What did you think in -95? (page 3)

Seeker4

I had stepped down as an elder by then - but I knew perfectly well what it meant. I had conducted the WT study in 1989 that used the same Greek words to prove that it had to be the specific generation around in 1914. Now they were using the Greek to prove the exact opposite!

It was the last straw for me. I never went out in service again. When a close friend elder invited me out with him, I explained that we should be going out in service apologizing for misleading people over the last 75 years! I was gone after that, slowed down my meeting attendance, step off the TMS, and faded.

I wasn't the only one - as this thread and many others show,.

In my own circuit, at an assembly, another brother told me, and I quote directly, "The Society is really covering their ass with that one, aren't they!"

My feeling is that the WTS peaked in the early 90s and has been in serious trouble ever since.

S4

LouBelle

I should start - and hold it in the parking lot of the close by kingdom hall.

Dorktacular

Seeker4, that is an old trick of the WTBS. Remeber John 1:1? "The word was a god?" Remember the hours of explaining they put into why the NWT translated that scripture that way? Here's a good explaination of why that may be wrong. In 1989 when the Watchtower argued the validity of their original stance regarding "this generation", they argued why it referred to those living in 1914. In 1995, they completely reversed and contradicted their first explaination that was offered up in 1989.

Shawn10538

I didn't even notice it, didn't give it a second's thought, untill a friend of mine said sarcastically, "Hmmm, now just how long is a generation anyway? Hmmmm." That friend, an ex-Bethelite and good friend Tilden Berger was largely responsible for me going to Bethel. The last I heard from him a few years ago was he did not want me to call him anymore. Even after I told him that I was no longer in "the False."

snowbird

I was out at the time, and read about it in the Mobile (AL) Register.

I thought to myself, "I wondered when they were going to change that teaching - I never believed it anyway."

Sylvia

White Dove

It floated by me without so much of a notice. I just thought oh, that's interesting and let it pass.

undercover

I never really "studied" anything. I just kind of accepted everything at face value, having been raised in the "truth". So when that WT came out, I just kind of zombied out during that particluar WT study.

But I overheard some pioneers talking about the change in the 'generation' teaching. A couple of them commented that it basically postponed Armageddon while others argued more in favor of 'new light'. I couldn't help but notice that this was a disagreement in what was being printed by the WTS.

I looked at it harder but didn't really see it as earth shaking at the time...but it did cause a change. I was a bit disillusioned and started questioning more.

In some ways, it could have been the beginning of the end but it took a succession of events to push me over the edge.

snowbird

When I went back in 2002-3 , I brought it and the sheep/goats teaching up with an elder.

He was very uncomfortable and brushed me off in a hurry!

The WT has been foundering seriously since 1995.

LOL at FinallyFree.

Sylvia

Seeker4

dorktacular - You get a certificate at Master, but you should see the sword you get at Jedi!

I think most Witnesses are like Shawn - it just slips past them. That's the way it was in my congregation.
One of the last School talks I gave, I took the 5 minutes to explain all of the recent changes - sheep and goats not being seperated, 1914 generation - and spelled out EXACTLY what these meant in clear simple language. You should have seen the mouths drop open! One old time sister came up to me after, no dummy and no slouch in the study department, and told me she had no idea that's what the changes really were.

The very last talk I gave was connected somehow with Proverbs 8 - which the WTS says is a description of Jesus as Jehovah's helper during the creation. In fact, those verses are in the middle of several chapters where Sophia - wisdom, and a woman - is talking. The next week the school overseer read the WTS's offical explanation of Proverbs 8 during the meeting.

I quit the school.

"The WT has been foundering seriously since 1995."

I totally agree.

S4

Gregor

It was a Saturday afternoon in about 1980 and I was working in my front yard, a car pulled up and it was my old pal, David. He got out and chatted a bit with a couple of my (5) kids who were playing ball in the street. I greeted him as he walked up to me. He seemed to have tears in his eyes and I knew he was very nervous. I tried to put him at ease, I offered him a beer and we chatted briefly about this and that. Then he got down to the point of his visit "we miss you at the meetings, you know it's the truth, the time is short, you want your kids to live in the new order...etc" I responded in kind, that is, with deep sincerety and conviction. I'll never forget putting my hand on his shoulder and saying the following- "David, mark my words. The organization has painted themselves into a corner with "generation of 1914" doctrine. Sometime before 1999 (I came up with that based on the Societies current statements that a person of 'that generation' would have to be around 12 yrs old in 1914) they will come up with "new light" to get themselves more time."

In 1995, after my family and I were long gone and had about a dozen Christmas trees under our belt, a friend sent me a copy of the WT wherein they double-talked their way out of the 1914 corner I had referred to those many years before. I have often wondered if any of those brothers to whom I had made that statement had thought about it on the Sunday afternoon when it was being studied in the KH.

What did you think in -95?

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