Good Hard Story Podcast Katherine Wolf

Amy Julia was a high-achieving, religiously devout Princeton grad who lived with the nagging feeling that there must something *more* to life than what she had experienced so far. Then her first child was diagnosed with Down syndrome, and Amy Julia began her journey into a version of “the good life” that she never expected.

Amy Julia joins Katherine for a deeply vulnerable conversation about the theological reckoning that took place in her heart and mind when she became a parent to a child with intellectual disabilities. She emerged with a new understanding of God’s love and her own inherent value.

Today, eighteen years later, she's inviting us all to re-imagine what belonging and belovedness really looks like for people with AND without disabilities. 

What We’ll Cover:


How to determine if you’re settling for a lesser version of the good life


The one place in the Bible where we get an “equation” for God and what it means about how we see ourselves and other people


Why there are no such things as “special needs,” only human needs



https://amyjuliabecker.com/

https://www.instagram.com/amyjuliabecker/

Reimagining the Good Life Podcast: https://amyjuliabecker.com/podcast/

Hope Heals Camp: https://hopeheals.com/camp/

“The Blurring Is Part of the Beauty”: https://comment.org/the-blurring-is-part-of-the-beauty/

Andrew Leland: https://www.andrewleland.org/

Mend Coffee & Goods: https://www.mendcoffee.org/

“Faith means believing in advance what will only make sense in reverse.” - Philip Yancey 

Scriptures referenced in this episode:

 Luke 14:15-24

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Subscribe to The GoodHard Story Podcast!

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-hard-story-podcast/id1496882479

Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/0OYz6G9Q2tNNVOX9YSdmFb?si=043bd6b10a664beb

Want a little hope in your inbox?

⁠⁠Sign up for the Hope Note⁠⁠, our twice-a-month digest of only the good stuff, like reflections from Katherine and a curated digest of the Internet’s most redemptive content: https://hopeheals.com/hopenote

Are you ready to replace the “God, help me to have a good day tomorrow” bedtime prayer? Maybe for your kids…and maybe for yourself!

Today, Katherine is offering you a benediction fifteen years in the making. What started as a bedtime prayer for her sons has become her prayer for a generation of souls hoping to live their good/hard story well to the very end.

If you need fresh inspiration and real-talk motivation for your prayer life today, this episode is for YOU!

What We’ll Cover:


What we miss out on by seeing life as only good OR hard.


How we can become better, instead of bitter, from our suffering


The surprising ways that Jesus defined “blessedness” and what it means for our pain


The opportunity we have to reframe painful limitations as the places of ultimate freedom



Treasures in the Dark: 90 Reflections on Finding Bright Hope Hidden in the Hurting by Katherine Wolf: https://hopeheals.com/treasures

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” - C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory, and Other Addresses

This Is a Joyful Rebellion! by Brad Montague - https://youtu.be/Pp_gxJspWEI?si=K7Uf_qvq9EAXVY-e

My Benediction for The Good/Hard Life

May you see life as a good/hard story that God is writing.

May you open your hands to release old dreams and receive new ones.

May you find the miracle you’ve been looking for has been right in front of you all along.

May you accept the stunning capacity you have to endure because of Jesus, who endured for you.

May you live out the hardest parts of your story with a joyful rebellion against the darkness.

May you believe the boundary lines around your life are good and pleasant because God uniquely assigned them to you.

May your invisible wheelchairs become avenues to a new kind of freedom because of Jesus

Scriptures referenced in this episode:

Psalm 139:16

Isaiah 43:18-19

John 12:37

John 16:33

Deuteronomy 31:6 

Psalm 16:6

Philippians 4:13

Galatians 6:5 

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Subscribe to The GoodHard Story Podcast!

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-hard-story-podcast/id1496882479

Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/0OYz6G9Q2tNNVOX9YSdmFb?si=043bd6b10a664beb

Want a little hope in your inbox?

⁠⁠Sign up for the Hope Note⁠⁠, our twice-a-month digest of only the good stuff, like reflections from Katherine and a curated digest of the Internet’s most redemptive content: https://hopeheals.com/hopenote

Get to know us:

⁠⁠Hope Heals⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/

⁠⁠Hope Heals Camp⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/camp

⁠⁠Mend Coffee⁠⁠: https://www.mendcoffee.org/

Instagram⁠: https://www.instagram.com/hopeheals/

Raise your hand if, in the last week, you’ve answered the question “How are you?” with some version of “Good! Busy, but good! Just tired.”

In the kingdom of hustle, busyness is next to godliness. Rest is something to be earned. But in the kingdom of God, rest is an invitation from Jesus himself.

Today Katherine is joined by Jess Connolly to talk about why we’re all so tired of being tired and what on earth we can do about it. 

On this episode we’ll cover…


The four types of fatigue you could be experiencing without even realizing it


Why the Sabbath is evidence of God’s love for his kids


The surprising secret to dealing with exhaustion



If you need a starting place to form sustainable and transformative rhythms of rest, this episode is for you.

Social Caption:

Raise your hand if, in the last week, you’ve answered the question “How are you?” with some version of “Good! Busy, but good! Just tired.”

And, if I can be really honest, I kind of love giving that answer. I hate to admit it, but being tired feels like a status symbol.

In the kingdom of hustle, busyness is next to godliness. Rest is something to be earned. But in the kingdom of God, rest is an invitation from Jesus himself.

I recently sat at the feet of my friend and teacher Jess Connolly to understand why we’re all so tired of being tired and what on earth we can do about it. 

On the latest episode of #TheGoodHardStoryPodcast we’ll cover…


The four types of fatigue you could be experiencing without even realizing it


Why the Sabbath is evidence of God’s love for his kids


The surprising secret to dealing with exhaustion



If you need a starting place to form sustainable and transformative rhythms of rest, this episode is for you.

Listen wherever you get your podcasts or at hopeheals.com/podcast.

This week, Katherine is sharing why Resurrection Day has never meant more to her than it does now.

For most of us, “resurrection” means the one-time-only, past-tense miracle that proved Jesus was who he said he was. It was an experience specific to him.

But after surviving a catastrophic stroke, Katherine realized she really needed resurrection to apply to her. In a slow-motion miracle of her own, she experienced victory over death. It’s looked less like a rolled-away stone and more like being rolled away in a wheelchair. But even so, resurrection became personal and present-tense.

So what has she learned? Jesus’ resurrection wasn’t a one-time event. It was actually a first-time event that sparked a chain-reaction of resurrection through the rest of time. He set the staggered but certain rhythm of disappointment then delight, hard then good, wounding then healing, death then new life.

This week on The Good/Hard Story Podcast, we’re unpacking what resurrection has looked like in Katherine’s day-to-day and how you might experience it in your own way. And if now is NOT the time for new beginnings in your life, she has a word for you too.



Treasures in the Dark: 90 Reflections on Finding Bright Hope Hidden in the Hurting by Katherine Wolf: https://hopeheals.com/treasures

“Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” from The Country of Marriage by Wendell Berry

Mend Coffee & Goods: https://www.mendcoffee.org/

The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom

A Grace Disguised by Dr. Jerry Sittser

Joni by Joni Eareckson Tada

Hope Heals by Katherine and Jay Wolf: https://hopeheals.shop/collections/books-resources/products/hope-heals-signed-personalized

“The point of the resurrection…is that the present bodily life is not valueless just because it will die…What you do with your body in the present matters because God has a great future in store for it…What you do in the present—by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neighbor as yourself—will last into God’s future. These activities are not simply ways of making the present life a little less beastly, a little more bearable, until the day when we leave it behind altogether. They are part of what we may call building for God’s kingdom.” - N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope

Scriptures Referenced:

John 11:25

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Subscribe to The GoodHard Story Podcast!

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-hard-story-podcast/id1496882479

Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/0OYz6G9Q2tNNVOX9YSdmFb?si=043bd6b10a664beb

Want a little hope in your inbox?

⁠⁠Sign up for the Hope Note⁠⁠, our twice-a-month digest of only the good stuff, like reflections from Katherine and a curated digest of the Internet’s most redemptive content: https://hopeheals.com/hopenote

Get to know us:

⁠⁠Hope Heals⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/

⁠⁠Hope Heals Camp⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/camp

⁠⁠Mend Coffee⁠⁠: https://www.mendcoffee.org/

Instagram⁠: https://www.instagram.com/hopeheals/

Today Katherine is trying her best to keep her cool as she interviews her longtime hero Dr. Russell Moore, the editor in chief of Christianity Today. You don’t want to miss Dr. Moore’s fresh insights on some of our favorite themes, like dealing with unmet expectations and anticipating God’s future presence and provision in our stories.

If you’re looking for nuanced approaches to some weighty issues in Christian culture and in your personal relationship with God, this episode is for you.

What We’ll Cover:


Why being failed by our idols can actually be a grace


The virtues we can cultivate when we find ourselves in “the wilderness” of life


 How to maintain relationships with when your ideologies and opinions don’t align


Finding security within mystery



Listen wherever you get your podcasts or at hopeheals.com/podcast.

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Losing Our Religion: An Altar Call for Evangelical America by Russell Moore: https://a.co/d/htjNDnm



“A Christian is one who points at Christ and says, ‘I can't prove a thing, but there's something about his eyes and his voice. There's something about the way he carries his head, his hands, the way he carries his cross—the way he carries me.’” - Frederick Buechner

The Russell Moore Podcast: https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/podcasts/russell-moore-show/

Christianity Today: https://www.christianitytoday.com

Scriptures referenced in this episode:

Hebrews 6:19

Romans 5:3-5

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Want a little hope in your inbox?

⁠⁠Sign up for the Hope Note⁠⁠, our twice-a-month digest of only the good stuff, like reflections from Katherine and a curated digest of the Internet’s most redemptive content: https://hopeheals.com/hopenote

Be honest. Deep down, are you waiting for a happy ending before you feel permission to celebrate your life? In this solo episode, Katherine is sharing how she stopped waiting for closure and began practicing the spiritual discipline of “joyful rebellion” against fear and despair.

We want to share something that could change everything for you: It’s possible to celebrate the lives we *actually* have, rather than the lives we wish we had.

Because when we celebrate our here-and-now lives, we are taking radical ownership of the stories we’ve been given. We’re thanking God for another day in the land of the living. We’re acknowledging that He is with us in the messy middle.

Today on the podcast we’re talking…


What it looks like to celebrate and mourn at the same time


Katherine’s personal and practical recommendations for hosting your own “brokenness brunch” (which includes a very enthusiastic sidebar on frittatas!)


The life-changing magic of surrounding ourselves with a diversity of hard stories


Why we should NEVER “save the good stuff” for special occasions


How to take radical ownership of the story you’ve been given



If the hope of a happy ending is getting in the way of your healing, this episode is for YOU!

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Treasures in the Dark: 90 Reflections on Finding Bright Hope Hidden in the Hurting by Katherine Wolf: https://hopeheals.com/treasures

Adam Young’s research on the healing power of telling your story: https://adamyoungcounseling.com/2019/12/10/why-engaging-your-story-heals-your-brain/

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Subscribe to The GoodHard Story Podcast!

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/good-hard-story-podcast/id1496882479

Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/0OYz6G9Q2tNNVOX9YSdmFb?si=043bd6b10a664beb

Want a little hope in your inbox?

⁠⁠Sign up for the Hope Note⁠⁠, our twice-a-month digest of only the good stuff, like reflections from Katherine and a curated digest of the Internet’s most redemptive content: https://hopeheals.com/hopenote

Get to know us:

⁠⁠Hope Heals⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/

⁠⁠Hope Heals Camp⁠⁠: https://hopeheals.com/camp

⁠⁠Mend Coffee⁠⁠: https://www.mendcoffee.org/

Instagram⁠: https://www.instagram.com/hopeheals/