children and the Painful Consequences of Divorce Mark 10:2-12 It is not uncommon to hear divorced couples speaking admirably of their children’s resilience in coping with their own separate lives. Whether it is over confidence, guilt, or a desire to believe that one’s own kids are exceptional in this regard, we cannot know the different forces that guide parents to speak like this, but author Elizabeth Marquardt calls much of it “happy talk” – talk that denies the very painful consequences that go with every divorce. Host Peter Marty reflects on the spiritual side of this pain. January January 25, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Wayne Messmer – Finding Release From Hatred Revelation 21:5 Wayne Messmer has quite a story to tell. This professional singer and broadcaster was shot at point blank range in the throat one night during a bungled robbery attempt. His vocal cords survived, as did his life and spirit. Through an amazing act of courage and faith, Messmer later found his way to the prison where his assailant was doing time. What happened there is a testimony to the dissolution of hate when one understands life as a supreme gift of God.   January 18, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Catherine Wallace – The Perplexity of Choice Deuteronomy 30:19   Most people will admit that we live in an age when a barrage of choices keep assaulting our lives. Bombarded by choice, we are forced continually to reevaluate our identities. We repeatedly must remember or figure out exactly who we are. Living in this confounded way rarely feels good. It fragments and divides up our lives. Catherine Wallace, a social historian and free-lance writer, joins this edition of Grace Matters to wrestle with the perplexity of choice in our modern world.   January 11, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Jacob Needleman – Your Relationship With Money Matthew 6:19-21   It is a strange phenomenon to equate happiness with having money, especially since having more money (at least beyond a certain point) rarely makes people more happy. Jacob Needleman has a philosopher’s mind for thinking about the subject of money. Clearly, the pervasive inability among Americans to take money more seriously, and to talk about money with true honesty, distresses this San Francisco State University professor. Here is a program that gets to the heart of our relationship with money.   January 4, 2009 MP3 | RealPlayer Stream Ralston Deffenbaugh – A Refugee Named Jesus Exodus 23:9   Ralston (“Ralie”) Deffenbaugh knows his way around immigration issues. He is a first-rate lawyer who understands the intricacies of immigration law. But more importantly, for the past 17 years, he has been president of Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, a vantage point for getting inside the hopes and heartaches of refugees and immigrants around the world. In these times of contentious debate over how to handle immigration reform in America, Deffenbaugh has some wise and faith-inspired words to think about with special freshness about the subject.