I did not know this was a bash the Jehovah's Witnesses Forum. I apologize for intruding but before I leave I would like to say a few things. I believe that if someone is a JW and decide that it is not right for them then fine, make your choice as you all have and leave it at that. When you get to the point of criticizing someones worship to God; that's a sin in itself. I believe that JW's are a good group of people, they teach what is in the Bible not what they believe should be in the Bible. How can anyone bash a group who live their life so close to what the Bible teaches. True there are some who don't, as some bring up the pedophiles. But that's in all religions; some more than others. But we know that each and ev1 of us are imperfect beings.
The Bible says that there will be those who rise up among Christians and turn apostate and try to turn others away from the truth. I don't know about any of you but I wouldn't dare want to be considered that person. My heart goes out to all of you and I'll pray for you all. It's natural we will come across one or two and sometimes maybe half a congregation that do not live their life according to the Bible, but these are the times we're living in; critical times hard to deal with and things are only getting worse. Satan is doing everything in his power to turn as many of Jehovah's people away from Him as he can. Satan knows he has a short time left and he's showing it; working ever so hard to throw whatever obstacles he can in front of us all. Proverbs 27:11 says we should make His (God's) heart rejoice so that he can make a reply to Satan. I'm not trying to preach to anyone at this point but I do ask that you all, as well as myself, continuously examine yourselves.
From very young I was brought up in the truth, but at the age of 26 I allowed room for Satan and it resulted in my being disfellowshipped. When that happened my life just got worse I cried myself to sleep nightly. It had nothing to do with being cut off from the congregation or family because half my family still associated with me. My feeling terrible and lost was because I had lost my relationship with God. For a while I tried to make myself feel better by making myself believe that I didn't have to be a JW. I never bashed JW's I just made myself content with not going to the meetings. I was disfellowshipped for 10 years and I thank God that soon I came across a WT magazine and the minute I read it I couldn't deny it any longer. I resumed going to the meetings and then Hurricane Katrina happened. I prayed fervently to Jehovah to keep me, my husband and our 3 kids (7,6,4) safe. After the storm we were able to pull ourselves together buy our home and get settled in a new state. I continued to pray to Jehovah for help and guidance and sure 'nuff one of the Witnesses knocked on my door. From there it's history, I have been reinstated and I feel so alive, invigorating, and refreshed. I feel closer to God than I have ever felt.
What I think happens to most of us when we leave the truth is we don't examine ourselves before making decisions. We get to the point that we want to blame everything and everyone else for what we have gone through instead of looking at what we have done wrong to cause it. Those of us who were disfellowshipped; all the while it was happening to others, we had no problems with it. BUT when it happened to us we just can't understand why they had to disfellowship us. So we start blaming the brothers, the congregation, the religion for something we basically brought on ourselves. We must remember that it is Jehovah whom we are striving to please not man and Jehovah can read our hearts so there's no reason for us not to be true with ourselves because what it all boils down to is our being judged based on our doing not anyone elses.
Again I pray that you all search your hearts and pray to God that he allow his holy spirit to guide you to the right path/course of life.
