I wish I could just hop on here and offer you a beautiful Christmas craft today and be a lifestyle blogger and go on our merry way with the fabulous lives we all lead.

But the fact remains . . . that just ain’t where I am right now.

I’m in a season of profound loss. In the past year, I’ve lost a beloved stepfather who made my equally beloved mother be filled with joy and peace for the first time in a long time.

And while it’s not even remotely on the same scale, we had to release my sweet soul-sister of a dog, Sassy, two weeks ago. The one we rescued after Ellie died. The ragamuffin with a patchwork heart and whose checkered past made me love her all the more because man . . . did she just get me. Two lost little souls whose paths crossed to bring love and comfort.

Today was another day of profound loss. I cannot yet share details but just know it was rough. As the situation unfolds, I will be able to share more.

Loss is hard. Grief is hard. Life is . . . well, hard as shit.

And yes. I said shit.

I am now 46 years old and looking at the other half of my life and feeling, like so many in my boat, like maybe I know nothing. Sadly, I’ve lived the last four decades thinking I might know something. But now, I realize there is so little I actually, truly, really do.

It is December and the holidays are in full-swing and we are all supposed to be holy and happy and whole. But today, I just feel doubting and sad and in about a million little pieces.

In my most recent book, I discuss how our deconstruction leads to our renovation. I know this to be true. While there is so much I am unsure of, this remains a steadfast truth I will take to my grave. While we can’t ever see this in the midst of our own suffering, I can’t deny the fact that every person in my life who I hold dear, who are my people and who are safe souls who won’t judge me or turn their backs on me when I suggest questions of doubt, have walked through profound suffering and lived to tell about it. Still waters run deep. If you don’t have deep crevices, I’m not sure I can understand. I will love you. I will bless you. I will wish only good for you. But if you, like Sassy, do not have at least a little bit of a ragamuffin of a past, we may not understand each other.

So while we anticipate the birth of a Savior I still hold dear, I also know this is a season of such sadness for so many. “I just try to get through it,” said a friend of mine recently who has walked through the fire as of late. And deep in the recesses of my soul, I relate on so many levels and understand that we are not the only two to feel the same.

There is other suffering I’ve walked over the past few years that I cannot discuss at the moment but know this: pain is pain is pain. My pain is no deeper or greater than yours and vice versa.

I will not try to wrap it up in a big red bow. I will not give the canned, Christian answers anymore. I will not try to make you feel better because I feel more comfortable when you smile.

What those of us who are walking through hardship right now need the very most is knowing you are there. Heck, it’s so much better to say “I don’t know what to say but I’m here” than give a trite answer that will just make us feel worse.

Because at this point in my life, there is one thing I do know: Jesus lived in authentic relationship with people who were suffering. He sought them out. He invited them to dinner. He loved them for who they were at precisely that moment right then.

Acceptance is a form of love. Grace is a bigger form of love. And presence communicates both.

So while I don’t know what will unravel in the coming years, I do know that I will still love a good pinot noir and crevice-filled conversation with those who have walked the hard path of suffering and have been reconstructed – only to be deconstructed and reconstructed yet again. Because our reconstruction is not a one-and-done thing. It’s a process.

And we’ll keep walking.

The post For When The Holidays Are Just Plain Hard appeared first on Natalie Snapp.

I would love to have you join the launch team for my latest book baby. In fact, I wouldn’t just love it – I’d be crazy honored. She makes her debut on September 17 and I am so excited for you to meet her.

Hey, friends – OK, so I admit it’s been crickets over here. If you don’t follow me over on my author page on Facebook, then click here so we can communicate a little more consistently. Over there, I’ve shared about my next book entitled The Bathsheba Battle: Finding Hope When Life Takes An Unexpected Turn.

Do you have to be a huge social media platform with thousands of followers? Absolutely not.

Do you have to commit hours a day to publicize this little book baby? Absolutely not.

Do you have to come up with your own content and agonize over wording? Absolutely not.

If you are committed to the message behind The Bathsheba Battle, if you are positive and passionate about your faith, and if you believe women should come alongside each other and be friends, this launch team just might have your name written all over it!

Should you be selected (and come on – why wouldn’t you??), you and I will be interacting in a small, private Facebook group and get to know each other better. Truth be told, this is what I am looking forward to the most.

So come on – apply already! Click the link below and let’s get going, girl! BUT HURRY: THE DEADLINE AS OF RIGHT NOW IS SUNDAY!!!!

Click here to apply to be a part of The Bathsheba Battle Launch Team

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Yet I have to say . . . I’m a little concerned for my sons. They are good boys. They’re being raised to have integrity, to do the right thing even when no one is watching. They’re being raised to be respectful of women. They’re being raised to look for those who need friends and feel left-out. They’re being raised to strive for excellence, to not accept mediocrity, to push themselves harder when they feel like giving up – but also understand when it’s time to release it to God.

It’s exhausting, this parenting gig. And parenting girls is different in a lot of ways. We’ll talk about that another time because for today, I want to talk about our boys.

In this era of #MeToo, I’ve watched good men be villainized for simply having the unfortunate luck of being born male. Now, before you send me hate mail, please know I would never side against a woman who has been sexually assaulted in any way. I am a strong advocate for the Church doing better when it comes to physical, psychological, and verbal survivors of abuse. My boys are taught that no always means no, that girls and women are to be respected and protected, and they are to defend them if they ever see anything happening that shouldn’t be.

But I’m concerned for them simply because . . . God made them boys. It seems like in today’s culture, it’s not OK for them them to be masculine anymore.

Our culture waters-down their maleness out of fear because if we can clip their biology, then we don’t have to worry about sexual assault. Just watch the commercials and TV shows of today – men are portrayed as bumbling idiots that can’t find their way out of a paper bag. Once you become aware of this, you’ll notice it even more.

I know the phrase “Boys will be boys” is controversial and when used as it pertains to sexual assault, it’s not acceptable in any way.

Yet boys will be boys in that they will be loud. They will wrestle and knock over furniture (I have bought five new lamps in the past two years). They leave sweaty socks ALL OVER THE HOUSE. They can’t help but love those dang video games. And they laugh incessantly over anything having to do with poop. Which, might I add, they never grow out of because well . . . there’s an older male that lives at my house that joins in, too.

When my daughter has friends over, they are definitely loud. But they don’t wrestle. She doesn’t love video games. No one is talking about poop. And the socks . . . well, let’s just say it’s far less with her.

Girls are different from boys. Boys are different from girls. Women are different from men. Men are different from women. There is purpose in that.

But until we protect our boys and make them believe they are not how they are portrayed by the media or the loud culture feeding them lies, we run the risk of the self-fulfilling prophecy, which simply means we become what we are expected to become. If we hear we are something long enough, then the label becomes reality. Psychology 101.

Not all men are sexual predators. Not all men are abusive. Not all men are chauvinistic pigs. There are just as many females who fit that criteria and I’m sure as heck thankful I’m not labeled a certain way based on the behavior of another group of women.

The war against good men has to stop – for the sake of our young sons. For if we want to see change in the world, that’s where it starts. We must feed our boys truth. We must teach them to look for ways in which their gender is stereotyped as buffoons (and girls as well – but they are sexualized instead of made to look like idiots. We’ll talk about that soon.) and refuse to believe it. They must know that God created them to be men for a reason and all the good things men do – and women.

We must teach our sons to rise-up, despite the stereotypes thrown in their faces each day. My husband has been reading The Way of the Warrior Kid (thanks, Pastor Eric!) with my boys before bed each night and a new phrase in our house is “Warrior up!”

Warrior up, boys. Warrior up to the truth of who you really are. Warrior up to fighting the stereotypes that say you’re a sex-crazed idiot. Warrior up and speak out against those boys and men who contribute to these stereotypes. Warrior up to loving other well – regardless of race, or beliefs, or gender.

It takes courage to be a masculine male these days, boys. Guard that responsibility wisely.

Warrior up.

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