Ep. 335 Natalie Runion Returns - Breaking the Lies that Hold Women Back in the Church

Natalie Runion returns to Shifting Culture with her new book I Don’t Even Like Women: And Other Lies That Get in the Way of Sacred Sisterhood. Behind the provocative title is a deeper story: how the church has too often handed women scripts of competition, gossip, and scarcity and how those scripts can be rewritten into something truer and freer. In this conversation, we talk about identity, trust, and the work of forgiveness. We explore what women’s ministry has been, and what it could become when collaboration replaces competition, when community is rooted in abundance, and when Jesus’ vision of sacred sisterhood begins to take hold. This isn’t just about women’s ministry. It’s about how all of us, men and women, learn to build communities that dignify rather than diminish.

Natalie Runion is the USA Today bestselling author of Raised to Stay and The House That Jesus Built, as well as the creator of the Raised to Stay Community (@raisedtostay). She lives in Kentucky with her husband, Tony, and their two daughters, where they work together to provide training to leaders in pursuit of a healthy church.

Natalie's Book:

I Don't Even Like Women

Natalie's Recommendations:

Becoming the Pastor's Wife

Crushing Chaos

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Transcript

Natalie Runion: 0:00

The words of Jesus tell us our identity. We find out who we are as daughters by being in the presence of God, being in the word worshiping, being in biblical community where people speak to us, not necessarily where we are, but who we're becoming. And those scripts are slowly rewritten as we put ourselves in the presence of God and in the presence of people who have been with Jesus.

Joshua Johnson: 0:36

Hello and welcome to the shifting culture podcast in which we have conversations about the culture we create and the impact we could make. We long to see the body of Christ look like Jesus. I'm your host. Joshua Johnson, I am so excited to have Natalie Runyon back on the podcast. Her new book carries the disarming, almost tongue in cheek title. I don't even like women and other lies that get in the way of sacred sisterhood, but beneath that humor is something serious. It's about the stories women are told by churches, by culture, by each other, and how those scripts shape identity, belonging and even faith itself. What I really find compelling about Natalie's work is the way it pulls together multiple threads. She's talking about women's ministry, but she's also talking about something larger, how communities form, how trust is broken, how gossip corrodes and how forgiveness can remake us. In her telling women's ministry becomes a kind of case study for the bigger cultural problem of scarcity versus abundance, whether we live as though there's only one seat at the table, or whether the kingdom of God really is as expansive as Jesus says it is, this conversation sits in that tension. We talk about the damage that's been done, but also the possibility of healing. We explore the work of rewriting old scripts into something truer, more freeing, and we ask what sacred sisterhood could look like if women and men chose collaboration over competition, hope over cynicism, abundance over scarcity. So this isn't just about women's ministry. It's about the way we all build communities that either diminish or dignify one another, and it's about what it means to believe Jesus when He says there is enough. So join us. Here is my conversation with Natalie. Runyon, Natalie, welcome back to shifting culture. Thank you for joining me again.

Natalie Runion: 2:20

It is so good to be back with you. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to dig into

Joshua Johnson: 2:24

I don't even like women. It's a hilarious title. It's it's funny. It comes from a story where you were called into leading women's ministry. Just take me into that. Why? Why this book? Why this title? And what are you trying to say here? You

Natalie Runion: 2:40

know, I had been in worship ministry for 20 plus years. It had been my gateway back into ministry, and my family and I had just moved about 1000 miles away for me to be a worship pastor at this very large and successful worship church. And about a year into that assignment, I got pulled into my boss's office and he said, you know, we think you're a great worship leader, but we think you have a teaching gift, and we would like for you to move into the women's pastor role. And it felt just like the rug got pulled out from under me, because first of all, I went to be a worship leader. That's all I had really known how to do in the church. And I said to my boss in that moment, out of sheer emotion, like, why would you guys do this to me? I don't even like women. This isn't even like a calling on my life. And really what was interesting about that is I would spend five years with those incredible women at that church, and it's now been something that as I travel and I lead for women's conferences and things like that. I'll ask the women's pastors or the pastor's wife, how did you get into this? And nine times out of 10 they say those exact words, I don't know. I don't even like women.

Joshua Johnson: 3:50

And so it is a constant refrain that you're hearing over and over again. What do you think it is? What do you think that is happening within the church and women,

Natalie Runion: 4:01

I think there's two things. I think the first of all, if we address the church complication, it's that women's ministry has been done poorly. I would say, since I was a little girl, I can remember being with my mom, who's a pastor's wife, and they would have teas on Saturday morning, they would do foot washing services, where women kept their pantyhose on like it was weird stuff, where especially teenage girls or single women or working women, everything was sort of catered to the stay at home mom or the Christian woman. And it wasn't a safe place to bring your non Christian friends. There wasn't a lot of theology, it was a lot of almost like country club type setting. And then we have the conversation of, why is this such a thing for women in the world? Well, I think we've been having scripts written over us, from Hollywood to just our culture alone that has been telling us who we are and how we should behave. That impacts our identity and how we see each other honestly.

Joshua Johnson: 5:04

So what kind of the scripts that women are starting to believe that they have taken into their lives, they've made it part of their identity, that they have been fed these scripts? What are some of the scripts that they've been fed?

Natalie Runion: 5:18

I think some of the negative ones, and I named those in each chapter, is things like women are so emotional, like women are made to feel guilty for emoting, through empathy, through sympathy, through anger. We're kind of taught to be that proverbs 31 woman, which we can talk about later, but we're taught to be quiet, to control ourselves, and if we can't do that, then we're not being submissive, you know. And all of those things that Christian culture has sort of told women, I think, from a not just a Christian perspective, but also just women in general, we've been told we're too dramatic, that we're gossips, that we're Catty, that we're competitive. And you hear these things since you're a little girl on the playground, things like, Well, you can't play with us, you don't look like us, or you can't sit with us at recess. And unfortunately, those scripts that have been written over us, I'm not pretty enough, I'm not talented enough, I'm not athletic enough, those transfer into adulthood if they're not dealt with in our early 20s and 30s. So that mean girls become mean women, and that's just our reality.

Joshua Johnson: 6:24

I think that's that's something that we have to do a much better job in the church, hands, in culture, and especially when, when women hit adolescence, that's the as the time where they're starting to receive scripts. The the shift into adolescence is when they they come into a place where it doesn't seem like there's their mental health shifts a little bit. They're not free to be who they actually are because they're starting to believe these these things. What do you think needs to happen? How do we help not reinforce these scripts over and over again, even especially when we're we're raising girls like I would like to, I'd like to stop this before it becomes a huge problem, and we have to reverse it and do all the work that you're trying to do to actually help women come back together and learn a better script.

Natalie Runion: 7:18

Trust Me, I'm raising teenage girls right now, and it's taking everything in my power to not transfer those scripts of my life being a 90s girl who was in purity culture, also in the anorexic and bulimic and bulimic culture, the heroin chic model phase, you know, how do I not project onto my teenage daughters the scripts that were written for me by Hollywood, by the fashion industry and even by the church, with the purity culture movement to not shame my daughters on the other spectrum of things. And so it has been really my husband and I sitting down and being like, how do we rewrite these scripts? And the only way to do it is through knowing the Word of God and speaking the Word of God over our kids, and not just our kids, but any child who comes through our door to have those scripts that are negative rephrased into biblical scripture conversation, which they may not know that we're using the Bible. But when kids come through my house, my daughter's friends, I am always saying things like, you are welcome here. You are so talented. You are so gifted at this. We're so glad you're here and just making sure that if any negative script is being spoken over them in their schools, teams at their home, that our house is a place where those scripts are being rewritten.

Joshua Johnson: 8:34

That's helpful, that it's not just your kids, that's it's their friends, that they see it when they're coming over that they see like, Oh, my mom, my dad. They're consistent like this. This is real. It's not just, you know, a false thing that they just want to pour into me, but as for my friends and everybody, and hopefully that starts to shift something in them. And I know you're to reinforce truth and to reinforce who people truly are and their identity. It's going to take a lot of work, right? It's going to take over and over, especially that, you know, when I hear one negative thing from somebody, I think about that more than any of the positive things that people say about me over and over again. And and I think that's part of what's happening in the church, too. I think one of the big things that is a problem, I think, is gossip and women and men, of course, but we're talking about each other in a negative light. And if women's ministry has become a country club, it starts to foster a place of gossip. What's going on there? Why is gossip happening? Why is this a script that we believe that we're Gossip Girls, or you're cost of girls, like, what's going on?

Natalie Runion: 9:53

Well, you know, obviously in in James, I mean, James addresses it like, basically, like your words are going. To produce life and death, and it's like guiding a horse with the bit in its mouth. Like our words are going to create tension, it's going to create either a place of something to live and breathe or something that is going to die. And I mean, our words are capable of giving life or literally tearing someone down. And I think that as Christians, we've gotten around this in women's ministry by posing our gossip as prayer requests or as this is just general information that I think everyone should know for the better of our church and we we basically package it in something super spiritual when really it's still the gross thing James is talking about. And what happens then is, in we become an unsafe sanctuary of sisterhood. And when people saw my title, you know, and other lies that we believe that get in the way of sacred sisterhood, they're like, what does that word sacred mean? Like? And it's not hocus pocus. It's saying that if something is sacred, it's set apart. Our sanctuaries are to be set apart. And when women come into our sanctuaries, which could be our homes, it could be our women's groups, it could be a small group. It should be the safest place in the world for them. And when they share about a prodigal or a child who's on drugs or a marriage that isn't going well, or a job loss, and then they hear that is being spoken about in other areas outside of that sacred sanctuary that is where there is a breach of trust. And a lot of times, women will never step foot, not only back into that event or that women's event or group, but back into a church and so gossip, I believe I kind of came up with my own definition. Is really the ego demanding to be heard when it has nothing of value to say. And I think as Christian women, there is a lot of stuff we can be talking about that is not each other, and we're wasting a lot of precious time and losing a lot of precious souls in our gossip. How

Joshua Johnson: 11:57

do we build something better? So if you're thinking about something where, hey, you're bringing women into a space. It's supposed to be a set apart, sacred. There's some trust building that has happened, and then gossip breaks that trust. They don't want to set foot in there again. How do we build better spaces for women? What does this start to look like? How is there true vulnerability, trust, accountability and love and supports within spaces for women in the church,

Natalie Runion: 12:29

I was asking myself all those same questions at 40 years old, when I'm handed eight congregations of women to come together to have this women's ministry, and you know, I, I wasn't a sorority girl, so you know, I wasn't like a large group of women's kind of a girl, but I had noticed some of these trends that were popping up from Old Guard leadership. And I thought we have this rare opportunity, you know, transition is a great time for reflection, to really reframe what women's ministry biblically should look like. And what I decided was that we would get away from this model of it being a free for all that anybody can have a small group, anybody can lead any study they want. It can be done anywhere, and we brought all of the women under one roof for an entire year of leadership training on learning how to have hard and holy conversations under the watchful eye of pastors and leaders who loved them, cared for them and would train them on how to cut people off if gossip started in a conversation, or would train them how to lead. Well, we actually did. Pete scazza, entire, Emotionally Healthy Spirituality, emotionally healthy relationships. We spent three full years rewriting the script of women's ministry where I was, and it took every bit of those three years to reframe what a women's ministry should look like. And basically, what does it look like? It looks like every woman serving the people of God with the heart of Jesus and making sure that the priority is care, Scripture and love. And it was wild to watch it, because what happened was pastors ended up not having to be the first call when there was a baby born or a spouse that we had lost. Those women, the people of God, caring for the people of God. I watched it with my own eyes, and was there still gossip? I'm sure there was. But what we did is we held it accountable. When we heard about it, we dealt with it. We held meetings. We did not let it get past us once we knew about it. And I think for women, standing up to women is terrifying, but we held women to a standard, and I think that that is something that even in our neighborhoods, with our neighbors, with our kids, friends, with our play date friends, we can all say it stops with me. I'm not listening to this, I'm not participating in this, but that takes pretty much a solid resolve in our spirits to say, I'm going to be that person

Joshua Johnson: 14:48

that's so good. We're having conversations like that in our church. You know, as we're we have home churches around so we're bringing our home church leaders back in this fall, we're going to start to go through emotionally healthy. Spirituality. We're gonna we're we're bringing people back in to make sure that these they know what they're doing, they're as they're facilitating conversations in their homes. I think that's what you just said. I think it's wonderful. Why? Because now what you're you're building, you're building shepherds for for women to actually, that are trained, that know how to have good, solid conversations, know how to facilitate those, know where to go, what to do. I mean, that is so huge. It's not a free for all. That's a that's a big, big thing. And what I love about that is that you are enabling women in women's ministry to be the church, to not just be some ancillary thing on the side of the church, but actually be the church where they're at. How can women start to believe that they are the church, that they have a space where they can be with others as the body of Christ.

Natalie Runion: 16:06

It's challenging, especially with how churches have defined what women can and cannot do. And I feel like some women feel immobilized, like, well, I can't have the title pastor, so therefore I can't Shepherd anyone. And that's not true when we as individual Ecclesias say I love God and I love people, and I have a pasture around me, whether that pasture is your playgroup, your job, your church, whatever that looks like, God has entrusted sheep to you, and it might look like your single neighbor next door. It might look like a teacher or the Starbucks barista, but God has placed sheep in front of you who need to hear his name, who need to know that they're validated, that they're beautiful, that they're wanted. And I think we have said, well, I can only do ministry if I have this title, and I'm in a church, and we have to remember women like from the very beginning, God created us to be different from men. He created us to worship. He created us to have a have a role, a name, a place and an assignment. And I think we've boxed ourselves in based off of what people have said we can and cannot do when God says that we are to go and make disciples and to love Him and to love people and that right there we can do everywhere we are.

Joshua Johnson: 17:21

I want to swerve a little bit back into your story of hearing you're going to be in women's ministry, but when they said, We think you have a teaching gift, and I think it's it's been born out throughout now your life and what you're doing and what you have done since then, the teaching gift is real. It's there you have it, and you could, you could teach well. So in those moments where I think, because women are going to have moments like this a lot, in those moments where you think it's going to be one thing, it's going to be worship leading, but then it swerves into something else. How do we deal with those moments where God might be moving us into a space where he wants to, you know, use, use us for something, for His glory, when we think it's one way, but God says, No, it's going to be another. How do we deal with those moments.

Natalie Runion: 18:21

Well, I'll be honest, I went kicking and screaming. There was no like, there was no gentle exit for me, and I'm grateful that the Lord, you know, he did have to pry worship from my cold, dead hands. And I hate to admit that, because I really had hoped at 40 that I would be a more surrendered woman. But I think my identity was so wrapped up in worship leadership that the Lord saw that as something that was almost a kryptonite, that if I believed I could only do one thing for the kingdom, then I would be stunted in my spiritual growth, in my relationship with him and my love for His church, and he really had to over the course of that five year span, and still working on me in this is reminding me that we as God's kids, are not one trick ponies, and for a lot of women, we do get pigeonholed into roles at the church that we didn't sign up for, such as administration, kids ministry, women's ministry, because it feels safe for our male brother. You know our brothers to say this feels like a women centric role, and so a lot of us do start out in those positions and then begin to prove ourselves to be strong, teachers, leaders, communicators, and I believe the Lord gives us eyes to see it in ourselves, but also shows our brothers like he did my pastor, hey, this woman has something in her that she can't even see yet. And so for my sisters, I would just say, like there is going to be a natural progression. I believe, as the Lord continues to build his church, that he's going to trust us with more than just the status quo in the church, and we have to be willing to say, like Mary did, be it unto me, as you have said. I don't know what I'm carrying. I don't know that I have the Holy Spirit necessarily growing in me yet, but I know that there's something in there, and it's going to be a process to see that come forth. But we, if we're not careful, we will settle for our good rather than accepting God's best.

Joshua Johnson: 20:15

Exactly. So a lot of people are settling for the status quo, and when we see that what the church has been doing, or there's women's ministry on the side, it is status quo, and we're like, hey, we want to just blow up the status quo and then start again. But what you just articulated that it's going to be a process to get to the other side. How do we not just blow up the status quo and just tear it all down, right? But have a process of regeneration and growth into what is next and what is new and what is better for the church.

Natalie Runion: 20:56

Well, I know we've all heard the saying that you can't turn a ship in the ocean too quickly that it takes five miles to turn a giant ship in the ocean. Otherwise you'll flip it. And I think that's what I realized that once I was okay with being in women's ministry, I was like, Okay, I see that this culture needs shifted, but I can't just jerk the steering wheel. I have to ease us into these transitions. And really what it was, was it took me back to that story of Deborah in Judges, where it said that every day she showed up to her palm of Deborah and rightly judged the people of Israel. And what I love about that story is that she was consistent to show up under her palm every day, and the battle that Barack invited her into wasn't a day after she sat under her palm This was after a long time of watching her steward well that position under that palm tree and be where she said she was going to be, do what she said she was going to do, and prove that she heard from the Lord and she would deliver the word of the Lord, no matter how hard it was to say what was needed to be said. And I think for a lot of women, we see this opportunity to break glass ceilings in the church, and rather than wait for the Lord to promote us through stewarding our palm tree, we go in with a hammer and just want to demolish all systems and all processes, probably with a good heart, but we know that we can have good intentions, but a bad spirit, and I really have had to check my heart in this entire season of wanting to fight for women and really strong places of leadership in the church, but without blowing up systems that are actually not wrong. They just need tweaks or worked on. And I think as women, we can collaborate together, not compete, but collaborate. See that change brought gently into the house of God, when

Joshua Johnson: 22:44

these glass ceilings or things that are being broken, the culture is shifting, when women are moving into positions of leadership, a lot of the times it's the it's other women that are not liking that and trying to hold other women back, and there is a lot of infighting. There's competition. You said, how? Why? Why isn't there collaboration amongst women? Why isn't there more support amongst women? Why isn't there more more love and cheering on other women while things are shifting and changing. I just say, when I interviewed Beth Allison Barr, and she's like, it's actually more from the women than it is from the men, I get much more pushback. And I was like, That is crazy.

Natalie Runion: 23:36

Listen, first of all, Beth Allison Barr is the goat. I just want to make it clear I am in the middle of her new book, and I am blown away by her, and she's absolutely right, and it's unfair for our brothers, and I've tried to bring hopefully some peace to my brothers and saying we're not making it easy on you. So I want to say that first, it's okay to not know how to have the conversation, because I think it is tender, but it shouldn't be. It needs to be addressed. I think that what has happened just traditionally over the last 20 years is that there have been one or two seats for women in any given role in the church, be it an executive team, a pastoral team, you name it, on the worship team, there's one spot for that one woman to back up the worship leader, who's a man, to be in the room with all the men. And so what happens is women come on to church staff. And I just had a conversation with my dear friend Becky Johnson, who's the pastor at Jesus culture now under banning and she said women kind of want the best of both worlds. They want to raise their kids and be out of the workforce for 1516, years, and then they want to come into the church and start wanting to be boardroom Becky, as she called them. And I think that's true. Women are like, no, it's time for me to use my voice now, and they're still thinking it's 20 years ago that there's only one seat at this table. And so rather than kind of coming in, relearning culture, relearning the church as it is today. Or they go in with this mentality of, I've got to fight for my rightful seat at this place. It's my time. I'm 40 years old, 50, and our brothers are like, whoa, wait a minute. Like, it's not that there's only one seat, but we really need to make sure we're prayerfully considering who is in these positions and how we work together. And so there's women that are kind of been in this for the last 20 years in the church, and they're seeing, Oh no, there are more than one seats, but there are some who are just are a little bit unhealed or wanting more power, and then there's no room for collaboration. And so I just want to say that I agree 100% that we as women have created this competition that's not even there anymore. And if we're doing our jobs well, and we're showing up like Deborah did under our palm, the Lord is going to open up doors like we could never imagine. And it isn't about how many seats there are, it's has God entrusted you with this seat? And if he has, then there doesn't need to be competition, because there's always going to be room at the table. But I say that collaboration kills competition. That's kind of what I have always leaned on. And we as women in the church have a long way to go in that.

Joshua Johnson: 26:08

I mean, that's the difference between right, scarcity and abundance. Like, if there's a mindset like in the kingdom, there's only one spot there isn't enough where it's always gonna be fighting with God, there's always enough in the kingdom, like that we have we do have enough. This is why we fight wars around the world. This is everything as we believe that there's not enough for everybody to go around, but there is. So how do we flip that script? How do we move out from a different place that is not a place of scarcity anymore. The kingdom of God is is bigger and better and more beautiful than we can imagine.

Natalie Runion: 26:51

Well, I'll talk first to the men, because I do think this is a question that has been asked of me a lot lately. And I would say number one, just maybe take inventory of who is sitting in the different seats of your staff, who is sitting in places of leadership that have a voice and a vote into how things are going. And if you notice that there is only one seat for one woman, it is possible that that is creating some tension within your culture, that there is only one woman who deserves or belongs. Now it could be you only have one woman, but are there other women that you've been identifying as a strong leader, as a faithful servant, who you are like, You know what? We actually could bring one more into this conversation, because I think having at least two women at the table, it doesn't make it feel so exclusive. So I would just say, if there's if there's space, if there's space. And there are candidates, not because you just need to put a woman in a role, but there are actual people, women who would be good for your organization. Consider maybe not just having one main worship woman up there with five men, consider adding one more. If she's there and she's called for women, we have got to be each other's biggest cheerleaders and biggest advocates. And when I say that collaboration kills competition, I say this when I walk into a room, I will always praise at least one other woman in my life who was doing good work for the kingdom. And this year, I realized I was overbooked. I could not take any more speaking engagements. And so what I did is I put out a social media post of three of my friends who are killing it as speakers and conference speakers, and I said, Look, I'm booked, but I want you to reach out to my girlfriends, who I trust with my whole life, to love your church well. And they started getting calls immediately. That wasn't because I felt sorry for them, it's because I want their voices to be heard, and I believe in what God has placed inside of them. And as a result of that, I get to scatter more seeds through them, and my kingdom legacy, my my role in the kingdom, expands because of my sisterhood with them. And so that's been something I've been practicing globally and locally, is to really celebrate women doing good Kingdom work, who are not my competitions, but my collaborators.

Joshua Johnson: 29:03

So let's build more collaboration, and let's build more sacred sisterhood. So give us some more steps that I mean you just you just named one there, but more steps that that women can do to build the sacred sisterhood within the church.

Natalie Runion: 29:17

We need to be what we needed when we were 20, when we were 30, when we were starting out, not just in ministry, because this is beyond just ministry, being a girl, being a woman. It is every stage of life. We need women who have already been where we are, who have not necessarily conquered it, but survived it, and some words of encouragement and prophetic words. And by prophetic words, I mean just speaking scripture over us, praying over us, sending a text message and saying, I see how hard this season of parenting is, and you're crushing it. We need to as women, remember that, first of all, we're all girls going through this at the same time. None of us have done this before. I've never been a 45 year old woman before. I've never raised. Age girls before. I'm just as new as anyone. But what I do know is that there are women in my life who have and if I need them, they're there for me. And I think that we underestimate and undervalue mentorship and discipleship. So women, be what you needed, and then look for people who have been where you are or where you're going, who you admire, and get coffee with them. Don't be so prideful and think you just have to, like, figure it all out. You know? I think the next thing is, is that we have to put that pride down and start searching for Sacred sisterhood in a way that's intentional, which means your phone may not be ringing with invites to go get coffee or lunch with a woman, but somebody needs you, and it might feel like, well, they should be reaching out to me. No, we're past that. So many of us have isolated ourselves through covid, through parenting, through hard seasons in our jobs, and some of us just need to be intentional. And I know not everybody is intentional. We're introverts or Enneagram number, whatever it is, but community comes to the committed we we have to be committed to finding community. And finally, just remember that just because something bad happened to you in one small group at another church, or just because one woman said something or did something to you 510, years ago, at a church, there are a lot of really good women in the church, in small groups who would love to have you part of their community, and so don't forsake community because of one bad experience. I'm watching women's ministry shift before my eyes, and God is doing good work in his house.

Joshua Johnson: 31:30

Let's talk about forgiveness. If you've been hurt for a long time. I mean, forgiveness is more for me than it is for the person or that I'm forgiving, it's to get rid of the chains that is around me so that I could be free and move into a space where I can trust again. I could be vulnerable again, I could actually have new relationships. Why is forgiveness important when we have been hurt and we're moving towards shifting into a new, better space.

Natalie Runion: 32:05

This year alone, I have seen more deliverance, and yes, I'm using the word deliverance from the conversation of unforgiveness than any other conversation that I have had as a pastor, preaching from a pulpit, when I say deliverance, I am talking full on women, weeping, going to their knees, just completely undone because of the hurt they've experienced in church at the hands of shepherds, pastors, wives, women's ministries, and it is heartbreaking, and yet, at the same time, those women are being fully delivered of unforgiveness and stepping back into community because the enemy wants us to be so bound by unforgiveness. Not only that we can't forgive, but we aren't forgiven. The Scriptures tell us that if we don't forgive, we won't be forgiven. So you know, church hurt won't kill you, but unforgiveness will. And there is something about that that really started to weigh on my heart. And last year, this is very, very personal, but I had been traveling the world telling people forgive, heal. It's amazing, and I'm in Canada one night, and I realized, oh my goodness, like I haven't forgiven, and I was thinking of this situation where I hadn't forgiven people, and all of this anxiety was in me, and I had gained 30 pounds, and I thought it was just traveling, but as I'm being convicted on the platform as the preacher, I'm realizing that the Lord is like I want to do a work in you. And I was radically healed in Canada last May from unforgiveness, and this year has been a pro. Has been a process, because forgiveness isn't linear. But I have lost all of that weight. I have been able to be in conversation and community with those people. And you know, we're not like BFFs and braiding each other's hair and stuff like that, but we, I think of them with a pure heart, and I think that that's what so many of us just need to remember, is that healing isn't linear. Forgiveness isn't linear. But you're right, releasing those people make space for us, to make room for safe people. And so that process can be through counseling, through therapy, through medication, through the church, but I'm telling you, forgiveness is for all of us, and it's

Joshua Johnson: 34:08

from the Lord. I've said this a few times, but now I think that forgiveness is the secret sauce to our lives, to the Christian faith, like it is so huge and key, and it does not excuse what has been done to you at all. It doesn't excuse that. It doesn't make it right. It doesn't like absolve people from what they have done, but it does set you free. Can you help me then, as the church, what do we do with women's ministry? Then, like, what is this? How do we reframe this? I know you're you're talking to women specifically, but I want to know, what do we we do? Do we keep it as an ancillary ministry? Do we fold everything in together with everybody? How does the How does it work to be healthy and whole, to bring people into a place where they do look more like Jesus and. It's not just Country Club fair.

Natalie Runion: 35:03

I think that's independent for every church. I think you have to look at your church set up and say, What are we set up for? Are we a small group based church? Are we a program driven church? Are we the kind of church that heavily relies on these ancillary ministries to bring people in? Is it an outreach, or is it a country club? Are we actually multiplying when we do these or are we just spending a lot of money to feed a bunch of women who would be here, regardless of whether or not we were, you know, spending 50 grand on an event? I think that we have to look at all of our ministries, not just women's ministry, but Men's Ministry, all of it, and say, Is it a source, or is it a resource? Because women's ministry should never replace Sunday morning or your gathering of the saints. Women's ministry should never exhaust your staff. It should never exhaust your team. It should never ask women in your community to put out more time and resources than maybe an outreach event or coming into church on a Sunday morning and worshiping and so whatever your church culture values, I think women's ministry can fit into it without it looking like it did in 1995 and the only way that you're going to know this is by asking women in your community what they want from their time together with Other women, and also praying and fasting and asking the Lord, Lord, what do you want for the daughters of this house? And it could be that you guys all clump into one small group, and you just have a small group ministry that where some are single moms and some are multi generational, and some are, you know, moms with kids, or working women, or whatever it is, or it is that once a year you do a huge conference where you bring in a big name, but you have to decide not what is best for just women's ministry, but what is going to bring as many people into hearing the name of Jesus Christ, weekly, monthly and every year. And if that's a conference, great if it's small groups, great if it's a weekly women's gathering, awesome, but whatever it is, it must point people to Jesus first and then draw them into community, biblical sacred community second. And if you can't do it well, don't do it like I'm begging you. Don't do it. If you can't do it well, because you'll hurt people. You'll over promise and under deliver, and you'll hurt women. And you just need to do something that you can keep going with in your church culture and and uphold your end of that bargain with whatever you're offering them. So

Joshua Johnson: 37:31

you're saying that church should be about Jesus and and community and not our programs. That's crazy. That's crazy talk. Natalie, I can't believe you said that. So as we we look at Jesus the way that he actually had relationships with women and treated women and had women with him all the time, what can we learn from Jesus as we are the embodiment of him now, and how women can have be friends and to be with each other in community.

Natalie Runion: 38:03

I love how Jesus never saw women as a problem to be solved. He wasn't like looking at women who came into his midst like, Oh, I've got to deal with this, right? There was always invitation, conversation, evaluation. He was constantly seeking, especially with the woman at the well, there was always an intention in that conversation, and I think that especially when we look at our relationship with pastors as women, so many times we feel like we can't be in friendship with the men on our staff or with the men in the church, because of all of the stigmas that are around that. But what I've learned is that when shepherds Shepherd women, well, it's with that same intentionality, that same question, that same intentionality to to dig deeper. And I can just say, from being on a church staff, some of the greatest moments of encouragement were when my pastor just looked at me and said, Hey, you're doing a great job. Do you have any questions? Is there anything that we can do for you as a staff and and being seen as a peer. Jesus made women feel as if they were peers with those other men. He never made them feel diminished. And even in Acts. Chapter one, verse 12 and 14, it says that all of the disciples, the women included, decided they were in this till the very end. And what were they doing? They were having a business meeting to figure out who was going to replace Judas. There were women that were trusted with decisions that were going to be made, and I I just believe that, as Jesus trusted women, as Jesus invested into women, that we can do that in the church now and still keep proper management in place. I want to be very clear that I love biblical relationships between men and women. I have a husband who I love is the head of my home. I have a male pastor and pastor's wife who I love, being under their care and their shepherding. I am not saying that women should just take over and be able to do whatever they want, but to understand that there is a co partnership in this to. Bring people into the kingdom of God, and that's important that we know how Jesus treated women, because we can model then, not only how we allow ourselves to be received by other people, but also how we treat other people. And I'll be honest, I've been treated better by my brothers and my sisters. And so I do think that this is a conversation that how did Jesus treat women? It's not about how should the men should treat the women. I think that women we should model. Yeah, Jesus treated women.

Joshua Johnson: 40:28

Yes, exactly, exactly. That's that's sad to me. If you've been treated better by men than women, like it. It doesn't need to be that way. It really doesn't need to be that way. There isn't a big competition. There can be some mutual flourishing between women. I really, really hope so. So we're learning from Jesus. One of the things that you, you went through, you talked, I think you touched on a little bit, is about your emotional intelligence and learning some, some EQ and so if you haven't been treated well by women, what is the journey towards emotional intelligence? What's the journey to actually figuring that out?

Natalie Runion: 41:13

It's crazy, because I had been in corporate America for several years, and I had been taught, hey, you actually have a leg up in this because you're tall, you're brunette, you dress well, and when you walk into a boardroom, you're going to demand attention in the room. So in corporate America, I was being told this about you, that you're loud, you're assertive, this is all going to work well for you. And that's really as I was getting full time ministry opportunities in churches, how then I led teams. Was okay, well, this seems to be something that people desire, is transparency, authority. And so I took that with me into church spaces where people had not been in corporate America, where there had not been really any bottom lines and oversights and management. And so when I came in, I wasn't there as the confident woman of God, I was a steamroller. I was coming in and just, you know, making decisions and doing things, and for me, that was really hard to say, hey, wait, I actually think I'm part of the problem here, because I'm demanding respect from people whom I've never met before, who don't even know if they want me here, and who I have not spent time with, to know how to lead them. And so I ended up getting coaching where I sat down with an EQ expert, and I really had to do my own self examination of what was insecure in me that made me go in and want to dominate a room. What were physical features about myself that I couldn't help but that I would have to understand were already working against me, and what was some of their problems that I couldn't fix and manage, but that I could go in and help manage a room by how I speak, how loud I am, how overbearing I can be. And I really had to have some humility. It was really actually so humbling to realize that part of loving God's people, especially loving my sisters, was not going in and just steamrolling, because that's just who I am, but shepherding them, even shepherds, shepherding shepherds, that's what we do. By understanding that my emotional intelligence, my the way that I understand how I'm wired, but also caring for how they're wired, would actually make me a better leader as a woman in the church. And you know, I have a whole chapter on what happens when your Paulette becomes your solid. And you know, we only really know bad leadership after we've been under bad leadership. And that season for me really taught me like, I don't want to be a solid. I want to be a Paulette for women, and that's going to take a lot of emotional IQ. It's going to take a lot of self searching and humility to say, yeah, like this. Might be preferring someone by not coming in and just screaming things into a room, and it may not always be effective, but I care more about you than the way that I'm going to lead right now.

Joshua Johnson: 43:59

Well, one of the things that you you just said there is that you, you believed that you needed to be a certain way. Because of corporate America, they were feeding you a script of saying, This is how you need to be. And so you probably put on a mask and said, This is what I'm going to do, and this is what leadership looks like. Because they've told me this is what leadership looks like. And throughout your whole book this conversation, you're saying women have been fed scripts. They put on masks to say, This is who I'm supposed to be. This is what they tell me I'm supposed to be. How do we remove those? How do we figure out who you truly are on the inside, so that, I mean, there is more trust and vulnerability and community and belonging in a place where people are who they are instead of who people think they should be. It's so

Natalie Runion: 44:55

important for all of us, women, to spend as much time in the scriptures, in the Word of God. As we can because really, the words of Jesus tell us our identity. We find out who we are as daughters by being in the presence of God, being in the word worshiping, being in biblical community, where people speak to us, not necessarily where we are, but who we're becoming. And those scripts are slowly rewritten as we put ourselves in the presence of God and in the presence of people who have been with Jesus. And that is something that I think a lot of women isolate away from when we've been wounded or we've been on a church staff and not accepted or wanted as we just think, Fine, I won't be part of it at all. And I think those script rewrites are so important. I also think as women, we need to stop regurgitating scripts. And like one example I use is whenever my daughter would come home and tell me that a girl has been mean to her, my knee jerk response was, Well, she's just jealous of you. And that's just one script that women, especially moms, will tell our teenage daughters. And the truth is, is that that's not a healthy script to tell our kids, because what we're saying is you need to diminish so that somebody else won't be jealous of who you are, rather than saying, Honey, let's really look at what's going on in that individual's home and their relationship with their parents, their grades, their sports, rather than looking at the source of what could be why This girl has been mean or indifferent to my daughter, rather than just saying the script that just naturally rolls off our tongue of Well, He's just jealous. And I want you to think like that's just one script, like there are hundreds of others that we say because they were spoken over us. And so we've got to start reframing. How would Jesus handle this moment with this individual. We had a girl in here at the house who was so dramatic. She was just bringing all kinds of drama. And my daughter is not drama. And I just thought, Lord, I don't know if I can manage this. And I just felt them like, convict me. Like Natalie, you were a drama queen at one time, too, and what made you dramatic? You wanted to be heard. You didn't feel validated, and nobody gave you any time of day to, like, really unpack this. Like, ask her what's going on. And it was crazy, because I just wanted to be like, Honey, she's just dramatic. She's just being a drama queen. And it's like, no, there's something deeper going on here that is spiritual. It's cultural. Like, let's unpack that. And so it's really been a shift for me, even in writing this like man, what just rolls out of my mouth carelessly as a script that's impacting my daughters and in their kids, so that that's are their their friends, and so that's been convicting, because I've realized they're just almost like comfort blankets.

Joshua Johnson: 47:36

What I love is that generations can can heal, and there could be new, new dynamics within generations. And it's not just you know our our individual generation, you know, you and I are almost the same age, like we come from the same generation. We're hearing a lot of these scripts. We're trying to heal from a lot of these things that we were, we've been given in the church. But there is a new generation coming up. What has given you hope in new generations? Like what do you see that's happening in the next generation? Well,

Natalie Runion: 48:11

first of all, I don't know if anybody listening is raising Gen Z or the Alpha generation, but they are the most unbothered generation. Probably default. I'm not glorifying it. It's probably default, but they really they they from the outside, they look like they don't care. And I think it's because, finally, with social media, good or not, they are seeing people who look like them sound like them. They're they're not going to school dressed like the clueless movie with their skirts and their vests are going in and pajama pants and and their furry slippers and whatever they're they're the most unbothered generation. But with that also comes a little bit of like, too much freedom, too much you do you. And this is where we now have the body positivity movement, where you can be obese and it's glorified because you just need to love the body that you're in. So we can, we can swing the pendulum the other direction, too far. But what I love about my daughter, my oldest daughter's friends, is like, I invited them onto my I don't even like women podcast, and they're 16 years old, and they're ready to go, you know, like they're ready to talk about the hard stuff. They love Jesus. They are sharing the gospel everywhere they go. They they really are unafraid about some of the things that we were terrified of as teenagers. And I think that that is a boldness that the Holy Spirit has given this generation to see the Lost Found. And I'm encouraged by that, because I do believe they're the generation that's going to rewrite some of these scripts, and we have to make sure that it doesn't go too far, like my truth and some of these scripts that we're hearing now, but guide that so that we're not boxing them into our ways, but giving them freedom to say, Okay, well, that might not necessarily be a biblical truth, but how do we take that concept of you are who you are by the grace of God, not? I'm just going to be whatever I want, but I am by who I am, by the grace of God, and really foster that to freedom and your identity in Christ. And so I see them being the ones to help us even heal from some of our scripts.

Joshua Johnson: 50:12

Yes, yes. And so we need to heal. So we've seen the church move in the last decade or so, there's a lot of unveiling. There's some healing that still needs to take place. But if you could say there may be a script that needs to be rewritten in the church right now, and to rewrite the script, what? What script would you rewrite for the church today? What would you tell the church?

Natalie Runion: 50:41

I would say that the old script has been by whatever means necessary. We need to build this house with numbers, programs, whatever it is, we need to get on all the social media platforms. We need to have all the followers. And I would say the new script is Love God, love people go and make disciples. That is the new script. The new script. The new script is actually the original script, the original blueprint that is whatever means necessary, not to build our kingdom book, to build God's kingdom. And that could mean losing people, that could mean deactivating a social media account. That could mean giving most of your tithes away to take care of your community, whatever that looks like, whatever means necessary to build the kingdom of God, not to build our own castles.

Joshua Johnson: 51:30

Let's do it. I love that script, so let's, let's make that script a reality. That'd be fantastic. Natalie, I love a couple recommendations from you, anything you've been reading or watching lately, you could recommend,

Natalie Runion: 51:43

well, the pastor's wives book that you just talked about. It's Alison Beth Barr, right? I always get her Allison. Barr, Allison, I always do that. That book has been so incredibly eye opening for me. Just and how the title pastor's wife, which might if you go over to London, you don't say pastor's wife, they will, like, literally fry you right there, because they believe that women who serve by their husbands are actually pastors too. So it's been crazy to read her book and then to go over to London and to see that that has been so encouraging. And I think that's probably the one that I've been holding on to the most, also Manny Arango, crushing chaos. That book has been absolutely just life changing and just seeing how God established order from the beginning. And so if you love brilliant writing and you like masculinity in writing, Manny crushed that. He

Joshua Johnson: 52:38

crushes chaos, you're right. He really did? He crushed it. Yeah, I think about that a lot, crushing chaos. It's, it's fantastic. I just, yeah, it reframed the way I think about it, and a lot of things. And I use it all the time in conversation. It's fantastic. So I love that one. That's good. Natalie, this book, I don't even like women, is fantastic. I hope people go out and get it, and I hope that a bunch of men go out and get it as well, that it's not just a women's book. It does talk about women's relationships a lot, but men would get a lot out of it. I loved it. I love your writing. So it's a lot of fun to read and get through. And the cover is one of my favorite covers. There is so good. It is so good. So that's I just, I just love I really do. I love the cover. It's so much fun. Where would you like to point people to to get the book? And then where else can people find you. Point people to the podcast that's coming out. What's Where do you like to point people to?

Natalie Runion: 53:45

Well, the book will come out September 2. It will be on Amazon, Walmart books, a million Christian books. And then everybody kind of hangs out over at the Instagram account. Raised to stay. If you don't like Instagram, you can go to Facebook under Natalie Runyon, we have a nice, robust community over there. And yeah, really, we have three books in three years. So if you're just getting to know raised to stay, there's three other two other books you can get now in the waiting.

Joshua Johnson: 54:11

Perfect. Well, Natalie, thank you for this conversation. It was so much fun to have you back. So much fun this conversation. Let's rewrite the script. Let's make room for all women, there's some collaboration that we don't need to compete anymore, that we could have spaces of trust and vulnerability and grace with one another, that women can Shepherd and that they could care for others. We could figure out a better way to be the church and be the body of Christ. So Natalie, thank you. This is fantastic. Thank you. Applause.