that said, OK, we're in the rubble of deconstruction.
It's not a bad thing.
But now we have this huge task as a generation to rebuild.
And thankfully, we have a blueprint for that
in the word of God.
Natalie Runyon, it is great to have you back here on Charisma.
And it was just not too long ago that you and I
talked for the first time.
And that time was about your book,
Raised to Stay, which was about identifying church hurt
and how we don't need to necessarily run away.
But we can be healing agents.
And really, since then, we have seen scandal
after scandal in the church.
We've seen the IHOP KC issues with Mike Bickel
and now recently with Robert Morris at Gateway Church
and the issues that have come out.
But God prompted you ahead of time
to write your latest book on the heels of Raised to Stay.
And now it's the house that Jesus built.
And so Natalie, I got to ask you,
why did you feel such an urgency to get this book out so quickly?
It was so interesting how Raised to Stay hadn't even
gone to edits yet.
And I was asking the Lord, just in my quiet time,
if I were to put out a second book later down the road,
what would that second book be?
And this phrase, the house that Jesus built,
just kind of was dancing around in my spirit a little bit.
And so I actually looked up the story
of the three little pigs.
And I was like, because when you think about building houses
and an enemy, you think of this nursery rhyme
that we grew up hearing about all the time.
And so there is actually a moral to this story
was that these three little pigs were tasked with building
houses that would protect them from the enemy.
But two of them wanted to go play.
And so they built fast and they built with bad materials.
And as a result of that, the one who built not in a hurry,
the one who built with good materials with the brick
is the one that actually could withstand
the hot air of the enemy when that wolf came in to huff
and puff and blow the house down.
And I started thinking about our churches
and this deconstruction movement that we've been in
and thinking, you know, there have been some foundational
issues where we as church people have built fast
and we've built on bad foundation.
And now we're seeing the enemy come in and huff and puff
and blow our churches down through moral failures,
sheep that are being abused, all of the things that led us
to this deconstruction.
So throughout all of scripture, God allowed his people
to tear things down.
But there was always a blueprint to rebuild.
And so I wanted to write a book that said,
okay, we're in the rubble of deconstruction.
It's not a bad thing.
But now we have this huge task as a generation to rebuild.
And thankfully we have a blueprint for that
in the word of God.
Yeah, you know, a couple of years ago at my parents' house,
there was an issue with the foundation
in part of the house.
And they actually had to have somebody come in
and figure out how to shore up the foundation
and fix everything.
And that was a big, expensive process.
And it wasn't because the foundation was previously bad.
It was just that it was very, very old and things had decayed.
So we need to pay attention to our foundations all the time
and make sure that everything's are cleared out.
But what are some of these foundational things
that we really need to make sure that we are building upon?
And what are some of the things that we've built upon
that are crumbling?
Well, in the raised estate community, which is online,
we have a very robust family of about 180,000 of, you know,
stayers who are very honest with me about the reasons why
they have gone through a deconstruction process
or why they've left their faith altogether.
And a lot of it came down to being severely disappointed
and hurt by people who should know better
and are behaving badly through abuse, celebrity culture,
not being integrists with their finances.
There are so many things that, like you said,
the foundation could have started well,
but over time it has become decayed
due to us not taking care of it.
And so when I looked at the different things
that people were telling me,
we really came down to spiritual abuse.
It came down to an orphan spirit
that a lot of our pastors and leaders have come under
when they haven't reached celebrity status.
We've got a lot of consumers in the kingdom now
who want the church to work for them
and not the other way around.
And so those foundational practices I talk about
in those first four chapters of like, what took us down?
What is it that made us unsteady?
And then in those last eight chapters,
I talk about the book of Acts.
And I go into Acts chapter two,
which we love the second chapter of Acts as Pentecostals
because we're like, man, there's like tongues of fire
and they're speaking in tongues.
But really when Peter stands up
and he begins to preach this message in the upper room,
what he's doing is he's laying out a foundational surface
for the very first church, which was repentance,
reconciliation, forgiveness, communion, worship,
the word of God.
And so when we look at all of those elements,
we think, wow, it's actually not having to recreate the wheel.
If we as a church just went back to that second chapter
of Acts and saw what was growing the church daily then,
what if we were to go back to those foundational basics
in our church today?
And just as it says in the message translation,
the people on the outside looked within the walls
of the upper room and generally liked what they saw.
Like, great would it be if the world looked
into our churches and generally liked what they saw?
Yeah.
So we focus so much on appearances in the church.
There's a lot of facade.
In fact, that's actually one of the biggest complaints
that I believe people of the world have is that,
Christians, they just wear masks all the time.
They're not real.
How do we show the reality or the realness,
the authenticity, but still the joy of the Lord?
Well, I think that's why social media
is such an interesting space
because there is a lot of chatter of just being honest.
Like, let's just be honest for honesty sake
and let's be vulnerable for vulnerability sake.
And what can happen is if there's not enough healing
in those spaces, it can just become a cesspool
of our wounds kind of meshing together
and creating this nasty abyss of just woundedness.
But when we marry honor and honesty,
and we say, it's okay to be honoring to the leaders
that have gone before us,
honoring of those who have paved ways for us,
but also honest that there have been some things
that were allowed in the church at the hands of those leaders
and even at our own hands that have wounded people.
So how do we talk about that as the church
in a way that still honors the Lord,
still honors the organization that is the church,
that is Jesus's idea,
and then also honors those who have been wounded
and who have been victims and not silence their stories,
but also being honest.
And in this space where we can say, we know that hurt
and this should have never happened
and sitting with empathy for both places,
because I know a lot of shepherds right now
who aren't hurting their sheep.
I know a lot of good shepherds,
there's more good shepherds than bad shepherds.
And they're having to kind of take on the blunt,
the brutal force of a generation
who's been wounded by the few.
Yeah, you know, as pastors,
they're sometimes guilty by association
and just by being a pastor.
I know that hurt people hurt people.
And so if they go from one church to another,
they're not necessarily healing as they should.
And so they'll sometimes take their offense
and put it and project it onto a pastor
who's not an issue.
But there are issues.
I mean, we've had some major ones come out
in the news recently,
but those churches are still filled with people
that love Jesus.
And, you know, do you throw the baby out with the bath water?
Do you clean the baby?
I mean, how do you deal with this
whenever you have a leader that's fallen?
What happens to the sheep?
Well, I've noticed that there are some
who are looking for a reason to completely walk away.
And all it will take is one moral failure
of a leader they thought was infallible
to give them permission to say,
well, I knew the church was crazy.
I knew all the leaders were bad.
They're no different than the world.
I'm gonna move on.
And that's a very small percentage of people, I believe,
who are in that camp.
What I believe is happening now
is that the church has been so hungry for revival,
so hungry for a move of God that isn't just encounter,
but also biblical formation and understanding
and seeing the great commission come to fruition
in our time, that people are willing
to not throw the baby out with the bath water,
but they're a little bit more willing
to have their foundations checked.
So as these leaders are falling,
you're noticing other pastors saying,
whoa, I don't want that to be my legacy.
I don't want that to be my story.
Because you have to remember,
if the enemy can't kill us
and he can't basically destroy us,
he'll try to steal our legacy.
And that's really the unfortunate thing
of what's happening right now
is men who have had legacies and ministry
are losing those legacies
and being known for moral failures
and not all the good they did in the kingdom.
So we're seeing pastors say, whoa,
I don't want that to be my legacy.
Come in and we're gonna hire outside groups
to do a good check on us, to check on our staff,
to check on our foundation
so that we can be up for the next 100 years.
Yeah.
So what are some things that we can do to protect ourselves
or to let's say, shore up that foundation ahead of time?
Because you just mentioned about people coming in
and checking on things,
but I'm thinking about a small church,
the pastor's maybe got 150 people there.
If he's doing everything he can to make sure
that the widow is being taken care of,
that the poor person is good,
that the people that are doing well in the church
are leading and growing in the Lord,
they can't necessarily bring in an outside audit and stuff.
But I'm thinking about those pastors as well.
How can they connect to this message?
Well, first of all,
I think we all need to do individual foundation checks
in our own life.
I ask why this scripture is search my heart, oh Lord,
and show me if any wicked ways in me.
And I'm gonna worry about the plank in my own eye
before I worry about the speck in someone else's.
So if my foundation as the ecclesia,
as the call it out one,
part of the global church is not healthy.
And then I go into a church building
with a bunch of unhealthy little ecclesias,
then we are probably all going to end up
at each other's throat for the end of this time
of being a Christian on this earth.
So really we all have to start on our own foundations.
Am I built on Jesus?
Do I offer reconciliation and forgiveness?
And am I worshiping?
Am I doing everything I'm demanding from the church?
And then second of all, for us and any leader,
the biggest thing is just, am I pointing people to Jesus?
Am I doing everything in the scriptures
that Jesus was doing,
that he was encouraging his disciples to do?
And if I can say, yes, I'm doing all of those things,
then when people come in with a critical spirit,
which is different than a foundational check,
but a critical spirit,
we're able to show them this list of,
look what we're doing in our city
and look what we're doing in our Judea and our Samaria
and to the ends of the earth
and look how many people are coming to know the Lord.
And you're just every day getting back on mission
with that great commission and that great command
of loving God and loving people.
And that's really what I'm looking for as a lay person.
When I walk into a church,
are they on mission with the great commission
and are they offering me the great command?
And are they offering me opportunities
to do the same in return?
And so that's a basic start, right?
Where we can just look within our own hearts,
am I doing those things?
And then I'm walking into my church
and I'm saying, they're doing those things.
And also remember this, it's not the shepherd's job.
It is not the lead pastor's job
to make sure that all of the Christians are behaving.
His job is to protect the sheep
and to make sure that the sheep are being fed.
And so we all owe it to each other to be responsible
and to be our brother's keeper.
Yeah.
So Natalie, as you were putting together this book,
the house that Jesus built
and as you're working on this blueprint,
tell me about the research that you've done
and as you're putting everything together
to help us kind of see what this needs to look like today.
Well, I learned more about construction
than I ever wanted to learn.
We were actually ironically building our house
when I was writing this book.
And what was so crazy about it is that I wanted to move in
a lot sooner than we did, because we were moving states.
And I was talking to our main contractor.
And I said, I just want it to get done faster
than it's getting done.
And he looked at me and he said,
ma'am, would you like this house built quickly
or would you like it done safely?
And I, from there on was like,
I'm actually intrigued by this.
And so what I started doing is looking at different terms
in the construction world when you're building a house.
And one of those researches that I did
was on this concept of rubblization,
where you take the foundation of an old entity
or an old building and you actually use what's left over
to create the foundation of the new thing
that you're building.
And what I loved about that is that Jesus has already come in
and done the work.
So we're not like having to build anything new.
We are literally taking what Jesus has given us and saying,
okay, there's some things that we need to maybe detangle from
that the world has added into this,
but now we're gonna start rebuilding with Jesus.
And so I just went through the whole construction process
of what it looks like to lay down a floor plan,
a framing and all of that,
and how important spiritually that is in our own lives
to have that framework in our life
that is the word of God, to have the foundation of Jesus,
to have a floor plan that is invitational
and laid out well so that people see our hearts
and they see our minds and our souls
and we're not just religious people running around.
And so I did a lot of that research.
And then I did a ton of research on the book of Acts
and what happened when everyone in that upper room
left the upper room, because thank God they left
the upper room so they could take the church beyond.
And all of the different people who were involved in Acts
and taking this church out to a world,
the different relationships that were involved
from Paul and Silas and Luke and all of the women
who were included in that with Lydia and John Mark's mom,
Mary and even Dorcas and Aquila and Priscilla
and how so many people came along to help create
this framework that is now the church.
Yeah, that's so cool.
Cause you can look through the Bible
and see how things are actually laid out in the foundation
and you just have to put on those glasses
of a blueprint maker and as a construction worker
and see, oh, this does make sense.
And the Old Testament is so rich in it as well.
I mean, you think about Nehemiah,
like the builders had a hammer and a sword in their hand,
one to build and one to fight.
And I see that for us now is we're the ready builders
with Jesus today.
Like we're defending some people,
we're defending some things, but we're also building
and he's tasked us for both.
Yeah.
So you mentioned the Old Testament.
I think it's super interesting that the Bible
is very specific on the dimensions and the decorations
for the temple and the tabernacle.
As you're looking at blueprints for your house
and you're looking at blueprints in the Old Testament
and the New Testament, what are some other things
that have surprised you that you were like,
I've never seen that as a building implement
or a foundational aspect before?
I mean, you just think about like all of the different
individual beams that have to be put in
just for there to be stability for the other beams
that are gonna be coming in.
We look at a house and we say, wow, that's a beautiful house.
Kind of the way we look at a church,
we think that's a massive cathedral,
but we forget that there are these individual
single unit things like the gyms in the New,
in the Old Testament, the different carpet colors,
the curtains, there are things that are strategically placed
within the walls that you can't even necessarily see
right off the bat that are there for protection,
beauty, for character, to tell a story,
to provide historical context.
And so I think for the average person,
they look at a church and they see four things.
They see the outside structure, they see the inside decor,
they see who's on the platform
and they see who has the authority.
And while all of those four things
are absolutely important,
that's not actually what's keeping the church up.
What's keeping the church up is the prayers of the people.
It's the intercession.
It is the things that we are doing behind the scenes
that nobody gets a Facebook highlight reel on, right?
And so I think that's what has shocked me the most
is like we ignore and potentially don't take care of
the things that are hidden because it doesn't look attractive,
but it's actually what's keeping us up.
Yeah, the foundations and the structure, the bones of a house
is really important.
And I've heard people say that house has good bones.
It's got good structure, it's got strength,
all the supporting walls are in the right places
and doing what they're supposed to be doing.
And yeah, those things don't get seen all the time.
You mentioned earlier about your community,
the raised to stay community, the stayers,
and there's like 100,000 some people in this,
which is that's amazing that that many people
have connected to this message.
You mentioned about deconstruction.
And I think we talked about that
in our previous conversation as well.
And deconstruction is something that is,
it's different than demolition.
A lot of times people deconstruct their faith,
but really they're just demolishing it.
And they're not actually doing it
with the intention of building it back up again.
Can you talk about what a healthy deconstruction is?
Well, I've had to talk a lot of pastors off the ledge,
excuse me.
I've had to talk a lot of pastors off the ledge
because they hear this deconstruction
and they're like my parents age and they think,
well, that must mean deconversion.
And it's like, no,
deconstruction isn't necessarily deconversion.
It can just be a detangling.
It's things that people have placed on us
that aren't even scriptural or aren't the Lord.
And so in my foreword of raised to stay,
Lisa Bevere says that deconstruction
without any plan to rebuild is just destruction.
And so we really have to search our own hearts
when we're going through our own faith detangling
to say, okay, am I doing this
because there are some things that I'm carrying
that God never asked me to carry like shame, guilt,
things about my sins I know are forgiven
that people keep putting on me,
different things that we were raised in maybe as kids
that actually aren't even scriptural.
And then doing what you just talked about
where we just demolish our faith and walk away altogether.
And what's hard about having a social media presence
like the one that I have is that I have all spectrums
and everyone feels validated
in why they did it the way that they did it.
And so really that's why we need wise counsel in our lives,
mentorship, discipleship, pastors, shepherds
that are healthy to help us discern
if we are really gonna rebuild
or if we're gonna slowly walk away altogether.
Yeah, and we want people to rebuild, obviously.
That's the big thing because we don't want anybody
to walk away from the Lord.
But one of the big reasons that people would walk away
from the Lord is because of spiritual abuse
or physical abuse, sexual abuse within a church
by an authority figure.
And the commonists that we have left here,
can we talk about that?
Because that has been the biggest issue
in the news recently, those specific things,
spiritual abuse and sexual abuse.
How can we help people with that?
Well, I always say that we have got
to be better listeners as a church.
We can sit down with somebody over coffee
and think we've scratched the surface
of who they are and what they are.
But the minute that somebody tells us,
I was abused by the church or I was hurt by the church,
that's not just like a gloss over,
like, okay, next conversation.
That's an invitation for us to ask deeper questions
and to find out, okay, what kind of hurt are we talking about?
What kind of abuse are we talking about?
So we don't let somebody just stay wounded
and just keep on moving.
We also have to stop defending the church.
Jesus himself, he will defend his church.
We have to start getting to a place
where we're not so busy trying to defend pastors and people,
but that we really are more interested
in protecting the sheep.
So I always say, if somebody comes to you and says,
I've been abused, we need to take that absolutely serious
the first time that it's said
so that we can do some investigating.
And if it's a child, especially, if it's a teenager,
because that's where the police get involved.
And so I just wanna echo how serious it is
because it is happening.
The documentaries like Shiny Happy People,
things like that that are starting to come out,
those are giving people who have been victimized voices,
thank God, because now they realize, oh, I'm not alone.
If it happened in Texas, if it happened in Utah,
if it happened in New York, it can happen to me in Montana.
You know, this was something that really happened.
So thankfully we're starting to give voices to our victims
to be able to walk this healing thing out.
The worst thing that we can do though,
is to isolate the victim
and to make them feel like it's their fault.
And I think that what we try to do when these big names
get exposed for this type of behavior
is because they feel more familiar to us.
We think that doesn't sound like so-and-so.
Well, we don't know so-and-so.
We just know their online presence.
So I always am just such an advocate
for let's be good listeners.
Let's be good friends.
Let's be good shepherds to the sheep God's entrusted to us
and then help them take the next steps
towards counseling, healing,
so that they won't leave the church altogether
and they'll know they're safe somewhere.
Yeah.
Natalie, as we're wrapping up here,
what encouragement can you give to people
that are struggling with this, that are wrestling, I guess,
is probably a better term than that.
And then would you pray for people
that are kind of in this need right now too?
Yeah, you know, I think you guys, first of all,
you have to know you're not alone.
I mean, we all, especially in our generation,
in the 40s, 50s, we're really disappointed.
There's just been a lot of disappointment.
And guess what?
We've disappointed people too.
We're not completely exempt from hurting people
and being disappointing for others.
And so to own that and say,
Father, forgive me for the way that I've hurt your sheep,
for the way that I've been part of tearing things down
that you didn't want torn down,
or the way that I've been part of making the foundation
a little bit risky, like I have to pray that prayer.
And second of all, to say that there are better churches
out there than what you think.
I always say this, that there are more healthy churches
and more healthy pastors out there than unhealthy ones.
And so to remember that it could be kind of like a year
of trying different churches, and as our church says,
you can date for a little bit,
but eventually you gotta put a ring on it.
You know, you want to get to a point
where you are in community,
where you can have that experience that hurt you redeemed
by a community that can love you,
and a shepherd who can love you.
And finally, just to know that you do have family
in the family of God, that you are not an orphan
and you're wanted desperately by God
and by the people that he's entrusted to take care of you.
So don't ever give up on Jesus, number one.
If you can't go back to church, don't give up on Jesus,
but know that his family is pretty cool too.
And would you pray for people?
Yes.
God, I thank you so much, Lord, for your church.
I thank you, Lord, for your bride.
She is radiant and she is beautiful,
and you are coming back for her.
Father, you are so proud of your children.
You love us so much, God.
And I just pray for those who are wandering right now,
who at one time was part of a good community,
at one time was on a church staff
and vibrant in their faith.
Father, I pray that that flame
would just be stirred up in them right now.
God, that they would be reminded of the promises
you spoke over them when they were young
and that that flame would just move
into a giant forest fire, God,
that would put them back on mission
with the great commission and loving people well.
God, I just pray, Lord, for those who are wounded,
Father, that you would bind up those wounds
and that you would bring healing
for those who have been disappointed, God,
that you would bring people into their lives, Father,
to give them faith again, maybe for the first time
and going back into a church building.
And for those who are just tired
and weary of all of the stuff they're seeing, God,
that you would just put them back in your word
and remind them of what you have to say
because you have the final word.
And I just pray, God, for peace over all of your people now.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Amen.
Natalie, thank you so much for joining us today here
on Charisma, and I just wanna encourage everybody,
you can get her books, Raised to Stay,
and the new one that's coming out,
The House that Jesus Built.
You can get those everywhere the books are available
and definitely on Amazon as well.
Put the link in the description for that as well.
So Natalie, thank you so much for joining us today.
Thanks for having me, John.