No - I never felt good enough.
When you were active, did you feel you would survive Armageddon?
by Band on the Run 50 Replies latest jw friends
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Phizzy
You weren't Cantleave, like me !
I always hoped though, that despite my being a no-good toe-rag in my opinion, that a loving God might see His way clear to allow me in, if not then I would accept his Judgement.
Now I know all that is stuff is fiction I look back and laugh.
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Vidqun
No, never. Like the pie in the sky, it was just was too high (Pink Floyed if I'm not mistaken).
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finallysomepride
no, even as young as 10 i knew i was not good enough for bigA survival
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Soldier77
Through the years I would go from yes to no to yes to no over and over and over ad nauseum. Then a year before I stopped attending, I said I didn't care if it came this instant, I have nothing to fear, it's all a fear tactic to get you to do what they want, not what god wants.
When I made the declaration, I knew it was time to leave.
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finally awake
at first I did - I thought that I could live up to the standards and I really wanted to be a JW. But after a few years, I realized that trying to measure up was sucking all the pleasure and peace out of my life and I was miserable. At that point, I realized that I could never measure up and I thought that I was just a bad person. Eventually I realized that I am just a regular person just like everyone else - I have flaws but I am not "bad". Now I know the whole armageddon thing is a crock and I don't worry about it.
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panhandlegirl
I always thought I would survive basically for the same reasons mentioned by Cedar. When I started to feel that I could no longer comply with all of the regulations imposed on me by the organization, I decided it was time to get out. I started to fade, them I found that I no longer believed anything they said. I decided to take my chances with God by myself. I decided I would survive or die but I would be the one making the rules for me.
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Ding
The key to the WTS' carrot and stick theology (and all other systems in which your salvation is thought to depend on your works) is that they have to convince you that you aren't quite there but that the prize is attainable with just a little more effort on your part.
No matter how well or how poorly you believe you are measuring up, they want you thinking that all you need to do is just average a few more meetings, just put in a few more field service hours each month, and just improve a little here and there at rule keeping.
Of course, with this approach you are on an endless treadmill and never arrive.
But if you come to believe that the goal is unattainable you'll quit trying, and they don't want that.
They also throw in some rewards -- you haven't arrived, but at least you've got a chance, which is more than you can say for everyone outside "God's organization."
They give and withhold "privileges" to keep you under organizational control.
None of this is New Testament Christianity, but no matter -- the GB says it's "the truth".
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panhandlegirl
I both laughed and felt sad reading all these posts. What the WTS has done, and continues, to do to children, and adult's minds/life is atrocious. They refuse to let anyone enjoy life and develop normally. They are "HELL BENT" on making your life as miserable as possible, alway keeping the threat of "death" at Armageddon before it's members.
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Quandry
For the most part, I did feel that I'd "make it through." I had all the right qualifications:
1. Always there to clean when assigned-after all, for 1,000 years they'd need me for that.
2. Always too my parts-even if sick-wasn't that some sort of qualification?
3. If there was something I didn't understand, figured the fault was with me, and that I was spiritually "dull in my thinking" and that if I persevered, I'd eventually understand some "deep spitirual things."
4. Was content to "let the brothers handle it" and "keep my place as a woman"
5. Even though I hated field serve-us, felt that my average numbers kept me in-was part of the great crowd like the average Israelite-that was enough.
6. Always had gatherings at my home, went to quick builds to cook, clean, etc. Wouldn't that be needed in the "new system?"
7. Dressed like the pictures in the magazines. In fact, I used to study them and look for clothes like them.
8. Can't go on-I'll be ill