Keep on the watch

by Norm 1 Replies latest jw friends

  • Norm
    Norm

    Are you on the watch? Are you religious? Are you a believer?
    Are you even a “true believer”? Do you believe whatever anyone tells you? If you do aren’t you quite gullible? If something is highly unlikely is it believable? If someone tells you about fantastic events taking place, things that has never happened in our time and age would you believe it? If they told you such things don’t happen anymore but they sure did happen a long time ago, do that makes it more believable? Why is it that makes such stories more believable and true if they happened a long time ago?

    Do you consider what you read and hear with a critical mind or do you just believe it because it comes from a source that you consider reliable? Is a source necessarily reliable and true just because it claims to be? Is something true just because someone says so? Are claims in a book automatically true because the author says it is?

    How do you personally verify if something is true or not? Do you bother at all with such matters?

    Let’s take a look at something we are all familiar with as the majority here has our entanglement with the Watchtower Society in common:

    *** w03 1/1 p. 17 “Keep on the Watch”! ***
    “Keep on the Watch”!
    “What I say to you I say to all, Keep on the watch.”—Mark 13:37.
    JUAN kept his valuables at home. He stored them under his bed—in his opinion the safest place in the house. One night, however, while he and his wife were sleeping, a thief entered the bedroom. Evidently, the thief knew just where to look. He silently removed every valuable item from under the bed as well as money Juan had left in a drawer in the bedside table. The following morning, Juan discovered the theft. He will long remember the painful lesson that he learned: A sleeping man cannot guard his possessions.

    What is it this Watchtower wants to press home with writing this? Well, they keyword is “sleeping” and it is as so many times before the old song and dance about the alleged imminence of the “coming of the Lord”:

    *** w03 1/1 pp. 17-18 “Keep on the Watch”! ***
    2 The same is true in a spiritual sense. We cannot safeguard our hope and our faith if we fall asleep. Hence, Paul’s exhortation: “Let us not sleep on as the rest do, but let us stay awake and keep our senses.” (1 Thessalonians 5:6) To show how vital it is to stay awake, Jesus used the illustration of a thief. He described the events that would lead up to his coming as Judge, and then he warned: “Keep on the watch, therefore, because you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But know one thing, that if the householder had known in what watch the thief was coming, he would have kept awake and not allowed his house to be broken into. On this account you too prove yourselves ready, because at an hour that you do not think to be it, the Son of man is coming.” (Matthew 24:42-44) A thief does not announce in advance when he is coming. He hopes to arrive when no one is expecting him. Similarly, as Jesus said, the end of this system will come at ‘an hour that we do not think to be it.’

    Above you can all observe the old tired worn out insane drivel that the Watchtower Society has recycled ad infinitum as long as it has existed and it is still stupid insane superstitious twaddle. Do any of you actually take this seriously anymore, I know it is based of the Bible, but does that help? Consider for a moment this sentence:

    “A thief does not announce in advance when he is coming. He hopes to arrive when no one is expecting him. Similarly, as Jesus said, the end of this system will come at ‘an hour that we do not think to be it.’”

    Now tell me seriously how could it ever be possible for the “thief” or the “end of the system” to come unexpected? Has there ever been a time when these idiots in Brooklyn or someone else haven’t been expecting “the end” to come? Logic has never been a big thing in religion I know but how incredibly stupid can it get? The Watchtower Society and Jehovah's Witnesses and many others have the equivalent of 24 hour surveillance and watch incessantly for signs of the “end”. They are constantly yelling about it, so how can any “thief” pass that unobserved?

    And why should anyone take an old book that said the “Lord” would come “soon” more then 2000 years ago? If soon means thousands of years the word has of course lost all possible meaning to a human being who lives 70-80 years. Would you send someone with that concept of the word soon out for pizza?

    How about us? We who have spent periods of various length in the Watchtower Society, were we on our watch? If we were, how come some of us had large portions, some almost our whole life stolen from us? Do they come any more gullible then us? Did you learn anything from this experience? Or are you just as lazy as you were? Still not thinking, still superstitious still not skeptical, investigating and verifying if what you are told is true? What does it takes to get you out of the fantasy world?

    Look at this worn out vomit from Brooklyn:

    *** w03 1/1 p. 18 “Keep on the Watch”! ***
    4 We can derive another lesson from Jesus’ illustration. Although the slaves did not know the hour when their master would arrive, apparently they knew the night. It would have been difficult to keep awake all that night if they thought that their master might come some other night. But no, they knew which night he was coming, and that gave them strong incentive to stay awake. In a rather similar way, Bible prophecies clearly reveal that we are living in the time of the end; but they do not tell us the day or the hour of the end itself. (Matthew 24:36) Our belief that the end is coming helps us to stay awake, but if we are convinced that Jehovah’s day really is near, we will have far stronger motivation to be on the watch.—Zephaniah 1:14.

    Again these idiots subtly claim that they “know” something. Look at this:

    “But no, they knew which night he was coming, and that gave them strong incentive to stay awake.”

    And this:

    “In a rather similar way, Bible prophecies clearly reveal that we are living in the time of the end; but they do not tell us the day or the hour of the end itself.”

    Of course the “Bible prophecies” show no such thing, never ever has, never will, why? Because it is all fantasies which was written down by superstitious people who didn’t know any better. It’s high time we try to deal with reality here folks, wake up, be on you watch!
    Use your heads, use your brains and thinking ability, be critical, investigate, and educate yourself. Or do you still want to spend your time and energy in an endless loop trying to make sense out the senseless in a perpetual Bible study?

    Take care,

    Norm

  • jgnat
    jgnat
    The Watchtower Society and Jehovah's Witnesses and many others have the equivalent of 24 hour surveillance and watch incessantly for signs of the "end"

    That's a great way of phrasing it, Norm. For six days God built, then he rested. And he called it good. The way the witnesses "keep on the watch", when can they ever sleep? It seems if they were serious about "keeping on the watch" they could at least stay awake in shifts, so that everyone had a scheduled times of rest. I maintain that the bible admonition to stay alert is different than staying awake, 24/7. In fact, to stay alert you MUST have times of rest.

    I grit my teeth over this interpretation too, Norm. I've decided, as a regular Christian, I can give a nod to my Creator that He can shake things up at any time. In the meantime, I live my life daily as if he were watching. What more need I do?

    And what about the reference to people marrying, eating, and sleeping right up to the day of the flood? I don't take it as condemnation, as in "Shame on you for marrying and eating and sleeping instead of pounding nails." I take the bible account in this case to be simply listing the things that people ordinarily do.

    But there's a big problem for a high-control group that let's it's people rest. They have time to ponder things on their own. An individual allowed to ponder might conclude that the society left out a few things in their prophecy-making. Or added some new (unbiblical) rules of their own.

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