The Super Blogosphere of a parallel word.

  There is something healing about the past if we revisit it in the proper way. Many of us have things in our past that we want to remain in the past, but some of us have trauma that is waiting to be healed. There are different causes of this particular trauma, some can be caused by our sins, but sometimes it is the sins of others that causes suffering. Mixed in with this trauma are good or positive experiences, which may no longer define who we are, but still have an effect on our psychology.   When we embrace negative trauma, the kind of trauma that is currently unwanted, when we embrace it in a positive way, we can learn from the mistakes we made and we can repent. Repentance can bring healing into your life, even if you were the cause of the trauma or you participated freely in it. The kind of trauma that is harder to heal, but not impossible is the trauma you experienced from an authority figure or people much older than you. Forgiveness helps to heal this kind of trauma ...

  Have you ever been thrown under the bus? Not literally but metaphorically? This is precisely what is happening in many Christian congregations in North America and elsewhere. The way churches used to behave is radically different from the way churches are acting in the twenty first century. With the population growth and growth in congregations, the pastors in some churches feel overwhelmed and unable to pastor the congregation, so what many churches have done is limiting the ministry roles of pastors and delegating more responsibility to lay leaders and lay ministers.   At first this seems exciting to the laity because it gives us more of a responsibility within the church, and we feel more empowered as to the direction of our faith. However, what is the result of putting less pastoral responsibility on the pastor and more responsibility on the laity? I argue that when this happens in a church, the laity actually becomes expendable. When our pastors are overwhelmed with the...