Do you witness more now?

by cyberguy 10 Replies latest jw friends

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  cyberguy

  I just got off the phone with a young, x-Pioneer, after a lengthy discussion (3+ hours) about the truth about the ?truth!? He?s married, with 3 young children, but is very confused as to what to do, as his family hasn?t been activity supporting the Kingdumb Hall (i.e., BORG)! I believe, I might be ?witnessing? more now than when I was a JW! However, I feel extremely impelled to speak-out to those I believe might have a listening ear (borderline JW?s and other interested ones), and show them the great deception they?ve been subjected to within "Witnessdumb!" How many have you fine folks are ?preaching? the real ?good news? now, more than when you were a JW?

  Cyber :)
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  Elsewhere

  I would say that my "anti-Witnessing" is substantially more effective than my "witnessing" ever was.
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  setfree

  Whats the "real good news anyway"?
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  CountryGuy

  Oh yeah. I let everyone know I was raised in a cult. (But I don't blame my parents.) Then when they ask what cult, I tell them the JWs. Most of my coworkers and all of my friends know to avoid the JWs like the plague.

  Yesterday, on the way to lunch with a friend, I get into her car and see the Watchtower and Awake in the floor board. I lit in to her, "What in the hell are these things doing in your car?" She explained that a really nice lady at Wal*Mart helped her get her daughter (who has MS) into the car and offered them to her. She said she took them to be polite, but added that the lady was real nice. "Of course she's nice," I told her, "she's looking at you as if you were a potential convert. Throw these away before you become corrupted."

  We threw them in the trash on the way into the restaurtant.

  Country
• 

  Jez

  Just look at my topic history and you will see that now I enjoy and take every opportunity to "preach".

  Jez
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  setfree

  Ifin you want to preach.. Than you dont belong here
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  seattleniceguy

  Ditto Elsewhere.

  At first, I was looking for opportunities to talk to active Witnesses. I'd email them and talk on the phone. I even took out an ad in the local weekly newspaper here describing the cult-like nature of the religion. But I came to see that you can't force someone to see something. They must be ready, and no one can make them ready.

  So now I focus my efforts on making sure that quality information is available to those people who are mentally and emotionally prepared to look for it. One way is posting on this board. Make the way available, people will rescue themselves.

  SNG
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  curlygirl

  SNG------I have to hear more about the ad that you placed in the paper!!! Did you have alot of interest?

  curlygirl
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  Heatmiser

  Not to actual JW's as I have no contact with any. My parents stopped preaching to me long ago, so on the rare occasion we have contact religion is not discussed. On the other hand I let everybody else I know how much of a destructive cult the JW religion is.

  My choice of career garuantees that I will not have any incedental contact with JW's.
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  seattleniceguy

  Hi curlygirl,

  At first, my plan was to place anonymous, three-line ads every week that gradually, mostly inoffensively, encouraged thinking. By using WT buzzwords, I planned to make the messages especially significant to JWs. Here's the thread where I was thinking about that out loud:
  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/72522/1.ashx

  However, what actually happened was I was driving to work one morning, thinking about it, and I was listening to a news program about terrorist ideology. My mind made this connection that the JWs have as hate-filled an ideology as any terrorist group, and it made me angry. I decided to nix my warm and fluffy ad concept and write some copy with teeth. The ad that actually ran was in the Stranger (which I thought the perfect venue) of July 26, 2004. The ad said:

  The Watchtower: A "hate-filled ideology"?Ask JWs about the gruesome fate they see for 6 billion non-JWs close at hand!

  Here's the thread in which I talk about that ad:
  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/12/75556/1.ashx

  I don't think this ad was of much assistence to current JWs. However, this paper is extremely well read, especially among the young urbanite crowd in the metro area. My thinking was that this ad would be helpful in a secondary way, because JWs who read the ad would know that the people whose doors they would be knocking on would also likely have read the ad, and they might expect to hear something about it. Since there is no good way of weaseling out of the fact that they really do believe most non-JWs will be obliterated shortly, I thought it might make the thinkers of the bunch a little nervous about going out in service. I know it would make my stomach sink.

  If it were simply a bold-faced lie, like, "JWs eat children," or something absurd like that, it would be easy to refute. However, pointing out something that is true but normally downplayed makes it impossible to deny effectively. I thought that this might prompt some to think more about the rightness of their ideology.

  In the end, though, I decided it was not cost-effective to concert my efforts in this way. You can lead a Witness to water, but you can't make 'em drink. Just make the water available, and when they themselves are ready, they will drink.

  SNG