Listening In, hosted by WORLD's Warren Cole Smith, features extended conversations with newsmakers and thought leaders. “Our goal is to explore topics as thoughtfully as possible,” says WORLD's Chief Content Officer Nick Eicher.
The Listening In podcast is posted each Friday. Read edited transcripts of Warren’s interviews.
July 7th, 2017 - A conversation with Annie Dupree
This week, Warren Smith talks with Annie Dupree, the lead singer of the Annie Moses Band. The Annie Moses Band is made up of six brothers and sisters who are all classically educated and have top-drawer playing ability. The band is named for the great grandmother of the six siblings as a way to honor the musical and spiritual legacy she left the family. The family also runs the Fine Arts Summer Academy, which offers a variety of summer arts programs for young performers held on the campus of Lipscomb University in Nashville, TN.
June 30th, 2017 - A conversation with Jennifer Knapp
Today, a conversation with singer-songwriter and LGBT activist Jennifer Knapp. Knapp took contemporary Christian music by storm when she released her first album 'Kansas' in 1998. Two more albums followed in quick succession, but years of constant touring and increasing financial pressure from the music industry took a toll on her. She announced in 2002 that she was going to take a break from music, but previous commitments prevented her from going away until early 2004. Since then, she has been an outspoken LGBT activist and has continued to claim a Christian faith.
June 23rd, 2017 - A conversation with Ken Turner
Today, Bible scholar Ken Turner explains how not to read the Bible. Turner is a faculty member at Toccoa Falls College in Georgia and is a contributor to Zondervan's commentary series on the Old Testament. Turner says that the way many evangelicals read and interpret scripture often lead us not toward greater regard for the authority of Scripture, but toward a worldview in which the reader, not God, is put in charge of what His Word says and means.
June 16th, 2017 - A conversation with Ryan Messmore
Ryan Messmore is the author of the new book, "In Love: The Larger Story of Sex and Marriage." He is also the founding executive director of the Millis Institute, a liberal arts degree program forming students to think and love well, housed at Christian Heritage College in Brisbane, Australia.
June 9th, 2017 - A conversation with Pat Williams
Pat Williams is the senior vice president of the Orlando Magic. Williams began his sports career as a baseball player in the 1960s, but when he didn't advance past the minor leagues, he went into management, rising quickly to become general manager of the Spartanburg Phillies in 1967, where he was named the minor league Executive of the Year at age 27. But Williams is best known as an executive in the National Basketball Association. During his 12 years with the Philadelphia Seventy-Sixers, that team won the 1982-83 NBA championship and became a dominant team in the league. He was part of the investment team that started the Orlando Magic in the 1980s, and he's been there ever since, though he has also written nearly 100 books and is active as a public speaker.
May 26th, 2017 - A conversation with Alan Sears
Alan Sears is the founder and former president of Alliance Defending Freedom, which is the largest Christian religious liberty legal organization in the country. ADF came into being more than 20 years ago when the leaders of a number of leading Christian ministries decided that Christian and conservative causes needed a legal alternative to the American Civil Liberties Union. Late last year, Alan Sears announced that he would be stepping down from his post as president, to be succeeded by Michael Farris. Last weekend, The Colson Center for Christian Worldview gave Alan Sears its Wilberforce Award, recognizing a lifetime of commitment to the Christian worldview and cultural change.
May 19th, 2017 - A conversation with John Stonestreet
John Stonestreet is a familiar voice to most regular listeners of WORLD News Group's audio offerings as a regular Friday contributor to our sister program 'The World and Everything In It.' Stonestreet's new book ' co-written with Brett Kunkle ' is "A Practical Guide to Culture." The book discusses dozens of important cultural issues from a Christian worldview perspective. Stonestreet is also the co-author of "Making Sense of Your World," which is a guide to the Christian worldview.
May 12th, 2017 - Conversations with George Barna, Joni Eareckson Tada, and Lauren Green
Today, Warren Smith talks with George Barna, Joni Eareckson Tada, and Lauren Green. George Barna may be the most quoted and misquoted pollster in all of Christendom. He specializes in polling related to evangelicals, and a decade ago he set out to understand how many Americans, and how many born-again Christians, have a truly biblical worldview. Lauren Green currently serves as the chief religion correspondent for Fox News. She has covered virtually every major religion news story of the past two decades. Joni Eareckson Tada has become one of the truly inspirational leaders of the evangelical church. A diving accident when she was 17 has left her wheelchair bound for the past half-century, but ' with her likewise inspirational husband Ken Tada by her side ' she has built a large and effective ministry to the disabled.
May 5th, 2017 - A conversation with Barnabas Piper
Barnabas Piper was a regular contributor to the WORLD web-site for years and is also the son of the well-known pastor and occasional WORLD contributor John Piper. In fact, it was in his role as a 'PK,' or pastor's kid, that Barnabas Piper wrote his first book, "The Pastor's Kid: Finding Your Own Faith and Identity." Piper has gone on to have a robust writing and speaking career. His latest book is "The Curious Christian: How Discovering Wonder Enriches Every Part of Life." Piper lives and works for Lifeway Christian Resources in Nashville, Tennessee.
April 28th, 2017 - A conversation with Ken Ham
Ken Ham is the president of Answers in Genesis, an organization that operates the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter, two well-known attractions in Kentucky. Ham is perhaps the country's best-known apologist for the idea that the universe is approximately 6,000 years old. In part because of his strong following in the fundamentalist and homeschool community, Ham has been the target of both favorable and unfavorable media attention. Ham has criticized other evangelical Christians who have a high view of biblical authority but who disagree with him on the belief that creation took place over six 24-hour days.
April 21st, 2017 - A conversation with David Limbaugh and Jerry Johnson
Today, Warren Smith talks with author and Christian apologist David Limbaugh and the president of National Religious Broadcasters Jerry Johnson. Since his conversion to Christianity in his mid-30s, David Limbaugh has become passionate about Christian apologetics as well as a best-selling author and conservative commentator. Dr. Jerry A. Johnson is the President and CEO of the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB), which is an international association of Christian communicators whose member organizations reach millions of viewers, listeners, and readers worldwide. Jerry Johnson previously served as President of Criswell College in Dallas, Texas. He also spent 14 years in various roles at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary.
April 14th, 2017 - A conversation with Mindy Belz
Today, Warren Smith talks with Mindy Belz ' the senior editor for WORLD Magazine ' about her book "They Say We Are Infidels," which tells the story of everyday Christians in the Middle East. These Christians, due to extraordinary circumstances, have been thrust into the role of heroes and martyrs. It is also in part Mindy Belz's own story of growing as a journalist, as a believer herself, and as a fellow traveler with many of these modern-day heroes of the faith.
April 7th, 2017 - A conversation with Lee and Leslie Strobel
Today, Warren Smith talks with Lee and Leslie Strobel about a new movie about their conversion. Lee Strobel is one of the country's best-known Christian apologists and his books, including The Case For Christ, have sold more than 10-million copies. Lee Strobel began his career as a journalist. After receiving a journalism degree from the University of Missouri and a Master of Studies in Law degree from Yale Law School, he worked for The Chicago Tribune and other papers for 14 years. Lee's wife Leslie became a Christian, and that sent Lee on a journey to use his journalistic skills to expose Christianity as a fraud. But his investigation convinced him that Christianity is true, and he also became a Christian.
March 31st, 2017 - Conversations with Dr. Kent Brantly and Arthur Rasco
In this episode, Warren Smith talks with Samaritan's Purse staff members who helped produce the new movie, "Facing Darkness," the story of the 2014 Ebola Outbreak in Liberia. We'll hear from Samaritan's Purse President Franklin Graham; Dr. Kent Brantly, who got desperately ill from the disease; and Arthur Rasco, the director of the documentary.
March 24th, 2017 - A conversation with Kara Tippetts
Today, on the two-year anniversary of the death of Kara Tippetts, we look back on a conversation Warren Smith had with her just months before she died. Kara and her husband Jason had four beautiful children and a thriving new church that Jason started and serves as pastor. But soon after moving to Colorado Springs to start that church, Kara discovered she had breast cancer. Despite aggressive treatment, cancer spread throughout her body. Kara described herself as a terrible sick person. She hated being sick, so it might have been easy for her to retreat into self-pity. Instead, she started blogging about her experiences with a remarkable transparency that immediately won her readers. A publisher discovered the blog, and the result is her first book "The Hardest Peace: Expecting Grace in The Midst of Life's Hard."
March 3rd, 2017 - A conversation with Michael Farris
Michael Farris is a founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) and Patrick Henry College. He ran for Lt. Governor of Virginia in the 1990s and was narrowly defeated in a race that received national attention. He has been a key leader in the conservative movement for more than three decades. Earlier this year, the nation's largest conservative legal defense organization, Alliance Defending Freedom, named Farris its CEO and General Counsel, succeeding its longtime president and founder Alan Sears.
February 24th, 2017 - A conversation with Colin Pinkney
Colin Pinkney runs The Harvest Center, a Christ-centered ministry that takes no government money and cares for thousands of homeless and working poor people in the city of Charlotte, North Carolina. The Harvest Center began more than 30 years ago in the number one violent crime neighborhood in Charlotte. The center began as a feeding ministry to the community and throughout the 90's and early 2000's evolved into an organization that provided hot meals, clothing, groceries, transitional housing, and after-school programs. In 2011, The Harvest Center began offering job readiness and life skills classes to assist adults with making the transition to self-sufficiency, beginning a transitional housing program which serves 20 to 30 families a year, and counseling, job skills training, meals, and other services to as many as 4000 people in a year.
February 17th, 2017 - Conversations with Jim Daly, Alan Carlson, and Steven Mosher
In this episode, Warren Smith talks about population, demographics, and abortion. His guests this week are Jim Daly of Focus on the Family, Alan Carlson, whose new book discusses how families are on the verge of a rebound, and Steven Mosher of the Population Research Institute.
February 10th, 2017 - A conversation with Mark Hancock
Mark Hancock is the CEO of Trail Life USA, a Christian alternative to the Boy Scouts. When it became obvious that the Boy Scouts of America was going to bow to the pressure of gay activists, Florida attorney John Stemberger helped organize Trail Life USA in 2013. In January of 2014 Stemberger officially incorporated Trail Life USA and hired Mark Hancock to be the group's first Chief Executive Officer. Under Mark Hancock's leadership, Trail Life has grown from startup to nearly 30,000 members in just the past three years.
January 27th, 2017 - A conversation with David Chadwick
David Chadwick has been pastor of Forest Hill Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, since 1980. Under his leadership it has grown from a small church that was part of the mainline Presbyterian denomination to a multisite mega-church with more than 6000 members. But for all that success, Chadwick has remained deeply connected to the Charlotte community, and ' unlike other megachurch pastors who have tended to moderate their position on controversial moral issues ' Chadwick has remained actively engaged in the public square. He was one of the few pastors who stood up for biblical morality in the recent debate on North Carolina's controversial HB 2 law, a law that protected women and children by requiring men to use the bathroom and locker room consistent with their biology.
January 20th, 2017 - A conversation Chad Lawson
If you are a fan of classical music, you may already know the music of jazz and classical musician Chad Lawson. His latest release, The Chopin Variations, reached #1 on the Billboard, iTunes, and Amazon classical charts in 2015. But Lawson's body of work cannot be contained in a single genre. His jazz recordings have developed a passionate and growing following. Chad Lawson is also a committed Christian who until recently also played piano in a large church in Charlotte, N.C. Though he is no longer a church musician, he believes that when he sits down at the piano, what he does there is an act of worship.
January 13th, 2017 - Conversations with Kristan Hawkins, Tina Whittington, and Emily Buchanan
Today, Warren Smith speaks with young women who are becoming important new voices in the pro-life movement, including Kristan Hawkins and Tina Whittington with Students for Life of America, and Emily Buchanan with the Susan B. Anthony List.
January 6th, 2017 - A conversation with Don Sweeting and Jeff Hunt
In this episode, Warren Smith speaks with two key leaders at Colorado Christian University, Don Sweeting, the president at Colorado Christian University and is a long-tenured veteran in Christian higher education leadership, and Jeff Hunt, who is the director of Colorado Christian University's think tank The Centennial Institute.
December 30th, 2016 - A conversation with Tony Marciano
Tony Marciano is the executive director of Charlotte Rescue Mission, a Christ-centered addiction recovery ministry located in the center of Charlotte, North Carolina. Charlotte Rescue Mission is a part of the Association of Gospel Rescue Missions, a network of 300 similar organizations in cities all across America that are intentionally Christ-centered.
December 22nd, 2016 - A conversation with Larry Alex Taunton
Larry Alex Taunton is a Christian apologist who struck up an unlikely friendship with atheist Christopher Hitchens in the last years of Hitchens' life. Taunton debated Hitchens, studied scripture with Hitchens, and even went on two road trips with Hitchens. Taunton's new book, "The Faith of Christopher Hitchens: The Restless Soul of the World's Most Notorious Atheist," is a moving account of Hitchens and their friendship. Taunton's book has been named by The Gospel Coalition as its book of the year.
December 16th, 2016 - A conversation with Les Sillars
Today, Warren Smith talks with journalist Les Sillars about his new book "Intended for Evil: A Survivor's Story of Love, Faith, and Courage in the Cambodian Killing Fields." Regular readers of WORLD Magazine probably already know Les Sillars' name. Over the years, he has written many stories for the magazine while he has pursued a career as a professor of journalism at Patrick Henry College in northern Virginia. In "Intended for Evil," Sillars tells the story of Radha Manickam, who became a Christian as a young man in his native Cambodia. When Khmer Rouge forces overtook Phnom Pehn in 1975, Radha became an eyewitness to one of the great horrors of the 20th century. More than 1.7-million Cambodians, including most of Radha's own family, died of starvation, disease, and mass murder in what came to be called The Killing Fields of Cambodia.
December 9th, 2016 - Conversations with Daniel Hannon, Steve Moore, and Tony Perkins
Today, Warren Smith speaks with Trump advisor Steve Moore, Daniel Hannon, a member of the British Parliament, and Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council. Daniel Hannan is a British politician, journalist, and author who is a Member of the British Parliament, where he has served since 1999.Steve Moore founded and served as president of the of the influential conservative group Club for Growth from 1999 to 2004. Moore currently serves as Distinguished Visiting Fellow at The Heritage Foundation. For the past few months, he has been serving as a senior economic advisor to Donald Trump.Tony Perkins is the president of the Family Research Council, and earlier in his career he held elected office himself, serving in the Louisiana legislature.
December 2nd, 2016 - Conversations with Darrell Bock and Dr. Brian Fikkert
In today's episode, Warren Smith speaks with Darrell Bock and Brian Fikkert.Darrell Bock is a professor of New Testament studies at Dallas Theological Seminary and has become one of the best known theologians in the nation. His work crossed over into pop culture when he wrote a book called Breaking The Da Vinci Code, a theological and historical response to the best-selling book and blockbuster movie The Da Vinci Code. Dr. Brian Fikkert is a Professor of Economics and Community Development and the Founder and President of the Chalmers Center for Economic Development at Covenant College. Fikkert earned a Ph.D. in economics from Yale, specializing in international economics and economic development. He is coauthor ' with Steve Corbett ' of the best-selling book "When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor...and Yourself."
November 25th, 2016 - A conversation with Andrew Peterson and Keith Getty
In this episode, Warren Smith talks about Christmas music with singer-songwriters Andrew Peterson and Keith Getty. Keith Getty and his wife Kristyn have become fixtures in Christian music over the past decade. For the past few years, they've done an annual Christmas tour. This year they're calling it "Irish Christmas: A Celebration of Carols." Stops this year include The Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, and Carnegie Hall in New York.For the past 15 years Andrew Peterson and a circle of musical collaborators have toured the country with a Christmas show called "Behold The Lamb of God." The program tells not just the Christmas story, the coming of the baby Jesus, but rather the full arc of the coming and ultimate second coming of the Messiah. This year, the tour makes stops in Houston, Birmingham, Orlando, Washington, and Nashville, at the historic Ryman Auditorium.
November 18th, 2016 - A conversation with Bill Walton
Bill Walton is the president of the venture capital firm Rappahannock Ventures. This year, he was called on to help lead the transition team for President-Elect Donald Trump. Walton's role will be to vette potential staffers who might serve in the economic arena of the Trump Administration.For 12 years Walton was chairman of Allied Capital Corporation an investment banking firm that traded on the New York Stock Exchange and managed companies worth more than $12 billion, employing more than 20,000 people. After negotiating the sale of Allied Capital, he opened his own firm, Rappahannock Ventures, which invests in companies that he believes is doing social good, including technology and entertainment companies. Walton is also on the board of a number of conservative groups, including the American Enterprise Institute and the Media Research Center.
November 11th, 2016 - A conversation with Anthony Bradley
Dr. Anthony B. Bradley is an author, professor, and public intellectual whose provocative and compelling views have made him a highly sought after lecturer, TV commentator, and cultural Critic. Bradley is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at The King's College in New York City, where he also serves as Director of The Center for the Study of Human Flourishing and Chair of the Religious and Theological Studies program. Anthony Bradley is also a Research Fellow at The Acton Institute.