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What Is "Church Hurt"? And What Isn't? (rewind)

Words of Life / Salvation Army
The Truth Network Radio
January 20, 2025 5:00 am

What Is "Church Hurt"? And What Isn't? (rewind)

Words of Life / Salvation Army

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January 20, 2025 5:00 am

This series originally aired in Spring of 2023. This is a look back at this series.

As we continue our series with Natalie Runion, today we discuss what church hurt is and isn’t. 

https://natalierunion.com/

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Hi, from the Salvation Army, you're listening to Words of Life. I just had a trigger. Sorry. Sorry.

Okay. We can't use that. Fight in Christ, not just stay so we get some sort of an award for being on staff for 15 years. Like there's no longevity awards in heaven.

We're hiring people who know how to do a job versus people who are called to feed the sheep. Welcome back to Words of Life. I'm Bernie Dake, and I'm joined this week by Natalie Runyon from this ministry called Raised to Stay. Welcome back, Natalie.

Hello, Bernie. It's good to be back. It's week two. I'm excited because we learned a lot about you and your family last week and just touched a little bit on Raised to Stay and the inspiration behind that. This week, we'd love to get into even more of that.

What exactly is the focus of Raised to Stay? What are you hoping to accomplish with this ministry? And maybe we'll get into some of the nomenclature as we go. It's evolved over time.

I think back to the first like couple of years of it. And my tagline was persevering in ministry when you have a million reasons to walk away. And that was kind of what I was aiming for were people specifically who were in church leadership, who were raised in the church, who were just weary, who had grown weary. And over time as people have come into the community, my new tagline is challenging the church and championing the Saints.

Nice. Because I think we have done a disservice to people in the church in some ways. The church has been reckless. We have been careless with people just as any organization or any human company might.

We can't say that because we're the church, we've done things perfectly. At the same time, to champion the Saints also is that iron sharpening iron to say, hey, we're going to stick around. We're going to see what God wants to finish through us, but we're also going to stay long enough to maybe bring some change to the areas that we've seen in the church that we think can be done better. We're not going to just abandon. We're going to stay and figure out how we can be part of a solution. So that's how it's evolved over the last three or four years. Yeah. I love that first Proverbs 27, 17. As iron sharpens iron, so one man, one human sharpens another. Yes, I can really appreciate where you're coming from with that perspective.

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No purchase necessary vgw group void where prohibited by law 18 plus terms and conditions apply. You often use the idea of church hurt. How would you describe that to someone that doesn't know what that means? The Bible Coalition talks about church hurt being any time someone uses scripture to Lord over to manipulate to deceive another person into making them feel less than. So when we talk about church hurt, we are often referring to imperfect people hurting imperfect people and this isn't new. This idea of humans hurting humans has been happening since the very beginning of creation. However, in the church, we do attach a perfect God to imperfect people. We expect to be hurt by the world as believers.

We know that they don't know better. We've been taught that in Sunday school that you know, our favorite Bible characters were hurt by people of the world. But when it happens within the four walls where they're supposed to be protection and God and family. This is the ultimate betrayal to be hurt by the church. Yeah, I know that there's probably people we should be crediting for quotes, but I have heard people say something like hurt people hurt people.

There's a comma in there. That's kind of important. I don't think that there's many of us that can say we haven't been hurt in some way shape or form. It doesn't define us but it's part of our journey. I really appreciate what you're trying to do in this regard because the Salvation Army is not any different than other fellow denominations in the Christian Church. We're losing people both congregants and officers or pastors. And I understand that that is a very normal thing in churchdom, but you reaching out to people and saying hang on hold on. We've been given this opportunity for such a time as this is so important. And I imagine you have story upon story of people giving you thanks or encouragement just for the way that you've appealed to them through these cool little black boxes with some charges or some encouragement or you know, maybe gentle reminders this week in general.

There's been one that has been fun. And as we were talking before the interview, you said this one's caused some not controversy, but you know, it's certainly gotten some people excited and you say, you know, if you're hired to work at the church, you should probably work in a sense. I'm paraphrasing and that's so true. I mean if we're taking the money or if we were given the opportunity and we accept it then well, let's roll up our sleeves and get to work.

But why would that cost so much energy do you think? People who have been hurt have not felt heard. And when we bring up things that I don't want to use the word trigger because that's such a used word right now, but anytime we read something or we hear something that evokes emotion out of us. The first indication that we need to retaliate is that feeling of being offended like and it's an indicator that we haven't healed yet from whatever has happened in our lives. And so when I write things like that, I don't take it personal when people come at me and they're upset because my first thought is wow, they must have really been hurt and they haven't healed. But when we start talking about how to use church time money resources, the first thing people want to do is say well, well the church wasn't worried about me when they were taking up my time and resources and that's a unhealed response and we have to give people the space to be able to say those things without shaming them for feeling that way, but at the same time not shying away from truth.

Paul did this to all the churches in Corinthians where he was like, look, you're not going to like what you're hearing, but that doesn't change the fact that it's true. So I think these black boxes are evoking emotion that aren't wrong and experiences that are not wrong, but we have to start putting people back into their line of sight of Jesus and not their pain. And my question for all of the Stayers every day is do you want to be healed?

If you want to be healed, we know the healer, but if you want to continue to be a victim, then you'll never walk in the victory that is set for you. And so I pray that this is a place of that balance. Yeah, I like how you use the phrase Stayers for your community.

You know, these are people that are going to hang in, that we're trying to get them to stay on board. You mentioned Paul, of course we're talking about the Apostle Paul and even he had moments of discouragement. You know, he was very vulnerable when he said the things I don't want to do I do and the things I do want to do I don't do and he just expressing frustration, but at the end of the day when someone who you trust is trying to speak into your life, and I believe that's what you're trying to do with this ministry, Natalie, we could receive that as both encouragement and sharpening to take us back to the Proverbs 27 model. That's a Stephen Covey principle, you know, the seven habits of highly effective people.

You got to sharpen your sword is one of the things he used to say. Can you maybe give us some specific examples of how we as the church have let others down? We are not good as the church with having hard conversations. I think we have them when we want to. I think we have them from pulpits. I think they're being had in smaller groups of people behind closed doors, but I don't think we're really listening to one another as well as we could be. So when a congregant or a volunteer or a staff person sees something that alarms them and it could be anything from LGBTQ community things to racism or it could be staff culture. I mean, we're talking a wide spectrum of different topics and they don't feel safe bringing those topics to leadership. That's a huge red flag that we don't have a safe space in an environment that should be the safest place for us.

People look to the church to be a beacon of hope and light and also a safe place for the widow and the orphan. But we also have to be a safe place for the things we don't want to hear and that iron sharpening iron is not just for people on staff and volunteers. That's for leaders too. And I think what I'm hearing from the community is why is nobody listening when we tell them they have abusers on staff? When we tell them that someone is hurting other people, why are we keeping talented people in high places who are hurting people? And a lot of that is the church. Part number two of this is hiring talent over anointing. We're hiring people who know how to do a job versus people who are called to feed the sheep. And when you start putting people on platforms who are there for their own benefit, then they're no longer able to protect. And so we have a lot of staff people with giant bullseyes on their backs.

Yeah. They're exposed to the elements because leadership hasn't been properly protecting. And let's make no mistake. If you've accepted a call of Jesus on your life and you are trying to separate yourself from the world, you have a target on your back. Satan is not interested in people who want to be more like Jesus. He's trying to steal, kill, and destroy your soul, your livelihood. This is not a game. This is a spiritual war.

It is. And if raised to abide looked good on a t-shirt, I probably would have called this ministry Raised to Abide because I am certainly not encouraging people to stay in toxic, unhealthy churches. In fact, I have a black box that says I'm not leaving, I'm going because sometimes the healthiest thing we can do is leave a place that is not healthy so that we can go and continue the work that God has called us to do. That would come out of the scripture of John 15 that we're going to abide in Christ, not just stay so we get some sort of an award for being on staff for 15 years. Like there's no longevity awards in heaven.

Right. We're not going to get 25 year trophies when we get to heaven. But there will be a phrase we all want to hear which is well done, good and faithful servant, not well done, good faithful worship leader, not well done, good and faithful pastor, but servant. And so in order for some of us to continue to serve, some of us might need to go and get away from these unhealthy environments so we can continue to abide in Christ and produce good fruits.

Now, I'm not a licensed counselor, so I can't really give any great advice except to say this. If you want to have difficult conversations, I would encourage you to consider a form of diplomacy. You know, I think there's a good way to do this and as Christians, we have biblical models where we can talk to each other and with a third party if necessary in love and hopefully the idea of that being a sharpening opportunity will be seen in that way. That would be God-honoring. So I just want to encourage our listeners because Natalie, this really is so encouraging to me to hear you talk about where you've come from and how you're encouraging other people. God is not finished until he returns. And at that point, you know, I hope we all get swept up with him.

There's an old Christian comedian named Mike Morkie that would talk about Rapture practice. You know, just want to go outside and make sure I'm ready. I just had a trigger. Sorry. Sorry. Okay, we can't use that one.

But it's true. You know, I just I want to make sure that we're encouraging everybody to consider what we do as Christians and how we approach each other because it should be loving and I think there's greater good there. And this is how we defeat the evil one's escapes.

Absolutely. Well, thank you for joining us. This is week two.

We got more to come. So we hope you'll come back next week and join us on Words of Life. The Salvation Army's mission doing the most good means helping people with material and spiritual needs. You become a part of this mission every time you give to the Salvation Army. Visit salvationarmyusa.org to offer your support. You can subscribe to Words of Life on your favorite podcast store or visit salvationarmysoundcast.org. Join us next time for the Salvation Army's Words of Life. Thanks so much for listening to Words of Life. We want to thank the team at Life Audio for their partnership with us on the show. Visit lifeaudio.com where you'll find dozens of other faith-centered podcasts in their network.

They have shows about prayer, Bible studying, parenting, and more. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you next time. Our world can feel chaotic and uncertain, but we don't have to live enslaved to fear. Christ has promised me and you his peace and throughout scripture has provided powerful tools and practical steps to help us experience greater freedom. I'm Jennifer Slattery, lead host of the Faith Over Fear podcast, inviting you to join me and my team as together we learn how to starve our fears and feed our faith. Subscribe at lifeaudio.com or wherever you access podcast content. The Historical Jesus Podcast is the sweeping saga of the life and times of Galilean Jesus of Nazareth, as well as the faith, religion, and church founded to honor and disseminate his acts and teachings. Join me, Mark Vinette, on this fascinating journey through time exploring the many great works of Christian theology, literature, architecture, music, and art inspired by the words and deeds of Jesus Christ.
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