by blondie 16 Replies latest jw friends
Paragraph 11 about the abusive employer stikes a raw nerve in me. I had a similar situation and the nicer I tried to be the more abusive she became.
Power tripping bosses will run over you if you allow it. You have to fight fire with fire in most of these cases.
Although the general principle of controlling anger is a good one, and although it's one of JWs' strengths when in large gatherings to be patient, peaceful and 'sheeplike' in unusually trying situations (whatever the sociological/psychological reasons are), the article was a little one-sided at times - condemning the 'world' while promoting the fluffy-bunniness of their chosen 'good' Bible examples.
5 Further, many of the people we come in contact with are "lovers of themselves," "haughty," and even "fierce." It is very easy for bad characteristics like these to rub off on us and anger us. (2 Tim. 3:2-5) In fact, movies and TV programs often portray vengeance as noble and violence as a natural and justifiable solution to problems. Typical story lines lead viewers to look forward to the moment when the villain "gets what he deserves" - usually a violent end at the hands of the story's hero.
6 Such propaganda promotes, not God's ways, but "the spirit of the world" and of its angry ruler, Satan. (1 Cor. 2:12; Eph. 2:2; Rev. 12:12) That spirit caters to the imperfect flesh and is in total opposition to God's holy spirit and its fruitage. Indeed, a fundamental teaching of Christianity is not to retaliate under provocation. (Read Matthew 5:39, 44, 45.)
It is a universal theme across times and cultures - a gross injustice has been done and the good guy overcomes the greatest of odds against him to dish out 'just desserts' to the bad guy. Surely, the OT has many examples of God-fearing people seeking vengeance to repay acts of evil. In fact, isn't it one of the basic themes of 'God's inspired word' - the seed of the woman who was bruised in the heel will, in retribution, bruise (crush) the serpent in the head?
9 It was quite different with King David. He had numerous opportunities to take revenge, but he did not. (1 Sam. 24:3-7)
Sure, he had opportunity to do harm to King Saul a couple of times and chose not to, and as the article goes on to say, he narrowly escaped bloodguilt with respect to Nabal - only because Abigail intervened. But what about David's 'godfather'-like revenge on Joab and Shimei executed through Solomon? (See 1 Kings 2:5-9 forwards.) Why was that omitted?
Paragraph 5 is a hoot. Most people that one comes into contact with are normal well adjusted people. The "lovers of themselves," "haughty," and even "fierce," are totally the exception in my experience. One of the little pushes out the door for me was the treatment from an elder who manifested one of the haughtiest attitudes of anyone i have encountered. The sad thing is that because of the theocratic training and his being an elder he didn't/couldn't even recognize it in himself. And the other thing is how they are so cognizant with what the entertainment world is like. Do they have special brothers who are allowed to experience these forms of worldly entertainment so that they can report on how bad they are?
A few years ago one of our visiting speakers read a news article about a driver who during an act of "road rage" murdered another driver. The speaker laid the article down, looked out towards the audience, and stated, "That's something that Jehovah's Witnesses don't do." I thought to myself, "And most other people don't do it either."
Why are people in the world today so angry?
I had to laugh at this question in the box at the end. The answer to this question will always be an opinion! But the answer in the article is stated so matter-of-fact.
-Sab
The jist of this article is that anger is not a human reaction, it's worldly, satanic and brings reproach on the Borg.
All of the examples were BS and insult the intelligence of the reader. Thanks Blondie for the comments, great job as always.
marked for later
