Grace Runkle on Making Things With Her Dad

Every once in a while, someone sits on the 116 Life couch and says something that makes you set your phone down and just listen. Grace Runkle — better known as Grace Wrl — did that for the entire episode.

Hosts Ace Harris and Mia Evans welcomed the singer-songwriter for what was actually her first-ever podcast appearance, and what unfolded wasn’t your typical artist spotlight. It was a masterclass in what it looks like when someone young, gifted, and genuinely surrendered to the Lord simply opens their mouth and lets the overflow speak.

Rest as Resistance

Before a single song was discussed, Grace spent the first half of the episode unpacking something most creatives — and most believers, if we’re honest — struggle to embody: rest. Not the take-a-nap kind. The kind that comes from actually trusting God with the outcomes.

She drew a sharp line between hustle culture’s version of productivity and the life Christ actually invites us into. “The seasons where I felt most hurried and busy is when I’ve been trying to carry and strive for things on my own that God never even asked me to pick up,” she shared. And this wasn’t theory. Both Ace and Mia noted it — Grace doesn’t just talk about rest, she radiates it. The peace is tangible.

Her framework was simple but convicting: stress is often just worry wearing a productivity mask. When we fix our eyes on the Father instead of the chaos swirling around us, we enter his rest — and from that place, the work actually multiplies. She cited a quote from a friend named Peter that stuck with her: “I absolutely believe that obedience to Christ will take me further than my own ambition would ever take me.”

That’s the kind of line that rewires how you approach your Monday morning.

A Voice She Didn’t Know She Had

Grace’s origin story isn’t the typical “been singing since I was three” narrative. She grew up a military kid, moved 13 times before college, and carried a faith that was more transactional than transformational. She liked the culture of Christianity but was living in hidden sin behind closed doors. By her own admission, she didn’t love God — she just didn’t want to go to hell.

Everything shifted at the end of her freshman year at a Christian college when she had a genuine encounter with Jesus — what she described as a true death-to-life moment. She was set free, gave her life fully to the Lord, and felt the call into ministry without knowing what shape it would take.

The music part? That came later — and supernaturally. While interning at a church in Madison, Alabama, she was asked last-minute to lead a response worship song. She hadn’t sung in front of anyone in three years. When she opened her mouth to sing “Surrender” by Hillsong, she sang with a voice she’d never had before. She dropped to her knees. Everything else faded. It was just her and her Father.

Then a snowboard concussion — yes, really — sidelined her from screens and normal activity, and in that margin, she picked up a guitar, learned a few chords, and finished her first song. That track, “Captivated,” dropped in May 2024. By 2025, she’d released five to six songs, each pulling millions of streams. For context, Ace pointed out just how uncommon that trajectory is, even among the many artists who’ve come through Holy Culture Radio.

Making Things With Her Dad

Grace’s bio reads: I make things with my dad — the heavenly one. It’s not a tagline. It’s a theology of creativity.

She described the creative process like a child being handed different colored crayons by a loving father — drawing together, building together, the art bearing his image because he’s the one guiding her hand. That posture frees her from perfectionism and performance. It takes the pressure off. And it produces work that carries a different weight because it comes from a different source.

She’s also fiercely collaborative. Her friend and producer Wyatt has been central to shaping the sound — indie, textured, honest — on records like “Meet with You,” “Openhanded,” and “Grace.” Her content is largely built with friends who film, act, and edit alongside her because they believe in what she’s building. It’s scrappy, Spirit-led, and unapologetically excellent.

Set Apart, Not Separate

One of the most resonant threads in the conversation was Grace’s take on engaging culture with honesty rather than retreating from it behind polished church aesthetics. She didn’t come at it from a place of critique or church hurt. She came at it as a young woman who simply believes that people beholding Jesus should be producing the most beautiful, honest art in existence — and that too often, the name of Christ gets slapped onto things that lack the heart, the mission, and the intimacy that real art should carry.

Her call to the church was both gentle and unflinching: if the lost will encounter Christian music and content before they ever step into a building, that content needs to reflect the real Jesus — the one who sat with sinners, washed feet, and meets us in our mess. Not a sanitized version built for applause.

Grace closed the episode the way she opened it — with simplicity. People just need to know there’s grace for them. There’s freedom for the broken. It’s more simple than we make it.

And for a young artist carrying that message with this much clarity, the Church should be paying attention.

Follow Grace Runkle and stream her music on all platforms.

Related Radio Show: 116 Life