Big Effort, Tiny Results

JeffT

We've talked before about how ineffectual Field Service is, but I decided to test the idea. I asked the question "What do you know about Jehovah's Witnesses?" on a non-witness related board and got some interesting results. The thread got about 200 views but only 7 responses. Virutally all of the responses came from people that had some kind of connection to witnesses, either a friend or co-worker. One of the responses came from a Pastor, who obviously has a professional interest in the subject. He was the only one that had a good grasp of Watchtower doctrine. One poster, who noted that only a small number of Witnesess expected to go to heaven (and was unclear about what happened to the rest) suggested that the only way to improve your odds as a witnesses would be to stop preaching.

So it would seem that the average person on the street has no real idea what witnesses are about, inspite of all those zillions of hours that are spent banging on doors. Certainly nobody remotely gets the idea that they are God's organization, or the fullfillment of Bible prophecy. Since the work, as they are conducting it, is so ineffectual it becomes obvious that the real issue here is control, and keeping track of how well the flock is following orders. I know we all the the Watchtower is a business, but it isn't even good at being a business. Businesses run this inefficiently change or go under.

Yerusalyim

I knew from the title what this thread was about. I really think the loyal dubs think that the whole world knows who they are, what they preach, and are actively persecuting them. My wife once told a neighbor that my step son could be trusted to be a good influence on their son because "he's one of Jehovah's Witnesses" the neighbor looked at my wife like she had three heads. She may as well have said Barry was Catholic, or a Shriner, or a Circus Clown. She REALLY thought the Dubs were known world wide for how "honest and upright" they are. It made me laugh, but was really sad too.

LovesDubs

Some truths about the whole PREACHING thing:

1. Most of the hours are submitted and lied about to keep the heat off the publishers.

2. Most of the hours are put into worthless, progressless "bible studies" by the pioneers and very little time is actually spent pounding the pavement for new recruits.

3. Most of the pavement pounding hours were not spent actually doing door to door, it was shuffling between doors, and frequent visits to the Donut shops and sitting in the car while one person approached a door on a call back.

4. Most of the newly baptized ones are JW kids who werent found in the DTD work in the first place.

Conclusion, the "preaching work" is far less effective than God making the rocks talk.

Gig

Many JW's I've talked to are suprised to hear that they aren't the biggest religion and nowhere near the fastest growing. I agree that with the zillions of hours dedicated to "the preaching work" one would think results would be more positive. My conclusion is that Jah isn't blessing them as much as they are endlessly told. I give credit to JW's for putting forth so much effort in the field ministry, obviously the representation isn't selling the truth according to the truth, or it would bear fruit. Just another small satisfaction we anti/ex witnesses can enjoy.

rebel

I know that I always got annoyed because I seemed to always end up sharing some territory with JWs who took ages at each door. They would knock 4 or 5 times, even though it was obvious there was nobody in. They would then dawdle down the path, rummage in their bags, chat to each other and walk veeeerrrrryyy slowly to the next door. I counted once and, me and my partner did 3 doors for everyone that they did! I used to get so annoyed.

And I used to hate it on a Saturday or Sunday morning when I used to get some poor person out of bed. They had worked all week, were looking forward to a lie-in, and here I was at 9.30 in the morning, grinning at them whilst clutching my magazine/brochure/tract or whatever. It's a miracle more people weren't rude. On the whole, most people were ok, even when I got them out of bed when they had just come off a night shift!

Oldhippie

The worst chewin' out I ever got was from man I called on in service on Thanksgiving morning. Then to make matters worse I ran into him in a store a few days later and he started chewin' on me again for bothering them on a holiday.

I don't think I ever went out on a holiday again.

LDH

Well, as long as the WBTS continues to dangle the carrot of everlasting life in front of all of the donkies (asses) that are JWs, they will remain too busy to notice.

See, WE all know that the JWs are a cipher in this world's equations, but in their minds, they are the single MOST important group of people on earth!

Laughable!

and, Cryable.

Yeru, great points.

Lisa