Blog Highlights: Lost Sheep – Hockey and Faith!

I wrote before of my friend lost sheep, who started a series speaking to faith through the lens of hockey.  I loved her post then, and encouraged her to continue writing.  She’s revamped one of her blogs to focus on faith using hockey as the analogy, as well as other popular things in our culture.  I love her take on it – I told her that she might even make me start watching hockey because of her enthusiasm for the game!

This is her “About This Blog” post:

i write a couple different blogs—one on spiritual abuse and another full of poetry and my faith—i struggle dearly with my faith due to spiritual abuse, hurts, and oppression.  I am hoping to take this blog as an inspiration—I want to take this blog and relate faith to everyday life, through sports, music, reading, quotes, etc—some of this may not be positive, heck some of it may be very dark—but i ask you to take the time to read the post and see how your faith, etc does relate to everyday life—also, if you have something to share, let me know—be happy to share that on this blog also.

Please take a chance to read through the revamped blog Searching For Victory and be immersed, for now, in hockey parlance as it connects to our faith.

Here is an excerpt from her latest post  “HE is a PENS fan!! :)”

My son and I finally have a team to agree upon–the PENS–most other sports we are rivals–i tried to raise him” with the “right” teams–but he is stubborn–PENS are my favorite, and hockey is my favorite so at least we agree here—just thank god he doesn’t like the Red Wings–BLECH-i am really surprised my son doesn’t chose the red wings out of spite  just to be deviant and defiant–but i would love him anyways (so i think  i don’t know about having a wings fan in my household–hmmmpphhh)

i also dont want to be pushy “parent”  and make my son like, or do things he doesn’t want to—want him to make his own choices, and to grow up knowing he has his own choices-however, i am trying to be convincing of him to play hockey as a sport—would enjoy so much watching him play this sport—but then would also worry alot about him getting hurt.  I tell him to pray about it when he isn’t sure what to do, or team to choose.

This again makes me think of my faith in several senses—….

Read the rest here.

Blog Highlight: Mandy Thompson – MandyThompson.com

I met this blogger through traversing through a mutual friend’s blogroll.  I fell in love with her quirky humour and lovely posts – and recently was touched by her songs (she’s an awesome songwriter and singer, as well as a worship leader) as she posted them up when she did a blog re-design.  I was going through a very dark day and just found myself on her Albums page and just listened to her songs over and over. And over. And over.  Until I started  to see the darkness lift off my soul.

She has chosen to reveal a hard part to her and her husband’s life.  And I thought that I would forgo the post I was going to put up here to highlight her today.

Infertility is not often talked about.  But it should be.  The pain. The depression.  The wait.   She is currently going through this , and it probably took a lot out of her to reveal this publicly to the world.

Start to read up on her story so far entitled The Waiting: Part 1 – We Have A Story; Part 2 – The Real Reason I Quit Seminary;  and Part 3: Clomid.

For those who are going through, or knows someone who is going through – point them over to Mandy’s blog. And get involved.  And then explore the rest of her site – because she is FUN to be around, notwithstanding the heaviness of the above series…

And… Mandy – I love you. I love your courage, and your commitment to your husband and the rest of your family – and their commitment to you during this time. I will do my part by listening – and by sharing.  And may someone else be helped because you were open.

And – I LOVE THE BLOG DESIGN.  🙂

Blog Highlight: Lost Sheep – You Will Rise Again

I thought that I would continue the highlights of blogs that I interact with, and friends that I have met through the blogosphere.

Lost Sheep has been my friend now for a while, and we have been walking together through her recovery from spiritual abuse.  I have been there to listen and just be a friend while she expresses her frustration and pain about being constantly told that God hated her, that she was a terrible Christian, that she would never amount to anything and the like.  It has affected her emotionally, physically and, of course, spiritually as well.  She was horrified to realize later that the ‘church’ she had joined as a brand new believer eager to know more about the Lord was actually an organization with strong cult tendencies.

She has detailed how the abuse has affected her, given her story briefly, and set up groups for mutual support and comfort for those who have been victims of spiritual abuse, as well as pastors and leaders who want to know how to help.

I have encouraged her that her story and her work is important, and it will help many.  In a real sense it will also shine light into the dark corners of spirituality (this isn’t true church by any means) and as the light shines in the darkness, it will definitely derail Satan’s plans on many levels.

So, I encourage all to go and read her blog – You Will Rise Again.  Anyone who is interested to understand how cults affect people – here is one person who is no where near the end of her journey… she is constantly battling spiritual oppression as well as apparent betrayals from those who have promised to assist her.  BUT – she keeps on going.  She keeps pressing on – albeit with a lot of encouragement from some close friends.  Her work is important.  Get involved by prayer or by reading the blog and interacting with Lost Sheep.

Pray.  Get involved.