by ÁrbolesdeArabia 17 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
"Wicked" may be a strong word for it...although there certainly are some! I have noticed over the years that there are more ex dubs who were first stumbled by stupid ham-fisted "counselling" by elders , than anything else.
It puts one in a receptive state of mind to accept that perhaps the beliefs are wrong....
I was never given a single reason for stumbling in my congregation. Seriously. Either things around Bethel are kept more on the straight-and-narrow (based on some of the crazy stories here, I have to say this is part of it), or else I was never privy to any scandals in the local cong. (also likely as I was not an MS or elder), or else I was just lucky. If I had witnessed something scandalous, it might have led me sooner to doubting that they were something better than "worldly" people. As it was, my doubts were based on principles and Bible interpretation and such, but took a long time to come to the surface.
That being said, a number of my peers were not faithful Witnesses, but they left as young adults and I imagined that this only proved that the ones left in the cong. had to be good Christians. But I was not really very sociable, and was generally left out of conversations between the adults (even the ones a few years older than me) that would have let me in on the "dirty laundry" that they might have known about each other.
Me too, and in answer to a watchers question, because I belived the org, including Elders, represented Jehovah, I felt it was Jehovah himself driving me out.
Having seen COs and DOs in action at the Elder's meetings I completely lost confidence in their ability to be any type of professional guides or counselors.
truJW, I am so sorry you suffered the fury of willfully ingnorant "rank and file" members! The source comes from the elders and perps attempting to discredit your story. Yesterday I heard a story about a local brother who went insane, the rumors are wild about this new apostate! Modesto has a long histroy of some crazy messed up situations, my cousin was a "clean up man" to fix Modesto over a decade ago. You being persona-non-grata, that's only with the Pharisees, not with our Lord and Saviour, you did the right thing which is never cheap!
Jehovah's people are good at destroying themselves with self-doubts, feelings of worthlessness, self-loathing, why? with many words from the platforms, microphones and field service groups we hear garbage like, "those who leave are removed by the anglels" "Jehovah keeps throwing out the ones out and we keep dragging them back in!"
Our Organization has lost it's way, I believe members like "JehovahJirah", "Aguest" who think the Watchtower locomotive is going to be derailed in a large way, I know Jehovah will shine real light once the "great cleaning" takes place!
A corrupt elder started me thinking and then when he changed congregations and the HS appointed him as an elder in his new congregation I started joining up all the dots and stopped attending meetings. I didn't leave mentally till I found this site and a few others which was almost a year after the memorial of 2009!
I endured some crap from so-called brothers over the years, money was stolen from me, for example, and nothing done, it never "stumbled" me, mores the pity, I put it down to the old "they are imperfect" bit.
Eventually the "wait on Jehovah" to sort it out got so thin I could see it was just mist, nothing substantial.
It was the silly doctrines that made me walk in the end thoiugh, I just look back and think,why did I not wake up earlier ?
The nice part about being stumbled is those doing the dirty work, think they are doing God's work! It's ok to scream at your kids, kick them out of the house before turning 18 years old, allowing your mother-in-law to work with your wife, while you stay home to work on Congregational matters, so you can bask in the glory of your fellow men!
We are to accept man made doctrines and traditions that contradict the "spirit of the Bible" "Jesus is not the mediator for all mankind!" Was St. Paul dealing with neo-traditionalist as he wrote Galatians 1:
"
6 I am shocked that you are turning away so soon from God, who called you to himself through the loving mercy of Christ. [c] You are following a different way that pretends to be the Good News 7 but is not the Good News at all. You are being fooled by those who deliberately twist the truth concerning Christ.
8 Let God's curse fall on anyone, including us or even an angel from heaven, who preaches a different kind of Good News than the one we preached to you. 9 I say again what we have said before: If anyone preaches any other Good News than the one you welcomed, let that person be cursed.
10 Obviously, I'm not trying to win the approval of people, but of God. If pleasing people were my goal, I would not be Christ's servant.
15.b When this happened, I did not rush out to consult with any human being. [f] 17 Nor did I go up to Jerusalem to consult with those (The Governing Body??????) who were apostles before I was. Instead, I went away into Arabia, and later I returned to the city of Damascus. "
St. Paul's letters are clear, he did not need any authorization to perform the works Jesus had sent him out to do. These Scriptures throw a screw into the cog of the Society's machine! Congregation elders and members pressure you into acts of monotony, covering your territory ten times in one Year, while forgeting to check on their own members who leave without notice nor worry about widows or orphans. They choice which sacrifices are valid and which ones are not going to further the interest of the publishing company!
