Matrix moment - what was it and when did you share it? (page 2)

jaguarbass

I had a matrix moment January 1, 1976.

That was before the matrix was even a movie.

skeeter1

1984ish - Convention where a speaker stood up and preachd how college was sinful and that the world was going to End soon. I saw 1975 come & go.

1999ish - Learning that the Society's teaching on the Generation changed and that 1975 was never predicted by the Society. It was all the brothers fault.

2004ish - Going to www.ajwrb.org Learning all about blood fractions being allowed.

**I tried sharing it here, but got no where***

2006ish - coming here.

Small bursts of light, getting brighter and brighter as the time went along.

OnTheWayOut

It wasn't like life in the JW's was going along until Morpheus found me and gave me the red pill.

It was little bits of the red pill mixed in my diet.

Sometimes when I was learning “the truth,” a little voice inside my head should have been screaming. Instead, it was there whispering to me, quiet enough for me to ignore it. When I was learning doctrines, sometimes it seemed that it was necessary to do Biblical gymnastics to make it all work out.

There was WatchTower’s reason for not celebrating birthdays that bothered me. In the Bible, they say there are only two specific birthday celebrations mentioned and people in power had other people killed at those celebrations. A pharaoh had the chief of the bakers hung and Herod had John the Baptist beheaded. I thought that doesn’t mean that Jehovah banned birthdays. What if those things happened at a wedding celebration? I would have thought Jehovah would have been more obvious and said so if He wanted to ban celebrating birthdays. And I don’t recall any hangings or beheadings at any children’s birthday parties, and I am sure they would stop celebrating if that were ever to happen.

WatchTower teaches the members that they cannot earn salvation. They replaced the word “grace” in the Bible with the term “undeserved kindness.” They say that everlasting life is a gift from God, reflecting his undeserved kindness toward us, but then they tell members to find “deserving ones” out there and recruit them to learn about Jehovah and receive His undeserved kindness.

Elders make mistakes because they are imperfect men, so members have to be patient with them. The Governing Body is not made up of men who are “inspired” as the Bible writers were, so they may have made mistakes in the past, but members should just believe what they say now because they are spirit-directed. All I have ever been able to figure out from their explanations is that Jehovah leads well but men don’t always follow well.

One of the hardest things I had a problem focusing on and accepting was WatchTower’s explanation for every last parable in the Bible, every hidden fulfillment of every last thing in the New Testament pointing toward WatchTower itself. They insisted that the book of Revelation points to the Board of Directors of the Watch Tower Corporation and to the magazine distribution work of the members. They say that the recruiting work is done just as it was done in the first century after Jesus’ death as recorded in the Bible. I don’t think Paul and Barnabas were going door to door with magazines, but WatchTower implies that the whole structure of the organization outside of the printing work is based on the New Testament. Elders are the “older men” mentioned in the Bible. Circuit Overseers are like the apostles, particularly Paul and those that traveled with him visiting the congregations and recruiting as they went. One single gathering of all the older men in Jerusalem and their making decisions shows that Jehovah blesses the permanent gathering and decision making process of the Governing Body.

If I did want to find a Matrix moment, it would be the day I realized I googled anything I had a question about, so why haven't I googled "Jehovah's Witnesses" ? So I did and the red pill that had been fed over time to me finally got dissolved into my system as I started to read websites critical of Watchtower.

Muddy Waters

I had a few niggling doubts, but had always suppressed them. You know, didn't want to be "presumptuous", didn't want to be questioning, didn't want to show "independent thinking" or disloyalty. The generation thing bothered me, the blood fraction thing bothered me IMMENSELY (made NO SENSE to me!)..... Jesus only being mediator for the 144,000 bothered me.... all these things I suppressed because of course the GB were the only ones who could ever enlighten us.

But my "matrix moment" came when I was going to give my sweet precious little grandbabies the Bible Story book. I started looking through the book and saw it through their little eyes. (Why I never saw this when my own children were little I'll never know!)

"My Book of Bible Stories" is a HORROR SHOW. It is frightening, scary, terrible. The images are way too graphic for small children who can't read, thus all our little children have to go on are the pictures. Terrible and terrifying pictures. If you actually go through this book and COUNT how many pictures show violence, blood, people crying, looking angry, being hurt, being sad, being killed, being tormented in some way... it's almost the WHOLE BOOK. **UNBELIEVABLE** (Go ahead! Count them!! It's totally eye-opening.)

As I was looking through the book, becoming more and more alarmed at the images, I realized this book was written for children by MEN WHO NEVER EVEN HAD CHILDREN!!!(Excuse all my caps.... yes, I feel like screeching about it).

When my faith in the GB came into question, the whole structure started to crumble.

breakfast of champions

My Matrix moment was standing on Governors island looking at lower manhattan. It was the moment my worldview "flipped"- I realized I had been raised in and living a complete myth. It was after looking into all the things I had questions about, coupled with several pretty strong beers.

MMXIV

Thanks for responses.

Controlling organisation that is always right, lack of disaster response, unbelievable flood explanations, desperate generation teachings, UN, birthdays, dodgy revelation interpretations - frankly it could have been any of these things for me.

Bible story book pictures were inappropriate for children and the stories no better. I recall taking the bible story book into school at the tender age of 6 and having several children gather round while I talked through some of the stories - the page of most interest was Jesus on the stake with nails through his hands. It may be a familiar image in Christian society but still wrong for small children.

mmxiv

tornapart

At the 2010 summer convention when they said about the overlapping generation...

tornapart

Actually, I guess that was the start.. my REAL Matrix moment was after reading CoC in 2 days 6 months ago.

wallsofjericho

"the society are always right"!

apologetics 101. Everything in your life is only to defend what you believe, never to shape what you believe.

I needed to get back in because the organization was going to close it's doors to outsiders, soon

appeal to fear. (ligical fallacy. Ultimate tactic of cults)

I was standing in the Natural History Museum looking at mammoth bones. A couple facts finally clicked in my head, and I realized the flood never happened. My next thought was I could never go back to the KH. It all came tumbling down in the next minute or so. I felt very good.

after years, even decades of the ultimate truth of the almighty soveriegn lord of universe being crammed into your brain it took 1 minute and some dinosaour bones to completely dismantle your indoctrination. Wow, how can divine truth be so impotent? Awesome

WatchTower teaches the members that they cannot earn salvation. They replaced the word “grace” in the Bible with the term “undeserved kindness.” They say that everlasting life is a gift from God, reflecting his undeserved kindness toward us, but then they tell members to find “deserving ones” out there and recruit them to learn about Jehovah and receive His undeserved kindness.

Elders make mistakes because they are imperfect men, so members have to be patient with them. The Governing Body is not made up of men who are “inspired” as the Bible writers were, so they may have made mistakes in the past, but members should just believe what they say now because they are spirit-directed. All I have ever been able to figure out from their explanations is that Jehovah leads well but men don’t always follow well.

DOUBLE THINK! DOUBLE THINK!

I love reading these experiences. It seems we hear the same things over and over.

My matrix moment was painful. Lots of stomach pain for about 3 months. I learned all about Russell and that was it. I knew it was all BS. I remember standing on my front porch looking up at the stars and seeing only that, stars. Then I looked at my neighbours houses and realized that I was just like them, wondering why I was here and what my purpose in life was.

so weird.

cofty

Its difficult to point to one moment, it happened over a year of personal study that began with the generation change of 1995.

Perhaps the key moment was when I was investigating the "great crowd" and I discovered they were in the "naos" in Revelation. Naos is used to describe the most holy part of the temple while hieron includes the whole temple complex.

I found a Watchtower that explained naos could include the outer courtyards of the temple and it was the word used in an account in the gospels which clearly took place in the courtyard of the gentiles.

I felt reassured but thought I better just quickly check the Interlinear to see it for myself - I discovered the Watchtower had told a blatant lie in a main study article.

In that moment I knew it was all over.

Matrix moment - what was it and when did you share it?

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