What made you think you were supposed to drink the wine and eat the bread? If you left the org, did you still feel like you were going to heaven?
For those who were partakers
by mamalove 46 Replies latest jw friends
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exwhyzee
Good question...something I always wondered as well. I hope someone answers...so far "crickets"
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donuthole
You just know.
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Soldier77
aren't we all going to heaven? Except the GB, they go straight to hell.
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exwhyzee
You just know.
Then just as suddenly....you don't know ?
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AGuest
What made you think you were supposed to drink the wine and eat the bread?
I knew from the first that I should, dear mamalove (peace to you!), but when I mentioned it to my "Bible Study," BSC, PO, etc., they would all talk me out of it. They were able to do so, NOT because I realized I shouldn't... but I realized, from what they were saying to me about how I COULDN'T be "anointed" (and they were right; the real anointing doesn't occur until you SEPARATE yourself and QUIT touching the "unclean" thing)... a great deal of "tribulation" would come upon my family if I did. So, for 9 years I didn't. But I didn't hide it from anyone, certainly not my family, closest friends, and a couple "brothers" in whatever congregation I attended (who really were like "refuges" for me).
Anyway, each year I would feel "wrong" after passing the plate and glass by. That it wrong to pass them by and that I was wrong for doing it. Some years, it caused me great grief. I didn't know it at the time, but the feeling was as if I had just done a "Peter"... and betrayed one I SHOULD be loving... in front of God, the angels, and men. My family knew this. Starting around 1991, however, I began hearing a voice say to me, each year, as I passed the plate and glass by, "Why do you keep passing life by?" The first time it startled me; after that, it saddened SO much, that I think I can say I know how Peter felt after the cock stopped crowing. Horrible doesn't even define it. I would leave the meeting in a turmoil, sometimes a wreck. Finally, one year my children said, "Stop worrying about us, do what you have to" and so I did. I had passed life by my last time. And so, at the 1994 Memorial, along with a 96-year-old sister who invited me to sit with her for my first time, I partook.
And from that day on I have never passed by life, the flesh and blood of Christ (the Life)... represented by the bread and wine... by. True, they kicked me out for doing so in 1997 (they were really hoping it was a one-time flukie sort of thing and I would "get over it" - I didn't, of course)... but that's their loss. Although I partake of the "manna" from heaven and drink from the "rock-mass" daily at home... and with other like and loved ones when we get together, I still attend the Memorial each year. I must, because who otherwise will show those still in that "city" what THEY must do in order to gain the promise to "live forever" that has been offered them? (John 6:51-53)
I am not ashamed of my calling (which is what I received when I was "in"... as is that which occurs with those in her to profess to be "anointed")... nor my choosing (anointing) since coming OUT of her... since I quit touching her.
If you left the org, did you still feel like you were going to heaven?
I didn't feel like I was going to heaven then, at least not in the way they teach it... nor do I now. I know that I will go to the spirit realm for a brief period to time to be joined to my Lord in "marriage" - the spirit union between him and his Bride - indeed, I have seen that event take place! But New Jerusalem (the Bride of Christ) comes down OUT of heaven... to the earth. Because Christ's co-rulership with them is UPON the earth... not over it. The Most Holy One of Israel did not make the physical realm for nothing - while the spirit realm will belong to His Son and King... forever... the physical realm will belong to man, as well. Such men, however, will no longer be terrestrial, but celestial, in that they will be "like the angels" and thus have "white robes" - spirit bodies that can go in AND out... between the physical and spirit realms.
I hope this helps and I bid you peace.
A slave of Christ,
SA
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Inkie
My spirit within me kept on telling that I should. My spirit within me kept telling me that I was a son of God. The various versions of the Bibles that I read said so and I believed it with my entire being for a very long time--years. Yet, the Society and the brothers kept telling me this was not so and it couldn’t be so, and so I better not partake. I was not worthy they told me. As I questioned the teachings of the Society more and more, I came to see that what they were teaching was not true, not truth. I was told on a few occasions that I should not speak about Jesus. Made me shake my head. I was told that what I was feeling couldn’t possibly be true as God was no longer calling the anointed class, that He had stopped doing that long ago. While I didn’t believe them, because of the verses I read in the Bible, I forced myself to acquiesce to their directives. Not easy. Funny, I became one of Jehovah’s Witnesses BECAUSE of the Society’s publication Life Everlasting in Freedom of the Sons of God. That little red book with the gold-edgesd pages spoke of the Sons of God throughout its pages and as I read that book, that book, the things written in it, was speaking TO me. This was before I was baptized. But in voicing to the elders my belief and conviction that I was a son of God, the elders and regular brothers and sisters told me over and over that this was not the case. Now, mind you, I did not brazenly tout my belief to the brothers, it was only when the subject came up by them and when they directed their questions to me that I admitted the truth of my belief and convictions. I did not publicize it to brag in any sort of way. I just told the truth when I was asked about it.
They made me doubt my belief and conviction of what I was, who I was, for years.
Finally, I no longer could deny it. The first time I partook was on Memorial night back in 1999; however, I did it in a cowardly way. I was afraid that I might be disfellowshipped for doing so. Two other brothers and I met in one of their private homes and we three partook there. It was good to partake. It felt totally right. The next year (2000) I partook in the middle of the congregation and it was SO right! I was no longer afraid of men or what they could or would do to me. They did nothing.
Please know that just because I partook did not mean that I didn’t question my belief or conviction because of them. I continued to question it because of the indoctrination of the brothers and the Society’s teachings.
THEN . . .
One night in February 2001 (I can’t remember the exact date), I came home from work deeply deeply troubled and distraught. I went upstairs to my bedroom. The family was downstairs in the den eating and watching television. I was alone. I threw myself upon the bed and began in earnest my prayer to Jah. It was a prayer, a long prayer, filled with deep emotion and sincerity, filled with weeping and petitions I was making known to God. I don’t think that I’ve ever prayed like that, in this manner, to God before or since, and I have prayed earnestly many times. I begged Him to tell me whether I was a “son” or not. I told Jah that I needed to know this. If I wasn’t a son, fine. So be it. But I needed to know either way. The mental and emotional fight I was in, going back and forth, because of the Society’s teaching and because of the things I read in the Bible thoroughly confused me and did me emotional turmoil. It wasn’t a short prayer by any means. It was like the Bible describes when it says with “strong outcries and tears” this prayer that I was praying was like that.
Suddenly, at some point during the prayer, as I looked about the room, the bedroom began to undulate; no, not really the room—but rather, the air in the room; no, rather, more accurately, the “space” within the room began to undulate and swirl about the room around me. I was totally awake and watching it happen before my very physical eyes. I lay their prone on top of the bed having raised myself up on my elbows watching what was occurring. The “undulating space” swirled all about me and then began to enter me and it permeated me—my entire body. I watched and felt this. And as it swirled about the room and entered me and exited me and entered me and exited me and I felt such an incredible peace. I am not kidding. Such an incredible peace AND received the knowledge that—Yes! Indeed, I was a son of God! After a while, I do not remember how long this occurrence lasted but when it was finished, as I said, I felt such incredible PEACE. Unlike anything I have experienced before. And my spirit bore witness to me that I was indeed a son of God. I NOW KNEW THIS and no one can take it away from me ever. Not only that, but for an entire month from this event, wherever I went, whatever I did, whomever I was with, for an entire month that PEACE STAYED WITH ME. After a month, it dissipated slowly and left. But I knew what I needed to know and ever since I have never questioned my sonship again.
I have partaken ever since and will continue to do so until our Lord arrives.
--Inkie
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donuthole
Then just as suddenly....you don't know?
When I said, "you just know", I was just repeating the tired JW cliche.
Well I was told and some other things happened and I followed by partaking.
That first memorial we were actually traveling so I was relieved that I wouldn't have to partake in front the congregation. However, ultimately to do so felt shameful - like I was ashamed. So I confided in an elder that I would be partaking that year. I told him I wasn't asking for permission, just letting him know. So I did. I did receive a shepherding call meant to readjust my thinking on the matter. When they were unable to convince me otherwise they left and I began to be persecuted a bit. By the time the next one had rolled around they had nearly disfellowshipped me but in his grace had stalled out things a bit to allow me that final opportunity to partake in my home congregation. That was a good experience.
As for your question regarding did I feel I was going to heaven. The thing was this, I was raised in the JW religion and was a publisher for 30 years. So my whole framework of reference was rooted in JW doctrine. There was difficulty reconciling the two. At first I was a bit hestiant to accept the calling because I figured I wasn't elderly or whatever. Then once I did I couldn't really understand, "why me" and why not any of the other more faithful ones in the hall. I mean at the time they didn't even let me handle the microphones. Yet I read something that Paul had wrote about God choosing the weak and foolish and I just figured I was one of those. As for Heaven, I guess I accepted that while I didn't really have any kind of witness by the spirit either way. I knew that I was to be with the Lord and that was my focus - it wasn't really like a specific place.
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Mad Sweeney
I wasn't anointed when I was a Dub but after I left I decided I should obey Jesus' orders and "as often as I partake of it" I try to remember him. It isn't an annual event. There is no holy day related to it. Having a relationship with Christ, one thinks of him whenever one drinks wine and eats a flat bread or cracker or any other reminder of him. That's how I currently look at it, anyway.
Am I "anointed" then? Not in the Dub sense because their definition is a fantasy. Do I have a personal relationship with The Way? I do.
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cattails
Inkie wrote: "I have partaken ever since and will continue to do so until our Lord arrives ."
Amen! Let the Spirit lead you.
(Romans 8:14) "For all who are led by God's Spirit are God's children."
(1 John 5:1) "Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Messiah has been born from God,
and everyone who loves the parent also loves the child."