Grace in 30

Tonight we continue military month on Grace in 30 with a focus on moms in the military and a special organization that helps provide housing to veterans who were disabled while serving our country.  Samantha Christopher served two tours of duty in Afghanistan at the same time as her future husband, Benjamin.  Both of them were injured in IED attacks and awarded Purple Hearts.  After returning home, marrying, and starting a family, they came across Purple Heart Homes as they searched for a place of their own.  The help that Purple Heart Homes provided to them made such an impact that Sam joined them as a Board member and is committed to the work of “veterans helping veterans.”  Sam joins us to talk about her experiences in Afghanistan, being a mom in the Marines, and her work with Purple Heart Homes. 

Rick Pina was the first US-born member of his Dominican Republic family.  He grew up in Brooklyn in the 1970s, a place characterized by poverty, drugs and violence, and he joined the Army partly to escape this environment.  In August of 1995, he heard the gospel in a military chapel in Kuwait and asked God to reveal His truth to him and save him – and his life changed forever.  Rick taught his first Bible study just five months after giving his life to Christ, preached his first sermon before the end of his Kuwait deployment, and has been preaching ever since including thousands of Web devotionals.  Rick’s identity as a man of God never wavered as he rose to become the Army’s first Chief Technology Officer (CTO).  Rick joins us to talk about how he unabashedly walked by faith throughout his 25-year military career and his post-retirement ministry with his wife, Isabella. 

Back in 1985, Stan Brock, the original “crocodile hunter,” founded Remote Area Medical (RAM) after suffering an injury in an isolated area of South America and also seeing the devastating impact that easy-to-treat illnesses and injuries can cause to people in hard-to-reach locations.  More than 30 years later, RAM has provided over $112M in free healthcare services to over 700,000 people around the globe.  Over time, RAM has increasingly focused on providing services in poor and rural areas of the United States, and today this work makes up more than 90% of their services.  Tonight we’re joined by Dr. Vicki Weiss, an Optometrist, serial volunteer, and President of the Board of Directors for RAM Virginia.  This year, RAM Virginia will run eight mobile clinics in locations of great need like Smyth, Warsaw, and Emporia Virginia, and they plan to expand to 12 clinics next year.  In 2016, 4,850 RAM volunteers provided free care to 5,134 Virginians valued at over $3M dollars.  Vicki joins us to talk about her experiences working with RAM and other volunteer groups, and some of the people she has served over the past 25+ years.

Can a church build an effective relationship with public schools – one based on mutual trust, serving the community, and satisfying the school’s needs?  Sharon Hoover joins us to talk about how her church, Centreville Presbyterian Church (CPC), has done just that with three Fairfax County public schools in their community.  Sharon discusses how CPC has come alongside these schools and worked with them to address a number of challenges including helping at-risk teens, supporting teachers, and even holding a prayer/support vigil in the face of tragedy.  Sharon also discusses her work with the Redbud Writer’s Guild (a collection of Christian women from North America and Canada who are working to influence faith and culture through writing and speaking) and her current and forthcoming books.

About 20 years ago, I (Ed) was adrift in my Christian faith.  I had stopped attending the legalistic church I had been part of for many years, I was chasing the big payday in the high-tech startup world, and I had recently become a father.  All the while, though, something kept gnawing at me, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.  As I wandered through Barnes and Noble, as I often did in those days, I kept passing a book entitled What’s So Amazing About Grace?  At first I thought, that’s a catchy title.  Then I started to think more and more deeply about the question until I finally said to myself, “What is so amazing about grace?!” So I purchased the book and read it, and it changed my life.  Today, we’re joined by Philip Yancey, the author of that book and 20 others (four written with Dr. Paul Brand), many of them award winning.  Philip’s most recent book is entitled Vanishing Grace, Whatever Happened to the Good News?  In it, he revisits the topic of grace noting that his original question has only grown more urgent in recent years.