Real Jehovah's Witnesses (djeggnog, StandFirm, etc), I'm trying to understand you.

by pirata 62 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  sizemik

  Here's the deal my friend: If this message were about saving lives and reaching every possible person, we'd be using every method possible. The fact that we don't betrays something VERY wrong with the leadership of this organization. If the money used to print all the endless tracts were instead used for actual advertising for say, conventions and the memorial, you would see a response so big it would knock your socks off. But why don't they do this? I do not know, it doesn't make a bit of sense to me at all.

  It makes perfect sense to me. The WT are targetting the vulnerable which the door to door ministry allows them to do in a clandestine, insidious fashion. The use of mass media would draw too much attention and publicity to them, and place them under more scrutiny and subsequent criticism than they have to endure at present. Thier high-control reactions to current threats such as the internet are keeping them busy enough.

  Thier tactic is to "fly beneath the radar" of scrutiny, reaching the "target market" as unobserved as possible. Thier attention is already shifting to areas of opportunity (under-developed nations) where the technology is not such a threat. Hence the need for the "simplified" magazine publications.

  That's why the above multiple poster is completely out of step with the "slave" and always will be. The GB will never approve such methods. They are totally counter-productive, which some just cannot seem to see, thankfully.
• 

  jair_irwin

  pirata that was one of the most astute posts I've read in a while. I have many of the same questions - you articulated them very well.

  Any Witness who frequents this type of site (while I certainly welcome them), would have to be considered very "spiritually weak", based on the very same literature and organization they profess to espouse.

  jair_irwin
• 

  punkofnice

  WT 7/15 2011par 7, pg 16

  ''What is involved in avoiding false teachers? We do not receive them into our homes or greet them. We also refuse to read their literature, watch TV programs that feature them, examine their Web sites or add our comments to their blogs.''
• 

  WontLeave

  The reason the Society fears the Internet is because you can go alone. All day, in the ministry, we encounter "apostates". Every person who attends a church is an entry-level apostate. You'd never see a Witness run from a house if he were to encounter a church pastor, but a church leader should be an uber-apostate. The thing is, when we preach, we're not usually alone. Some back-stabbing, judgmental false brother/sister is with us, watching our every move, just hoping for a chance at glory by turning us in to the elders. JWs police each other; the prisoners are their own guards and every JW knows better than to trust any other JW, because the collective is truly their god.

  The rank and file are the SS to the Nazi party of the Society, with the Governing Body making up a compound Hitler. Just like the Nazis, everything is about the movement, the group, the party. A hierarchy power structure and appointing every member as a spy scares all the members into lock-step conformity with the collective. The Internet allows for an anonymous underground counter culture.

  The Society doesn't have the means or permission to wire tap or you'd better believe they would. They have the only people they can on very short leashes: Bethelites. They really wish everybody was under that kind of control: Dress codes, haircuts every 3 weeks for men, up at 5am for a day where every minute is decided for you. That's the world the Society wants, not an electronic free-for-all of individuality.
• 

  jgnat

  Karen Armstrong in her book, "The Battle for God" points out that religious extremists will ignore basic tenets of their faith. It is as if they enter an altered state of mind where they view the world as hopelessly corrupt. In such a bad place, everything is permissible in their zeal to remove the evil. For example,

  "Mohamed Atta, Egyptian hijacker of the first plane to hit the twin towers, was drinking alcohol before he boarded the aircraft. (Muslims are to abstain from alcohol)

  Ziad Jarrahi, the alleged Lebanise hijacker of the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania, was also a drinker and frequented the nightclubs and women of Las Vegas.

  Baruch Goldstein, the Jewish fundamentalist who gunned down thirty-nine Muslims in Hebron in 1994, enjoyed a breakfast of bacon and eggs before carrying out the action.

  On quite a different level, the bizarre antics of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker...which led to the television scandals of the 1980s in the United States, represented a nihilistic revolt agains the more sober fundamentalism of Jerry Falwell." (Source: The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong, pages ix-x)

  The tenets we wish they would uphold for instance, is to do no harm and peaceableness.

  Now, I'm not saying that our resident apologists have gone to these extremes. But they have obviously self-justified a break away from the explicit instructions of their faith. I, personally, do not challenge their presence here. I figure the more they engage, the stronger their independence. Independence is a good thing.
• 

  jair_irwin

  Well put jgnat
• 

  tenyearsafter

  1pnt,

  I am still confused why you didn't answer Pirata's question? It wasn't accusatory or aggressive. If the FDS tells you specifically to not participate in any way, shape or form on apostate websites, how do you justify disobediance to that direction? You use the example of Paul to justify participation...do you think Paul would have gone directly against the Governing Body's (since JW's claim there was a 1st Century governing body) direction if told not to? Rather than "preaching" on unrelated subjects, I, like Pirata, would be interested in why it is ok to go directly against the FDS on this matter?

  I await your short and direct answer...

  TYA
• 

  pirata

  @20571pnt428571

  Thank you for your detailed reply! I will read over it later on today.
• 

  AGuest

  Dearjgnat, peace to you! A recent expose on CNN seemed to reveal the same about Osama bin Laden. I agree that those JW apologists who post here most probably aren't of that ilk, but it is interesting to see how some self-justify going against their own religion (a poster here is writing a very good novel which has a character like this! Good stuff!).

  Dear 20571pnt428571, peace to you, as well! I am sorry to say, but every "loyal" JW, including your dear self... is being misled. While you might give "honor" to the Immortal King Jesus Christ, you neither know him... nor follow him. Rather, you follow the "golden calf" that is the WTBTS that you worship INSTEAD of God... and you follow... instead of following Christ, the Lamb. You do this because you miss the truth of and do not grasp the sense of Christ's words, when he said:

  "I ... am the Truth..."and "NO ONE comes to the Father except through me."

  Like your loyal co-members, you are going "through" the WTBTS... which calls ITSELF the "Truth"... in total usurption of the place of Christ. For example, that institution teaches, in response to the question, "What is the truth that sets you free?" that it is the "truth found in God's Holy Word, the Bible." This is a LIE... on two counts:

  First, CHRIST is the ONLY Truth (John 14:6)... as well as the only Truth that sets us FREE. There is NO other. Which is why he is recorded to have said:

  "If you know the truth, the truth will set you free." John 8:32

  "Therefore, IF THE SON SETS YOU FREE you will truly BE free." John 8:36

  NOWHERE did he say the Bible... or what's contained IN it... would... or even could... set anyone free. To the contrary, he said OF the Bible:

  "You are searching the scriptures because you THINK that by means of THEM you will have everlasting life. And these are the very ones that bear witness... to ME. Yet... YOU DO NOT WANT TO COME... to ME... that you might have life." John 5:39, 40

  Second, NOWHERE in the Bible does it say that it is God's Word. NOWHERE. However, in SEVERAL places is says that CHRIST is God's Word:

  "In [the] beginning the Word was..." John 1:1

  "So the Word became flesh and resided among us..." John 1:14

  "... and he is arrayed with an outer garment sprinkled with blood, and the name he is called is The Word of God." Revelation 19:13

  And in several places the Bible shows that Word speaking to earthly servants of the Most Holy One of Israel, JAH (Psalm 68:4) of Armies... as WELL as that One (JAH) telling us who to listen TO:

  "This is my Son, the Beloved. Listen to HIM." Matthew 17:5

  The Bible also shows us where that Son also tells us that those who belong to HIM listen to HIM... and him ALONE; they won't LISTEN to "strangers." John 10:1-15; 27

  “Most truly I say to YOU , He that does not enter into the sheepfold through the door but climbs up some other place, that one is a thief and a plunderer. But he that enters through the door is shepherd of the sheep. The doorkeeper opens to this one, and the sheep listen to his voice, and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4 When he has got all his own out, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him, because they know his voice. A stranger they will by no means follow but will flee from him, because they do not know the voice of strangers.” [Jesus] spoke this comparison to them; but they did not know what the things meant that he was speaking to them.

  Therefore [Jesus] said again: “Most truly I say to YOU , I am the door of the sheep.All those that have come in place of me are thieves and plunderers; but the sheep have not listened to them. I am the door; whoever entersthrough mewill be saved, and he will go in and out and find pasturage.The thief does not come unless it is to steal and slay and destroy. I have come that they might have life and might have it in abundance.I am the fine shepherd; the fine shepherd surrenders his soul in behalf of the sheep. The hired man, who is no shepherdand to whom the sheep do not belong as his own, beholds the wolf coming and abandons the sheep and flees—and the wolf snatches them and scatters them—because he is a hired man and does not care for the sheep. I am the fine shepherd, and I know my sheep and my sheep know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I surrender my soul in behalf of the sheep." John 10:1-15

  "My sheep listen to my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.And I give them everlasting life, and they will by no means ever be destroyed, and no one will snatch them out of my hand." John 10:27, 28

  Yet, the leaders of the WTBTS... the "hired" man, to whom the sheep do NOT belong... have told you to listen to THEM. In direct OPPOSITION to what the MOST Holy One of Israel, JAH of Armies, and His Son and Christ, the Holy One of Israel, JAHESHUA (who is the Chosen/Anointed One of JAH), told you to listen to.

  By virtue of this, you, too, will be counted among those of whom the Christ said would say, "'Lord, Lord, didn't we [do such and so] in your name?' Yet, I will say, 'I do NOT know YOU.'"

  One of the reasons you do NOT know Christ, besides the fact that you are trying to get to God by going through others, versus going THROUGH him, the Door and Narrow Gate, thus usurping HIS (Christ's) position as the Greater Joseph, the ONLY One who could get Israel in before "Pharaoh"... is that you are not in union with him. And you are not in union with him because those you follow persuade you FROM it. Yet, CHRIST is recorded to have said:

  "I am the bread of life. YOUR forefathers ate the manna in the wilderness and yet died. This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that anyone may eat of it and not die. I am the living bread that came down from heaven; if anyone eats of this bread he will live forever; and, for a fact, the bread that I shall give is my flesh in behalf of the life of the world."

  "Therefore the Jews began contending with one another, saying: "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?" Accordingly [Jesus] said to them: "Most truly I say to YOU, Unless YOU eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, YOU have no life in yourselves. He that feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has everlasting life, and I shall resurrect him at the last day; for my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink. He that feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood remains in union with me, and I in union with him. Just as the living Father sent me forth and I live because of the Father, he also that feeds on me, even that one will live because of me. This is the bread that came down from heaven. It is not as when YOUR forefathers ate and yet died. He that feeds on this bread will live forever."

  You believe that YOU can/will live forever, even be resurrected should you die. But you believe this according to what the WTBTS teaches on such matters and NOT what CHRIST teaches. HE said ANYONE may eat of the bread that is his flesh and not die. HE said IF anyone so ate, they would live forever. HE said... UNLESS one so ate... AND drank his blood... such one had NO life in themselves. HOW then, can such live forever? Where will the "life" in them come FROM? He also said that if one did so eat and drink... HE would resurrect them.

  Yet, the WTBTS teaches that ones will resurrect themselves. HOW... if they have NO LIFE WITHIN THEMSELVES? What will be the "source" of the life that so resurrects them???

  The WTBTS answer to that is that when one dies one pays for one's sins and so will be resurrected. This, too, is a LIE: neither one's death NOR one's blood can "pay" FOR one's sins. ONLY THE DEATH AND BLOOD OF CHRIST FURNISHES PAYMENT... and so, only HE can "repurchase/redeem/buy one BACK... from death.

  When one dies, one pays the PRICE of sin; however, ones does NOT pay the price to redeem one BACK. Hence, one REMAINS dead. The cost/wage of sin... is death. You sin... you pay. With your life. However, the GIFT that God gives... is everlasting life. That "gift" isn't paid for with YOUR life; it was paid for with CHRIST'S life. However, if you don't BELONG to him... by means of being in UNION (and thus, "one") with him... there is no "gift" to YOU.

  Thus, with their [very] false teaching on this matter, the WTBTS is now in the forefront of those who "shut up the kingdom of the heavens before men." Because, as my Lord said, "they are not going in, neither do they allow those on their way in to go in."

  You are following a false prophet, dear one, led by very false "christs" (anointed). These are NOT "chosen ones" for the very fact that they have NOT received the promised holy spirit, which "oil of exultation" is the very manifestation of their choosing. They don't even know what it IS.

  Rather, these are those who have "seated themselves in the seat of Moses," who call themselves "leaders"... although the Body of Christ already had a leader. One... Christ.

  So, while your loyalty is commendable, it is grossly misplaced, dear one. Rather than waiting patiently for the Greater Moses to come back down off the mountain (this time, Zion), you have been misled to follow an idol, a golden calf, set up to be worshipped in the meantime. But "Moses" is coming back down. True, it's been awhile, but what will YOU be doing when he arrives? Waiting patiently and walking by FAITH, by following the instructions HE gave before ascending? Or, giving in to doubt... and fear... and walking by SIGHT... such a putting your faith in a "visible" representation?

  To help you decide, dear one, you might want to remember that the LAST "visible" representation of the Lord on earth... was the temple at Jerusalem. And that edifice was destroyed. Since then, God's spirit dwells in the "house" being built by Christ, which house is made of PEOPLE (Ephesians 2:19, 20; 1 Corinthians 3:16)... and includes BOTH the little flock of Jews... AND other sheep, which includes the other 10 tribes of Israel... which is stated by John as:

  "144,000... from among the sons of ISRAEL" ... AND

  "A great crowd out of EVERY nation, tribe, tongue, and people."

  BOTH groups are called and bought by Christ to replace Israel as a holy nation "of kings and priests" (Revelation 5:9, 10)... which is why BOTH are [initially] in the spirit realm (heaven): the sons of Israel is a bit higher "place" - Mt. Zion - and the great crowd... "standing BEFORE the throne and rendering SACRED SERVICE IN THE TEMPLE (which only priests are allowed to do!)... day and night." Non-priests cannot render "sacred" service, dear one, and certainly not "in the temple." BOTH of these groups, 144,000 from Israel, literally, and a great crowd from ALL nations, etc.. which no man can number... replace ALL of Israel... as God's holy nation. But all of them do so... THROUGH Christ... and no other.

  None, however, stay in heaven. They only go there to be joined to Christ in literal marriage and for the wedding "feast" that comes after. After that, they... NEW Jerusalem... COME DOWN OUT OF HEAVEN (the spirit realm)... TO EARTH... where they rule for 1,000 years with Christ (whose rule is NOT limited to 1,000 years, but lasts forever - it is only THEIR part that is limited).

  They rule UPON the earth, not OVER it (another false teaching)... because the tent of GOD... HIS "house"... is WITH MANKIND. Through this, the things of the heavens AND THE THINGS OF THE EARTH... are brought BACK TOGETHER again... as they were in the days of Eden... when Adham could go in... AND out... and back in again (before being barred forever)... and find "pasturage". John 10:9

  There is SO much they have kept from you... are teaching falsely. Because either they DON'T know (because they are leaning upon their OWN understanding, rather than listening to and following the Lamb wherever HE goes), or do know but are teaching falsely (as did their forefathers before them) for their own personal gain.

  You, however, don't HAVE to keep following them. You can CHOOSE to follow the Lamb. But no one is going to make you. It must be YOUR choice... to worship God... in SPIRIT, by going THROUGH the Truth (Christ). You manifest that choice by listening to... and obeying... the One God TOLD you to listen to and obey: His Son... who IS the Word of God... and IS alive.

  I hope this helps and, again, I bid you peace!

  YOUR servant, as I am servant to ALL those of the Household of God, Israel, and those who go with,

  SA
• 

  pirata

  @Wontleave: Some back-stabbing, judgmental false brother/sister is with us, watching our every move, just hoping for a chance at glory by turning us in to the elders. JWs police each other; the prisoners are their own guards and every JW knows better than to trust any other JW, because the collective is truly their god.

  @Wontleave, JWs are not lying in wait, ready to turn in each other for "glory". I talked to one brother who turned in another brother recently, and he felt really bad about it, but did so out of obligatoin and concern.