Questions for the District Overseer (page 2)

slimboyfat

Yeah, that's a bit heavy. Maybe I'll just stick to the plan and ask him whether we will wear any clothes in the new system?

Slim

ninja

or if he would like a cup of tea?...always an ice breaker....then go into the false prophecies....he he

professor

Disfellowshipping takes place only if a member of the congregation unrepentantly engages in gross sin.

Mmm hmm. I was repentant and had completely discontinued my offending actions at the time of my Judicial Committee meeting. The elders literally laughed at me as they disfellowshipped me.

slimboyfat

Possible conversation starters:

Well I just read this book on Who Wrote the Bible, and you'll never guess...

You know that new Question from Readers on the selection of the anointed, well I have been reevaluating my own status lately...

Slim

You could ask him about this:

"I have a question that's been nagging at me. We say that Jesus emphasized the Divine Name. Yet, it seems he mainly only uses the Divine Name (in the NWT) when he's quoting from the Hebrew Scriptures. Otherwise, it appears there are only about 3 verses (in the NWT) where he uses Jehovah in his everyday speech. And, does he utter the Divine Name in his prayers? True, he refers to God's name ("Let your name be sanctified" and "I have made your name manifest") but I haven't found any of his prayers which have him actually saying "Jehovah". Usually, it seems he says "Father" and refers to him as "God". This is just a question I've been trying to resolve.

stevenyc

Slim, ask him about the May 1st Watchtower QFR.

Tell him you always knew you were of the heavenly fold, and that you will now start partaking, and will be happy to mediate, on his behalf, between him and Jesus.

steve

cabasilas

Another question idea:

"Someone asked me this: Is the number 12,000 from each tribe in Revelation 7 literal or symbolic? I thought it was symbolic and I told them that. I later checked in the book "Commentary on the Letter of James" (pp. 12,13) and it seems to say it's a symbolic number. The person then asked me: How can you insist the total number 144,000 is literal when you say the number 12,000 from each tribe is symbolic? Isn't that inconsistent? Shouldn't the numbers be viewed as both symbolic or both literal? I didn't know how to answer that."

OnTheWayOut

Nothing good can come from questioning the DO. The elder and DO will just use this session as
an evidence-gathering meeting. Do yourself a favor and just listen to him. When he asks a question
at the beginning, don't convict yourself. Just say, "I am here to listen." At the end, don't commit to
any further meetings or course of action. Just say "Thanks for coming."

If you can change it, don't meet at your own home. You need an excuse to leave if it starts to become
an argument session. Meet at the Hall or in public.

Best would be to cancel the meeting, altogether. Short of that, don't bother to cooperate with any
efforts to gather evidence. Even if you are ready to walk away from it all, go to the rank and file for
closure- help someone else become AWOKE, somebody who might actually listen.

TD

Hi Slim

One of my favorites with the upper-echelon type of JW (Not that I get the opportunity to talk to that sort very often) is to ask them to explain the revised generation teaching by first defining their terms and then paraphrasing.

This usually just draws a blank look, so I say, "It's all very well to speculate on how an individual word in a sentence should be defined, but the proof is whether or not that definition works when it is plugged back into the sentence."

For example, these are how the terms used to be defined:

This generation = Those alive in 1914 when the sign commenced
Pass away = Die from old age
All these things = The entire sign including Armageddon

Plug these terms in and you get this:

Those alive in 1914 when the sign commenced will not all die from old age until the entire sign including Armageddon has occured

Right or wrong, this at least makes sense.

Of course those defintions are no longer considered valid. These are how the terms are now defined:

This generation = Those contemporary with the sign who take no note
Pass away = Die at Armageddon
All these things = The entire sign including Armageddon

It's difficult to plug in these terms and paraphrase, especially in spoken conversation because the mind rebels at the thought. The temporal preposition, "Until" demands that the ending condition be farther down in the stream of time than the starting condition. When that doesn't happen, the result is a semantic null:

Those contemporary with the sign who take no note will not die at Armageddon until the entire sign including Armageddon has occured

Regardless of how politely and non-confontationally I've broached this topic, all I've ever gotten from a JW in response to this inquiry is red faced indignation.

Questions for the District Overseer

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