Bleeding Daylight

Michael Dittman builds telescopes for NASA by day and has spent the last nine years processing a decade of chronic pain, a shattered family and his daughter’s four overdoses into a story of hard-won redemption. In this conversation he talks candidly about the gap between knowing the right theological answers and actually experiencing the delight of an intimate relationship with Jesus, tracing how thirty years of striving, shame and unexplained physical suffering eventually gave way to a single, transformative encounter at a men’s retreat: hearing Jesus say ”I know, me too.” From infertility and inflammatory arthritis to his daughter’s descent into addiction and two painful church experiences, Michael doesn’t shy away from the mess. He explains how a small, untrained house church taught him more about genuine transformation than forty years in churches with gifted preachers ever did, and shares the framework he now teaches through Grace Forge, the ministry he and his wife Karen have built around the idea that God has already forged the grace we need. His new book, In the Wake of Jesus: Grace That Changes You and the World, unpacks it all.

Jason Tatlock grew up as a pastor’s kid before spending thirteen years in academia, eventually earning a PhD studying ancient Israel. Alongside his wife Krista, he now co-leads King on a Hill Ministries, shepherding pastors across India, Uganda, Pakistan and Kenya, and has recently released a new devotional called With. In this conversation, Jason talks about how his scholarly love of the ancient world and biblical languages deepened his understanding of faith, and how a season of debilitating anxiety reshaped the way he now ministers to others. Jason shares confronting, moving stories from the field, including brick workers trapped in debt servitude in Pakistan and pastors in India facing real persecution for their faith. He unpacks the Hebrew meaning of hope, the compassion ministry Katharos, and why genuine Christian community matters more than we often realise, especially before the storms of life arrive. It’s a rich, honest conversation about scholarship, suffering and the hope that carries us through both.

Dr David Pendergrass is a pastor, biblical scholar and pastoral counsellor with a PhD in historical theology, and in this episode he talks with Rodney Olsen with striking honesty about the doubt that has shaped nearly 30 years of ministry. David shares the story of his dramatic call to ministry as a teenager, then walks through the two seasons in his life when he walked away from faith intellectually, driven by a deep fear of being ”duped” by something that simply wasn’t true. He explains how he worked through that doubt by seeking out trusted mentors, reading widely, and eventually writing his own book. The conversation moves beyond David’s personal story into the bigger questions facing the church today: why so many people quietly deconstruct their faith rather than work through their doubts, why so few pastors have the theological training to sit with hard questions, and why David believes the true test of any gospel message is whether it would still hold up for believers suffering under persecution overseas. He also offers practical, compassionate steps for anyone currently wrestling with their own doubts, and a challenge to church leaders to be more honest about what they don’t know.

Brett Knight has spent his career standing in the space between justice and grace. A former criminal defence attorney who later became an ordained pastor and author, Brett has watched the drug epidemic up close from both sides of the courtroom. In this conversation with Rodney Olsen, he traces his own faith journey from head knowledge to a genuine relationship with Christ, and shares the pivotal moment as a prosecutor when he asked God to let him see addiction the way God sees it. Brett’s book, From the Gavel to Grace, grew out of hundreds of real encounters with people trapped in addiction, and the families desperate for answers. In this episode he unpacks the true meaning of tough love, the boundaries that protect without abandoning, the reasons churches often struggle to welcome people in recovery, and the ”sin snobbery” that keeps many of us from extending the grace we’ve received ourselves. Alongside stories of heartbreaking loss, Brett offers real accounts of restoration that continue to fuel his conviction that no one is beyond reach.

Michelle Konson built what looked like a picture-perfect life: a career as a corporate attorney in South Africa, a loving marriage, and four children. But underneath the surface, she was quietly unravelling, using survival strategies she’d developed as a child to try to control a world that no longer responded to control. In this honest conversation, Michelle traces her path from unrecognised childhood patterns to a genuine reckoning with her story, and shares how that journey eventually led her into trauma-informed training, group therapy, and years of untangling the fragments of her own past. Michelle now helps others do the same through her journal, Untangling Your Story, a tool designed to bridge the gap between everyday struggle and formal counselling. In this episode, she talks candidly about the role of community and empathetic listeners in healing, why digging up the past isn’t about blaming those who hurt us, and how her Christian faith has shaped her understanding of forgiveness, grace and self-compassion. It’s a conversation about patterns, permission, and the freedom that comes from finally telling ourselves the truer version of our story.