February 2025 Newsletter
“Hey, Hey Anybody Listening?” by Sonja Hinderlie
THANKS FOR 2024
We are very thankful to all of you who keep carrying our Forgivin’ Livin’ podcast ministry in your prayers and in your giving.
In 2024, we paid all our bills for the first time since we began our podcast ministry four years ago. Thanks to the new non-profit status, many of you were able to send in tax-deductible gifts for the first time. Your gifts covered all our operational costs. Thank you.
For 2025, we do need extra support for us to fulfill the outreach described next. Please consider a gift to help us bring freedom from resentment to people in America.
FREEING PEOPLE FROM RESENTMENT is our Luther mission in 2025
Martin and Katie Luther are going on the road this year. Their purpose is to help people experience the freedom that comes by receiving and giving absolution in the name of Jesus. When we are absolved for our sins, we feel the love of God for us. This love softens our hearts and helps us absolve(love) others as we have been absolved(loved). (John 12:12-13)
We are offering these Martin and Katie Luther presentations this year to dissolve the power resentment has over people. We want people to discover how to break free from any anger that is controlling their lives. Martin and Katie had plenty of resentment in their lives. They had to learn how to be forgiven and how to forgive.
This year, Johan and I are going to churches and communities around the country to help people get free from guilt, resentment and shame. We will use a “Table Talk” experience to do this.
The “Table Talk” begins with our usual drama around a table that might be at a lunch, a dinner or coffee. Afterward we will give people some practices from the Luther household that help them like using the ABC’s of Forgivin’ Livin.’ They will also be given other printed resources to take home to keep learning how to live in the freedom of forgiveness.
Our first “Table Talk” is scheduled for Carrington, ND. It’s Wednesday, February 26 at 11:30. We also have two planned in South Dakota over Palm Sunday. One on Saturday the 12th in Yankton and the other on Sunday the 13th in Freeman.
The only cost for these events is a $200 mileage fee. This is the same where ever your church may be. You would also be responsible for any food that you prepare for the event.
The reason the cost is so low is because of a grant that was given to Ground Up Grace, Inc last December. This covers the major cost of the expenses normally needed for these presentations. We still need additional donations for other expenses, resources, promotion and miscellaneous costs.
If you are interested in helping people in your church or town discover Luther’s solution for resentment, let us know. These “Table Talk” events are one way to free people from its power. The size of your group can be as small as 10 people.
But, please pray for this ministry. Pray for places where we will have a receptive audience. Pray for our words that we will speak. Pray for the resources that we will be handing out.
Resentments control so many people. We all need to say to those who have hurt us the words Joseph said to his brothers in Genesis 50:20: “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today.”
As our good friend Pastor Frank in Servant of the Shepherd Church in River Falls, WI has reminded us, “I can’t forgive in my strength. I need to ask God many times a day to give me the willingness to be willing to forgive.”
LENTEN ONLINE RESOURCE
March 5th is Ash Wednesday. This year we are creating an online resource that you can use to strengthen your daily meditation time with the “Daily Texts”. This resource will be downloaded by you so that you can either use them digitally or print them off to write out your reflections in a journaling fashion.
PROSTATE CANCER
Johan mentioned on the January 27th podcast that he has prostate cancer. He is doing research into his options with radiation, surgery and any other choices. There are different ways to address his problem. His cancer is serous enough that he has to do something to take care of it. The urologist that did the biopsy told him that there was no urgency for resolving his condition. He needs to do something by June 1. Thank you for your prayers.
MARTIN AND KATIE’S 500TH WEDDING ANNIVERSARY
This year is the 500th anniversary of the date of their wedding. We are taking a tour with 17 people to Wittenberg and other locations that shaped their faith and life. For those of you who have heard us present the story of their weddings, you know they had two ceremonies. The first one was private, and the second one a public event two weeks later. The humorous part of this is that Katie did not know when the first ceremony was planned until two hours prior to the event! Luther claims innocence as he wanted to protect them from any judgements. Katie claims he was being impulsive! In spite of these arguments, their willingness to make their lives and their marriage a landing strip for the gospel had a huge impact for Christians of their day. As our friends who studied the impact of wedded clergy have said, “when it’s warm in the pastor’s bed, it’s warm in the whole church.”
This special ANNIVERSARY tour leaves the day after Easter. In addition to the Luther celebrations, we will follow the path of the “Daily Texts” in bringing down East Germany in the Leipzig prayer movement of1989. We will learn how the “Daily Texts” shaped Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s faith and the Moravian Revival. We then travel to Prague for three nights where we will learn about Jan Hus’ role in the formation of Protestant Europe. You will hear podcast accounts of our discoveries as you travel with us each day overseas.
Yours under the grace of Jesus,
Sonja (and Johan)