The primary focus of this podcast episode revolves around the exploration of sacred sisterhood, as discussed with our esteemed guest, Natalie, who is introducing her forthcoming book entitled "I Don't Even Like Women and the Other Lies that Get in the Way of Sacred Sisterhood." Throughout our conversation, we delve into the complexities and challenges women face in forming genuine friendships, particularly within the context of church communities, where competition and gossip often create barriers to connection. Natalie shares her personal experiences of feeling rejected by women, illustrating the need for deeper, more meaningful relationships that transcend superficiality. We examine the importance of fostering supportive and encouraging environments, where women can uplift one another rather than compete. Ultimately, this episode serves as a clarion call to embrace the beauty and necessity of sacred friendships, urging listeners to cultivate connections that are both enriching and transformative.

Takeaways:

• The podcast explores the significance of sacred sisterhood and the complexities involved in female friendships.
• Natalie's forthcoming book, entitled "I Don't Even Like Women," addresses the obstacles women face in forming lasting connections.
• Listeners are encouraged to confront feelings of rejection and to strive towards building meaningful relationships despite past hurts.
• The discussion emphasizes the importance of emotional intelligence in navigating female friendships and mitigating destructive behaviors such as gossip.

Hey there and welcome back to the Clarity Podcast.

This podcast is all about providing clarity insight, encouragement for life and mission.

And my name is Aaron Santomier and I get to be your host.

Today we have the phenomenal opportunity to have with us on the podcast.

Natalie is the first time on the podcast with us and we get to sit down and discuss her new book that's coming out on the realities of sacred sisterhood and the realities of what that looks like and sometimes how the enemy can get in there and cause tension and create hurt.

And the title of the book is actually I Don't Even Like Women and the Other Lies that Get in the Way of Sacred Sisterhood.

And so you know me as the guy.

It was very insightful.

And so I had the opportunity just to ask the questions.

And in the reality, she'll share at times, she felt rejected by women.

She'll share.

Just the idea that I thought was poignant was that, you know, she thought she had a Paulette in her life and it ended up being a solit.

And the realities of sometimes how gossip and the destructive nature of gossip, how that can tear down friendships and the importance of having sacred friendships in our lives.

And then the other.

One of the other quotes she talks about in the book was this idea that probably you would get stung a few times attempting to get honey.

Probably.

But the sweetness is worth the sting.

And the pursuit of friendship, the pursuit of those sacred sisterhoods, as she calls them, and the importance of that in a woman's life and honestly in a man's life.

Also to have those relationships and the importance of not if we get hurt, how do we enter back into the game and looking for friends rather than go towards isolation.

And then she talks about her view of sacred friendships and this season of life maybe contrast in other seasons of her life.

And so just a fun time having her on the podcast.

Do want to ask you to continue to send in your questions for Backchannel with Foeth.

That's where we get to sit down with Dick Foth and get to learn from him.

Always enjoy having Dick on the podcast.

Over these years.

He's been on the podcast almost since the inception of it, and so it's been a fun ride also.

Yeah, I just want to thank you.

We're six years into the podcast and I thank you for listening in.

Thanks for the people that have listened in to a lot of them.

Some of you are just new to the podcast.

Interesting for me to see people that are right in, that are listening in around the world and What a blessing it has been to them.

And it's been a blessing for me because I get to sit down and learn from great people.

So.

Well, there's no time.

Better than not to get started.

So here we go.

Greetings and welcome back to the Clarity podcast.

So excited to be here today with a new friend, Natalie.

Welcome to the podcast.

It is great to be with you.

Thanks for having me.

Natalie.

We were talking all things protein bars and energy bars before we jumped in.

And I was trying to convince you that Perfect Bars were the best bars ever.

But now we'll get to more important things.

Can you share a little bit about yourself before I start asking you some questions?

Well, yes.

My name's Natalie.

I was a pastor's kid growing up.

Did everything to try not to be in ministry as a pastor's kid, which included being a personal trainer.

I went to college to be an exercise physiologist and that explains my life.

Protein bars.

So old habits die hard.

Yeah.

Ran with my whole heart away from ministry as much as I could.

But as we know, you can run, but you can't hide.

And the Lord introduced me to campus crusade for Christ on my public university campus.

Started leading worship, fell in love with teaching people about Jesus, seeing people get saved.

And for about 10 years, I was bivocational.

I was a worship leader by weekend, gym teacher by week.

I got married.

My husband and I have been married now for almost 19.

We have two daughters who are almost 17 and 13 and we live in Kentucky.

And my husband, God love him, he married a gym teacher and he got a woman preacher out of it.

So, you know, just be careful.

You know, love who you are going to, you know, love the people for how they're going to be, not who they are when you marry them.

Very, very, very, very true.

So I'm from West Virginia, so we're not, we're kindred spirits at least.

Where, where, where, where you're living.

So good, good, good, good stuff.

So the, you know, the first book I've read of yours.

Insightful, challenging, I could do a whole podcast on that.

But that's not what we're going to talk about today.

Today we're going to talk about the new book that you have coming out.

Interesting title.

And, you know, I've been traveling.

I was in Kenya last week and I was sharing with them this, that I had read your book and was excited about it.

Can you just share the origin story and the unique title of the book?

Well, I had written two books prior about healthy church culture.

And I had been a worship leader for years, and about age 40 or so, I got called into my worship director's office, and they said, hey, look, we think you're a great worship leader, but we want you to become our women's pastor.

It was a large church, eight campuses.

And I remember the words that came out of my mouth were not thank you.

It was, why would you do that?

I don't even like women.

Like, I've never in my life voiced interest in this.

And as the Lord does, he took those years with those women at that church, and he showed me why that he didn't need me to pastor his daughters.

He needed his daughters to pastor me, because that's the kind of good God we have.

But as I began traveling with, raised this day and talking to other women, that phrase, I don't even like women came out of so many women's mouths that I thought, we have to talk about this.

So my publisher was a little bit nervous when I said, I want to write a book called I Don't Even Like Women.

But we all agreed that we need to have these hard and holy conversations, and women are a vital part of healthy church culture.

So let's talk about it for sure.

And.

And that's.

That led to the conversation.

Face it, when I'd say the title, people are like, what.

What did.

What does he mean by that?

So.

And I try to explain, and in preface, you know, hey, I'm.

I'm a guy.

So I don't mean to be judgmental, but kind of unpack some of the important points that you have in the book.

And very, very insightful.

So you've written extensively about growing up as a pastor's daughter and the joys and pains of that.

How did that, growing up as a pastor's daughter shape your view of women and leading women?

Well, women were a vital part in the denomination that I grew up in.

Women were empowered.

They were equipped.

They were up on platforms.

They were teachers, preachers, singers, worship leaders, musicians.

I saw women operating in partnership with their husbands for the kingdom.

And so for me, there was never a, you can't do that.

It was, how are you going to do that?

What will you do with the things that God has given you?

And so it wasn't until I was older, in my 30s, that I actually heard that some women couldn't do these things.

Or, you know, I started also finding out that women in the church could be just as hateful as women in the world.

And really reconciling that difference of oh, you know, just because a woman's in church doesn't mean that she's necessarily a nice woman.

There are also mean girls in the church.

And so a lot of the church hurt that I would encounter in my 30s and 40s, unfortunately, was at the hands of a fellow sister.

And having to.

I talk about it in the book, having my Paulette become a solette.

What happens when a woman who's supposed to mentor you becomes jealous of you?

And really having to reconcile.

Like, what kind of a woman do I want to be in ministry?

I don't want to be power hungry.

I don't want to be controlling.

I don't want to fight for a seat at the table.

I want to be collaborative.

I want to be encouraging.

I want to be a woman that younger women look at and say, I want to do what she does for the kingdom one day, not I want to be her.

There are so many things that those women taught me when I was a young girl that was so good and so healthy, and so having that paradigm sort of shifted in my adult years was actually pretty radical.

And so I've had to spend maybe the last four years of my life rewriting scripts that I had written over my own life about women, that I had said about women, because I didn't like myself.

And that really comes with a lot of time in the presence of God, searching our own hearts.

Wow.

And then the courage and the willingness to engage in that.

Right.

You know, to take that time, to take that effort, that takes courage.

Is that just something that came naturally to you?

Is that something the Holy Spirit gave you, the courage to begin, to unwrap that, untangle that?

Is that a fair question?

Absolutely.

I think that you have to come to the end of yourself before you become desperate enough to look in the mirror and say, okay, God, maybe I'm part of the problem.

The Lord allowed me.

I think sometimes as Christians, we think hard seasons are punishment or spiritual warfare.

But sometimes the Lord will invite us into difficult seasons for us to grow, to be stretched, but also to be convicted, to look at our own lives and say, where have I contributed to some of this pain, to some of the confusion that I'm feeling?

Where have I believed lies from the enemy?

We go back to the garden in Genesis, and we see that the very first thing the devil does is he tries to make women question if they can hear from God.

And I really believe that that's where a lot of the dysfunction amongst female friendships begin, is when we, as women start to doubt that we Actually hear from God.

And so therefore, we not only don't like who we are, but we then turn that into how we view other women, all based off of the enemy's deception over who God says that we are as his daughters.

Wow.

Wow.

So we're going to get into those.

Those friendships here, here in a minute.

But you write in the book pretty candidly, I think this idea that.

It'S not that you don't like women, but you have felt rejected by women.

And you kind of mentioned that with a mentor that went from, I think you said a Paulette to a Solette.

Can you share just a little bit more about that?

I mean, it starts in elementary school when you're told you can't sit with us at the gym, you know, at the cafeteria table, in the gymnasium, or you don't get invited to a party, or you get older and you don't get the promotion, or you end up under someone who is meant to mentor you but then becomes jealous and starts to see you as their competition.

And in my situation, I really didn't go into adult ministry seeing women as my competition.

I really did see them as a collaborators.

And to have that sort of challenged by a woman who was supposed to support me and lead me and guide me, and not only that, but to see active attempts of sabotage was.

Was so disappointing and also terrifying because I think for a lot of people who are hurt by the church, all it takes is one encounter like that to get them to not only leave the church, but leave their faith.

And this is why, for whatever reason, when it happens at the hands of a woman, it is almost 10 times worse for women than if it were to happen at the hands of a brother.

Because we really do believe that as sisters, we should be working together for the common good.

And so I am seeing a lot of this in my generation where we should be working together as generations.

But we are seeing a bit more competition.

And unfortunately, not everybody gets a book called Raised to stay out of their challenging season.

Sometimes they walk away from their faith altogether.

And that's what we need to start being cognitive of.

Wow, that's a good word.

And the reality, you know, you process through that, but as you said, sometimes it's an exit ramp for certain people that hurt can.

And that competitiveness, is that something you think has always existed, or do you think it's more prominent today?

I mean, I know you're not 115, so you.

Is it increasing?

Is it decreasing?

Does social media.

I'm asking you 15 questions, but does social media play into that?

Any more thoughts on the competition?

Part of it, I think women have always had to try to figure out their seat at the table.

In certain environments, in certain job fields and certain workforces, in certain ministry settings, there are usually fewer seats at tables for women than men in some categories, especially in the local church.

So growing up, you would see there was one alto singer, there was one soprano, there was one woman who maybe got to sit in the room with the men as the administrator for the elders meeting.

You saw these places where there was one seat.

I believe that's changing as women and men start to see themselves as that.

Barack and Deborah and they start partnering together in ministry.

But that relationship takes trust, and I do see that happening in the church.

I think that competition is healthy for us in some ways.

I don't want to say that we should never feel like we need to work hard for promotion, but I also want a seat at a table based off merit and not off of my gender.

And so there is a. I think in women, an innate need to compete for what we feel is scarcity.

But I am really seeing for myself that as women begin to collaborate in the church, not only are there more seats opening up, but women are starting to pull up seats for the next generation.

And that's new.

That is something that I believe the millennials Gen X is doing for Gen Z.

And my prayer is that we can model it better for them than it was modeled for us.

Yeah, good work.

So I.

My early days of life and career, I was a nurse, a registered nurse.

So I was like the guy.

And then there's, you know, work with 20 women.

So I got used to.

And I was young, you know, the majority of them were, you know, probably 10, 15 years older than me.

So the dynamics.

I got very comfortable with females being leaders and leading me and telling me what to do.

And then also the dynamics of working with women and seeing some of the dynamics between them and some of the things you share in the book now, that was in, you know, a hospital wasn't necessarily in the church.

But at the same time, some of those dynamics I saw play out.

And as a young guy, I just kept my head down and stayed out.

Of the situation probably better for him.

It was.

It was.

But, you know, the other.

What has helped me, I think, at least in life and ministry, is being able to see Leaders.

And if they happen to be men or they happen to be women, not the gender, doesn't necessarily have to be, you know, a predominant equation.

Part of it just looking for people that can lead, have the capacity and have the desire.

And.

It'S been a fun ride.

So you mentioned earlier.

But what are some of the unique challenges of being a woman and you're leading other women.

It's challenging in that women are just naturally emotional.

And I actually have a chapter in here called Women are so Emotional, as if that's a negative thing.

Like we've been taught that we can't be emotional because that makes us out of control or crazy or we can't be reasoned with.

And God has given us as women very specific, unique things that he has purposefully placed within us.

And emotion, when regulated, can actually be really helpful and good.

Communication, transparency, vulnerability.

But when it is channeled into places of anger and competition, that emotion can often come off as being unhinged.

Or in the church, sometimes you'll have a passionate woman who gets labeled a Jezebel because it looks like control.

Whereas a man can be passionate and raise his voice and he's honored for that.

Look how much passion that man has.

But when a woman does it, she's like, can't be reasoned with.

And I think for women leading each other, we have to have a really good, healthy dose of emotional iq.

We need to understand the weight of what we carry.

We carry an anointing on us that we don't sometimes even recognize that we have.

We carry a lot of influence now.

We have a lot of young girls looking up to us and we have a lot of men who are having scripts rewritten for them for what it looks like to lead with a woman.

And that's a lot of pressure.

And so I think women wouldn't admit it, but it's a very high pressured responsibility to have leadership in any capacity, whether you're a teacher, a nurse, a doctor at a grocery store leading a team, whatever.

It looks like women carry a different weight of burden in leadership, especially when it comes to leading each other and not having a healthy view of one another.

Wow.

Wow.

And I think what your, your book does and the challenge you place is you're, you're casting a vision for a brighter future.

And I think it, it allows that brighter future and gives a model of what that can look like.

And as you said, that is taking place in some of the younger generations, as you mentioned, pulling seats up from the table rather than removing seats from the table.

And that opportunity for mentorship.

And you give a.

You give a great.

A great model for that.

And I found that valuable.

Very, very valuable.

What can a woman from God.

What can take a woman from being a God's girl to a Gossip Girl?

And how do women deal with those who are gossiping?

So, you know, you mentioned in the book.

I just thought it was.

It was a catchy phrase from God's girl to Gossip Girl.

And how should women be able.

How can women deal with those who are gossiping about them or that are gossiping around them?

It's such a slippery slope within the church community, especially because, you know, the world will talk about each other and they don't care.

They're like, you know, you'll sit around a lunch table and you'll hear everything.

I was in corporate America.

You should have heard those women go.

And they're unapologetic about it.

But when you get into a church situation, we all know gossip's bad.

So it has to be wrapped in something that sounds holy.

So we end up with prayer request or conversation in the prayer of prayer request.

And it really has to come down to women saying, the buck stops with me.

If I'm in a room and I hear another woman talking about a woman who's not there to defend herself or there to give her side of the story, we always are the one it's going to stop with.

Because the truth is, if they're gossiping to you, they're probably gossiping about you.

And for women, we have to be so resolute that I am not going to be the one to spread this discord, understanding that we will be held accountable for that.

Yeah.

If it is something that is causing, you know, this is kingdom repercussions for this stuff.

And so being in a room and seeing that and saying, hey, guys, you know what?

Let's talk about someone, something else.

They're not here to defend themselves.

Or if a friend calls you to tell you something, hey, you know what?

I don't really know them that well.

I can't really keep going on with this conversation.

But I've learned with gossip that so many times we do it because we don't wanna talk about our own pain.

We don't wanna talk about our own faults, our own insecurities.

And really what I've started doing with people, when they call me to tell me prayer requests or whatever, I'll just say, hey, let's talk about you for a little bit.

Like, where is your walk with the Lord?

What's Going on with your daughter, your family, your job, and really just kind of without having to be like, the buck stops with me, really just kind of shifting it back onto the things that we have control over.

And it's not other people.

Yeah.

My wife and I have become fond in our.

Least in our family is, you know, it's not my story to tell and it's not my.

Really, it's not my story to listen to, you know, and so.

And it can be awkward, you know, to stop somebody in the middle of a conversation and say, you know what?

This is really not my story to be listening to.

But at the same time, I sleep better at night and it keeps me from talking more and.

But I don't want to tell other people's stories.

And I think you mentioned earlier on that idea of competitiveness.

I think sometimes gossiping is.

It's tearing other people down to make a.

To make ourselves feel better and trying to figure out what our true motive is in that.

So anyway, it's.

I just.

I appreciated you pointing out whether you're a man or you're a woman.

I think this, the reality of gossiping and the nature.

The destructive nature of it is something that we can.

We can.

We can get better at, for sure.

And those.

Stop those conversations.

Have you found a way to get through the awkwardness of when, you know, when you stop somebody talking about the story, you don't want to know?

Yeah.

Any more thoughts on that?

I would say it's a slippery slope because you could be in the middle of a very natural, innocent conversation and suddenly find yourself in the belly of that beast.

And so there isn't really an easy way to get out of that other than just say, you know what?

Let's just stop here.

But I also think that gossip is the ego's demand to be heard when it has nothing important to say.

And I've learned with people that a lot of times.

Well, you know, a lot of times they'll gossip because they just want to feel part of something.

And so then this becomes an emotional, psychological, spiritual thing, because now you're thinking this person doesn't feel connected and the lowest hanging fruit.

They have to feel like they have some sort of knowledge or something powerful as somebody else.

So this becomes also a very pastoral moment to look at someone and say, well, I'm really sensing that you just have some things that you want to talk about, and I think we should not waste our time talking about that person and let's talk about what's happening in your life.

Like, how can I. I pray for you, how can I serve you?

And really not making them feel guilty for that, because there's probably enough guilt in their life, but to really just pastor people through that.

And we're all shepherds in our own lanes, in our own fields.

So to.

To learn how to guide that away from not making people feel guilt, but to kind of convict, allow the Holy Spirit to convict them in his own gentle way while we're just accountable for our own space in that time.

Yeah, it's good.

Good word.

I was in a discussion one time and a leader said, hey, we're going to need to take a 90 degree turn in this conversation.

And it was, it didn't make anybody feel guilty or upset, but it also let us know that he felt uncomfortable with the direction of it and he wanted to see the conversation turn in a different direction.

It got the point across.

It didn't.

Like I said, nobody was, you know, felt offended by it, but it's something that I've used too.

Just that idea of.

And then, like, as you said, you can focus on the people that are there rather than people that aren't necessarily in the room.

So you talked a little bit about the idea of sacred friendships.

What's the importance of women having sacred friendships in the world and day that we live in?

Well, we have so many definitions of friendship and sisterhood, right?

Like, if you watch movies, we've got Mean Girls, we've got Gossip Girl, we have Clueless, we have the show Friends, we've got that Summer I Turned Pretty.

We, we have all of these definitions, definitions culturally of what friendship looks like.

And then you use the word sisterhood and you're thinking, okay, is this like Taylor Swift, Beyonce sisterhood, where we're all joining together for a political fight, for a cultural war.

And when I was looking at that word sacred, I was really thinking of what does it mean for something to be sacred?

And that just means to be set apart and safe.

What are the sacred spaces in our life?

Well, sanctuaries are sacred.

Our homes are sacred.

Our marriages are sacred.

Things that took covenant and vow.

It takes commitment, right?

And not everyone will view friendship as a commitment.

They'll see it as a convenience.

They'll see it as something that someone can gain something from.

But a sacred sister is someone who says, I don't have much to offer you, but I do have Jesus.

It's what Peter and John said to the man at the gate called beautiful.

They said, silver and gold I do not have, but I will give you the one thing I have in the name of Jesus, get up and walk.

And we think with friendship that we need to give people our big houses and fancy girls nights and that we have to be like, you know, all things to all people, but really all sacred sisterhood is being as the hands and feet of Jesus and giving each other what we can give them.

Which is a nice text to say, I'm praying for you today, or, I heard that your son is sick.

Can I bring you some soup?

Like, there are so many easy ways for us to be sick.

Safe places for each other that don't require a lot of our time.

And I think for women, we're not looking for seventh grade friendship where we braid each other's hair and have sleepovers.

We're just looking for a safe place to call and say, hey, I'm having a hard day, can you pray for me?

Yeah.

That's good.

And you continued on on that thread, you said that the women will be stung a few times attempting to get honey, but the sweetness is worth the sting.

How do women, and probably for all of us, how do you push through the stings to get to the sweetness and not seal off and accept.

I think the alternative, as you point out in the book, is to accept superficial relationships rather than those rich friendships.

So how do you push through the stings to get to the honey and not seal off and just say, hey, I don't want to get stung anymore, so I'm just going to accept the superficial?

Well, first of all, I would say I think all of us have probably just thought, I'm better off alone.

I can at least like manage myself and not hurt myself.

And we've all had that.

Well, I'm just going to isolate.

And I think for some of us, we've tried that and we've realized that loneliness is not the answer, isolation is not the answer.

And so I've gone the other direction where I've just tried to have a bunch of superficial friendships and just thought, well, I'll just like, like dabble in all of these friend groups and hope somebody sticks.

And then that makes me feel even more left out because I'm not part of their cliques.

And really what I've had to do is just start asking the Lord for intentional interactions with women that aren't necessarily for the matter of lifetime friendship, but for in that moment, everything that I need to be for her and everything the Lord wants her to be for me.

And it may not result in a 5 year BFF.

It may not be my lifetime sister.

But in that moment, Lord, how can I be a friend to this woman?

And how will you allow her to be a friend to me?

How will I allow her to be a friend for me?

And in that 500 women in the last year that I've interacted with, five or six have been the ones that I'll go grab coffee with or I'll go for a walk with.

And again, it was just little bits of opening my heart up and saying, in this moment, right now, not next week, not the next year, but how can I be a friend to this woman?

And just how the Lord has either ended it right after that, or he's allowed that friendship to continue.

So we just have to have our hearts available just to be kind, give a smile, give a side hug, like, you don't.

We don't have to, like, go for the gusto right out of the gate, Just gentle small steps towards back into that.

And in being obedient to the Holy Spirit and having the discernment and to walk through those opportunities and that God places in our step each and every day.

And I would agree with you, I think there's been times where I've, you know, had the stings and thought, yeah, this friendship thing is.

Is not worth it.

And so my, my dad would say, growing up as a kid, he said, you know, people in the church, they're like bees.

If they love you, they'll make honey.

If they don't like you, they'll sting you to death.

You know, I mean, and so it would, you know, and that when you.

What you read there, it made me think of what he would often say, but it can be the truth.

And so you would hope for different, but sometimes it's not.

But to push through and go for the sacred friendships, as you describe it.

You share a comment.

When I've talked about your book.

With different ladies I've interacted with throughout my travels, this idea that women are catty.

What are some of the triggers from cattiness?

And what do you mean by catty?

Well, we get the word catty from the phrase cat fight.

So anything that raises our claws, to defend, to protect, to, you know, to really, like, almost justify, like, why we are the way we are, and we become catty.

I feel like when we feel like we have something to lose when something that we care deeply about, whether it's a good thing or a bad thing.

I know women, we call it mama bear, but we become very catty when it comes to our children, to sports, to Their school to opportunities, the things and people we love and want to protect, and we see it as protection.

But so many times it's a fear inside of us that we have something to lose.

And when we understand.

I feel threatened because in my past, when someone has come at me this way, I've lost something, so I need to defend myself.

We can actually become really hurtful and we can say really mean things and we can try to protect our reputations and it's all feeling really justified until we walk away from that and think, oh man, like, like I probably didn't need to break her down quite the way that I did to make my myself feel bigger, or I didn't need to get quite as catty or as nitpicky about that as I did, but I just felt so fill in the blank.

And you have no idea how many times I've had to call friends or my own sister and not say, I'm sorry for being catty.

Because, like, people don't usually use that word to describe themselves.

But to say, hey, when you said that, it made me feel really defensive and my reaction was not what I wanted.

Will you just forgive me for that?

I'm so sorry that my, my behavior was hurtful for you.

And I think for me, I've just had to realize, like, I have to know as a daughter of God that I have the father who owns the cattle on a thousand hills.

And if he will give me the table before me in the presence of my enemies an entire meal, then he surely set a seat for everyone else and there isn't lack for any of us.

And I think that Satan again wants to deceive us into thinking that God has favorite kids and that God must like her better because she got the job or the husband, or she's the one who has the big house and the fancy vacations.

And so we become catty.

We major on the minors rather than being grateful for what we have.

And so we try to protect what we have.

And you know, self preservation is not a fruit of the spirit.

And I've had to learn that in my journey away from cattiness, for sure.

Self man, you've had several good quotes.

Self.

Self preservation is not the fruit of the spirit.

But as you were, as you were sharing and talking, it did make me think back to the competition and that idea of things being scarce and the defense when we feel like we're losing something and it can come out.

And so anyway, as I said, I worked in the hospital for quite a few years.

And had saw some of the interactions and anyway you addressed it so I thought, well, it'll give me an opportunity to learn from it him.

And so it's good stuff.

So I have two or three more questions for you that I'm going to ask you to pray for us.

So how has your view of sacred friendships changed?

Maybe.

And maybe compare in this season of life maybe to another season of life for those that are listening in because I know for females, you know, you, there's some that are solo, they're not married yet, some that are, they're newly married, some that are married with young kids, some with married with kids that are in university.

And so there's different seasons of life and I would imagine that there's different, you know, there's different time constraints and amount of time and just life experience.

So different seasons of life, sacred friendships.

How have you seen that change in your life?

Any wisdom for those listening in?

I think of Ecclesiastes when it talks so much about seasons, how there's a season for everything under the sun.

And I think for a lot of women that jump from college or from being in our early 20s where we're working and we're not constrained by the cares of life, you know, we're just, you know, sleeping on people's couches and going on trips to the lake or whatever your early 20s looked like, that shifts drastically and very quickly between your early 20s into your mid and late 20s as friends start getting married, as friends start having babies and friends.

For me, I was the last of my group to get married, to have babies.

I was 30.

My kids had 6 year olds, some had 8 year olds by the time that I was having babies.

And almost the gut punch of how quickly that season changed and how we don't get a chance to mourn it, so few of us, I don't know what it's like for our brothers, but we don't get a chance to mourn the loss because we're so busy getting into the new thing, the new job, the new house, the, the new state that very quickly we lose touch with people.

We don't have as much in common.

And then you get into your 30s and kids are at different ages and our hormones are all over the place and we're, we're trying to navigate getting older and nobody taught us what it was like to get older and how friendship in our, when we were 18 is not the same at 38.

And there's again another grieving of I'm not who I was Then, and that's when I had all the friends.

And now I feel more alone than ever.

And, and this is why I think this conversation needs to be had is so that women know they're not alone.

Like, we're all going through these seasons and stages and, and God is with us in that, but he also has placed very strategic people in our life to help walk with us.

And if we are so busy pining over what we had when we were 18 that we can't celebrate what God is doing for us right now, we're going to miss the people God's putting right in front of us who might be 10, 20 years older than us, us, but want to help walk us through a child graduating or empty nest or whatever that looks like.

And I just, I'm really wanting women to know, like, it's okay to struggle and to grieve with what was.

But don't miss who God has for you right now because he's faithful just as he was then to provide you friendship.

He's faithful to provide you sacred sisterhood now.

Yeah, such a good word.

Such a good word.

And those, those different seasons of life, they, they do look different.

I appreciate you sharing about grieving and taking the time to grieve the change.

Yeah.

Like I said, I wish that's something I would have done better, but I was moving on to the next thing.

And you miss some of those seasons.

Last question.

I have.

Well, I got two more questions for you.

Second to last.

What does Naomi and Ruth teach us about sacred, sacred sisterhood?

Well, first of all, we can all find things to trauma bond over.

And these two, if anybody was gonna trauma bond, it was going to be these two.

Over losing, I mean, losing a son, losing a spouse, we, we see what happens when we choose to stay and remain with people, not because we have a similar trauma, but because there is something about their faith that makes us know, hey, if I stick with this person, then no matter what comes, we're going to be okay.

And it isn't we're going to stay together because we've got this grievance.

But more so, we're going to stay together because we realize we're better together and that as we're walking and journeying, you may not be my age, you may not be who I would have chosen to journey with.

It's teaching us multi generational friendship.

It's teaching us family friendship, which I think a lot of us think, can I be family?

Can I be friends with my family?

Can I be friends with my Mother in law, can I be friends with my daughter in law?

The answer is yes, you can be those things.

And to not see sisterhood as just two women who find each other randomly, but women who are actually walking very similar roads, who find God in that place and say, hey, you know what?

Your faith is something that I want to borrow from and your God's going to be my God and your people is going to be my people and you're not getting rid of me no matter what.

And that friendship that went from so much grief and turmoil and loss ended up being one of the most beautiful pictures of sacred sisterhood that we have.

And just so to encourage women, like, some of my best girlfriends are 20 years younger and 20 years older and God will use, use them all.

Trauma bond.

That was.

That's a new one.

That wasn't.

That's a new one.

That's a new one for me.

But a great way to put it.

A great way to put it.

And Natalie, is there a question I should have asked you if you're thinking, Aaron, if you were good podcastos, you would've asked me this, either about the book or a question on women and friendship or anything you think you would like to add.

Anything I should have asked you.

First of all, you're an incredible interviewer.

Your questions were amazing.

And I love, as a man, that you picked this book up.

I've had several men say, I won't carry it to the airport, but I've got it at home and I'm reading it.

Well, I read it.

I read it in the airport.

It was on my computer, but I definitely read it.

Brave man.

You know, I think that a lot of women have the question of why is the church one of the hardest places to find female friendship?

And I really think at the end of the day, we're no different than the world.

You know, guys, like, we are Jesus lovers, but we're still human women and we should expect more from Christian women.

But I would say don't be discouraged if you go to a church and there isn't a huge community for women.

Make one.

Be what you needed.

Start being the one to build the tables.

And I know that's hard for a lot of you because you feel like that's been your role your whole life.

But God has clearly marked you to be someone he trusts with his daughter.

So the church can be the safest place on the planet for both men and women.

But we, as women, like we, we do have to do that groundwork sometimes of creating that safe Sacred sisterhood within our sanctuaries.

Wow.

And taking.

Taking the responsibility.

Taking the responsibility to do it.

So, Natalie, it's been.

Been a joy to spend some time with you today.

Will you pray for us?

Of course.

God, I thank you so much for everyone listening.

I thank you, Lord, for this time together.

Just to take a peek into biblical sisterhood, sacred sisterhood and what it can look like for women all ages, God, I thank you that we're not confined to being friends with only those that look like us and sound like us and live by us and have the same ages and have the same families, God.

But that we are bound together because we're your daughters and we are your family, God.

And unity is your heart's cry.

So I pray for the listener, one who is lonely, God.

I pray, Lord, that you would fold her into family, Lord, that you would give her creativity, God, to bring other women into her family, God, I pray for those who feel overwhelmed right now by the seasons that of change, Lord, that you would give them grace, God, to walk through these years and grieve properly, but also anticipate what's coming, God, because you always continue to provide every need according to your riches and glory, no matter what season we're in.

And God, I thank you, Lord, for making us women.

I thank you that you didn't forget to make us men, God.

You knew what you were doing when you made us women.

And you've equipped us, God, to be your daughters and to bring other women into the family of God where they belong and where they're wanted.

So I just pray, Lord, for just a.

An encouragement to come across your family today, Lord, to know that you have designed us for sisterhood and family.

And it's your heart that we would find sacred sisterhood in Jesus name, Amen.

Amen.