Yeah so got invited this year and just thought what a waste of my time no one partakes in the wine or bread the talk has been the same for 20 years I would rather stay home
Memorial talk the SAME EVERY YEAR no anointed??
by Witness 007 8 Replies latest jw experiences
-
-
St George of England
I would disagree with your assessment that the talk has been the same for 20 years. I cannot say when it changed but not so many years ago. We no longer hear anything about the Exodus, Passover or the New Moon. Even the Memorial song has changed.
It's all about the First Century and Jesus New Covenant now. Why is this? Probably realised they do not celebrate it on the correct day.
Any ideas?
George
-
TonusOH
I stopped attending in the early 2000s. In 40 years of attending, I can remember two or three partakers. And one of those was the speaker, who was visiting from either Bethel or another congregation (he made such an impression that I don't even remember his name).
I probably stopped attending before any major changes were made to the speech. To be honest, I doubt I'd even notice the difference. It was a really boring talk most of the time.
-
Ron.W.
I think I might have been spoiled.
In every hall I have attended from the 1960's to the 2000's there was at least 2 or 3 'anointed'..
The serious older ones from my youth gave the impression they were somehow different and on a higher spiritual plane to the rest of us, without appearing condescending or superior...
Not sure how the current partakers come across?
-
HereIam60
A portion of every Memorial talk seems designed to discourage anyone from "partaking" ( Do anyone but Witnesses even use that word?) The speaker practically DARES anyone to do so by making statements such as "Likely very few, or possibly no one here will partake of the emblems.." If that's really their view then why pass them around at all. They could just as well ,after praying over them make an announcement "At this time, those annointed for heavenly life may come forward and partake of the bread and wine. If you are unable to do so, raise your hand and an attendant will bring them to you.."
My own view is that everyone present does partake of Jesus body and blood, in that , all are there (at least to some degree) to His request to do this in remembrance of Him..and the emblems are offered and passed to everyone, so all recieve them in that manner.
Scripturally we are supposed to be "discerning the body"... reflecting upon and thankfully appreciating Christ's sacrifice. I do not think actual physical consumption of the emblems is required, or in some cases even possible.
-
Rattigan350
Why does everyone focus on the anointed? There is nothing special about them.
Now there aren't any anointed on earth; if there are, it is just a handful.No need to worry about them.
The Memorial is for the apostles only, not for us today.
-
Anony Mous
@rattigan: the Bible clearly instructs to do this ‘whenever’ two or more followers of Christ come together for worship. If you are a Christian, you should partake whenever you worship in a group.
JWs don’t believe in the divinity of Christ, so whatever they do at the memorial has nothing to do with Christ’s divine nature, they are focused on the ‘anointed’ although that’s recently been modified to only include the ‘governing body’, because the anointed (aka governing body) rule the JWs on earth as kings and according to their doctrine will in heaven too.
In other words, it’s a power play to confirm the ‘rulers’ of the JW on earth, although with more and more partakers, that kind of backfired on them. I remember back in the day, the partakers were always old, elders and circuit overseers or their family members, and if you partook (there was always some crazy brother or sister) they were called into the backroom for the next few meetings to assess their spirituality with subsequent approval from Bethel based on their report. That changed later in the late 90s I believe when they said they would no longer do these assessments and the elders were told to kind of figure it out on their own whether they wanted to count them.
But I know two people that were disfellowshipped for continuing to claim they were anointed after the elders told them they weren’t approved, I was too young to understand, but one of them was a woman that said Jehovah was talking directly to her, which I now understand is a mental issue, but the window washers said it was demons which you could get from playing tapes backwards (I was scared of those double self-reversing hifi setups and 8-track players, because ‘what if’ instead of rewinding, it played music backwards) Yeah, crazy stuff used to go on in the 80s and 90s.
-
TonusOH
Rattigan350: There is nothing special about them.
Well, sure... we know that now. Back then, we thought they were going to heaven and that this was the bestest thing possible.
-
Rattigan350
"the Bible clearly instructs to do this ‘whenever’ two or more followers of Christ come together for worship. If you are a Christian, you should partake whenever you worship in a group."
No, Jesus did not instruct us to come together and do the bread and wine. He told the 11 apostles to keep doing that in remembrance of him. Because that is all that they had. Memories of him. They did not have the 4 biographies of jesus.
We on the other hand do not have memories of Jesus, but we have 4 biographies of him. So in remembrance of him, we don't do the bread and wine; we reread the 4 biographies of him.
The anointed don't go to heaven. Since it is post Jesus being king, as 1 Thess 4 says, when they die, they instantly get raised to heaven. Going to heaven is not the best thing possible. It is a job, not a resort.
They are kings and priests with Jesus.