Dozy posted the latest suggestions for activities to do on Family Worship Night. Thanks for that by the way, Dozy! In the thread I wondered whether or not JWs are worshiping the things that make this religion unique or not. Another poster, Ynot questioned what exactly is worship. After browsing the suggestions listed by the WT for Family Worship Night, I'm wondering too. What exactly is worship?
I looked it up in the dictionary to see what it says, not that it matters to the WT because they define words as they see fit. Truthfullness be damned.
Worship: The reverent love and devotion accorded to a deity, and idol or sacred object; The ceremonies, prayers, or other religious forms by which this love is expressed.
Worshipping: To perform an act of worship; To participate in religious rites of worship.
Can it be said that JWs when following the directives of the WT , are actually worshipping Jehovah? For instance, meetings. The material considered at meetings is largely the reitiration of why the works we do are important, and not to loose sight of the why part. We have meetings about, get this.........we have meetings about meetings. We go over why its important to be present at meetings, why its important to comment at meetings, why its important to be at meetings early, why its important to hang around after the meeting is over, why its important to pay attention during the meeting, why its important to prepare for the meeting. What about singing praise? We sing songs about the faithful and discreet slave, we sing songs about going door to door, we sing songs about being joyful, we sing songs about being different from nonJWs, we sing songs about nonJWs being destroyed, we sing songs about the Shulamite Maiden and Timothy as examples for young people....... To be fair, there are plenty of songs that have Jehovah's name in the title, and because the song book sucks so bad I can't recall the lyrics. But my memory is good enough that I know many songs are merely repititious verses over poor music with general themes of what Jehovah's Witnesses do, and often enough it has very little to do with actual worship of Jah. What about this so called Family Worship Evening? Considering the verb, Worshipping is part of the title, that would indicate the family is worshipping Jehovah together, right? Consider some of these suggestions, and you tell me whether or not its actually worship. You'll notice that many of the suggestions place emphasis on what makes JWs unique. Prepare together for the meetings, practice the songs scheduled for that meeting. Again, these two suggestions are often themed with what makes JWs unique from other Christian faiths. These two suggestions are often about the suggestions. In other words we sing songs about singing songs, and have meetings about meetings. Another thing you'll notice is this organization is that is self-serving first and foremost. It's a book publishing company. The biggest supporter of WT literature is in fact, Jehovah's Witnesses. I'd love to see some figures on how the placement of literature in field service jibes with how much is ordered in congregations. I'm sure there's a gross amount of waste as evidenced by the new arrangement on picking up your magazines at the counter. But again, notice in the suggestions for Family Worship Evening, the emphasis placed on using the WT's literature. Consider material from the Young People Ask Book or Learn From the Great Teacher. Read together an article from our current magazines. Watch and discuss one our videos. Discuss together Young People Ask, or For Family Review in the Awake!. Read and discuss a portion of the current Yearbook, or a release from the last disctrict convention. One last thing about worship on my mind, is that of creature worship. The WT loves to bash other religions, or anybody for that matter for giving in their opinion too much praise to fleshly imperfect humans. However the WT does the same with its emphasis on the faithful and discreet slave aka TheeGoverning Body, which as has been noted as of late, is getting more noticeable. They also want publishers to be in awe of Circuit Overseers, Elders, and Regular Pioneers. Notice this suggestion from the insert for the Family Worship Evening. Occasionally invite a publisher or couple to join you for your Family Worship Evening, and perhaps inteview them. Whoa!! I read that and almost choked! I guarantee you, more direction on that particular suggestion will be provided later. I guarantee you that they'll suggest inviting a "spiritually mature" individual or couple over. I'm talking a die hard Pioneer, or an Elder and his wife, etc.. Again though, you notice rarely does any of this have anything to do with worshipping Jehovah. It's all about repitition, emphasis, reititiration, etc.. It's the worship of actions, and the worship of those taking the lead performing these actions. Very little is actually about worshipping Jehovah. Am I looking at this wrong? It can be quite possible I'm searching for the forrest throgh the trees. If I am, please let me know.