I have read the prescribed books by Steve Hassan ...
I recently had a discussion with my wife about Ray's "Crisis of Conscience".
She knows where I stand as far as "The Truth" goes, but still holds out hope that I will come to my senses.
My biggest fear at the moment is for my teenage daughter who is not yet baptized but is at an age and time when a change could have a great influence on her future. She wanted to get baptized at the convention last year, but when she was talking about it was around the time I started waking up so the deed was avoided.
I mention this so you understand somewhat my urgency.
A couple of weeks ago I spoke with my wife about "Crisis of Conscience", I told her that I wanted her to have any opportunity to read the book herself. I knew she wouldn't want to, so I suggested it as an opportunity for her to read it before I had my daughter read it. I told her how I wish I had it available to me to read before I was baptized and that it would be wrong for me not to allow my daughter the opportunity to read it. I presented it as an opportunity for my wife to read it first, not to try and change her, but to give her the opportunity to understand it first so when I presented to to my daughter she could have the opportunity to present her informed side to refute it.
Well, our discussion was fairly civilized, but she most certainly doesn't like the idea, and she hasn't turned me in yet.
Today, I shared with her some information from "The Finished Mystery" ... I had left some printed pages with hilighted parts lying around, she looked at some of it ... since it isn't technically from apostates, she allowed me to discuss some of it with her. Particularly the Adventist ties to Russell, the description of the locomotive with its steam engine as fulfillment of Bible prophecy, all of the reasons scripturally and in prophetic fulfillment at the time PROVED 1918 would be the fulfillment of what they mistakenly thought would would happen in 1915.
We got a good laugh about it. She agreed they had some crazy ideas, but that we always knew they thought some crazy things but that God still uses the organization. She believes that even though they were wrong, it was their desire to understand, their willingness to change, that showed them to be like moist clay willing to be shaped by the potter.
If it was just my wife, I could be much more patient about this, I could go to the meetings and play the game, but I feel for the sake of my daughter, I must move this along more quickly.
Any thoughts ... suggestions? Thanks.
