PEOPLE OR PROCEDURES-WHICH DESCRIBES YOU

tijkmo

what do you think is the most important...i remembered this illustration from a mid 80s wt...do you think this is a description of wts at this moment

Even when organizational responsibilities multiply, caring elders will never lose sight of the fact that they are dealing with people—people whom God loves. (1 Peter 5:2, 3, 7; 1 John 4:8-10) They will never be so occupied with organizational matters or procedures that they forget their prime role as shepherds, guardians, and protectors of the flock.—Proverbs 3:3; 19:22; 21:21; Isaiah 32:1, 2; Jeremiah 23:3, 4.
An intense preoccupation with schedules and figures, for example, might crowd out concern for people. Consider a bus driver who thinks his prime duty is to stick efficiently to his schedule come what may. He is consumed with a desire to get from one end of his route to the other in exactly the time allotted. Unfortunately, from his point of view, passengers get in the way. They are slow and disorganized and always arriving at the bus stop just as he is moving away. Instead of remembering that the whole point of his job is to serve the needs of his passengers, he sees them as a hindrance to efficiency and avoids them.
Care
for Each Individual
A heartless drive for efficiency often ignores the needs of individuals. Weaker, inefficient ones may be seen as liabilities. When this happens, terrible consequences can ensue. For example, in the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta, weak and sickly children were left exposed to die. They would not make strong, efficient soldiers to defend a strong, efficient state. "When a child was born," says philosopher Bertrand Russell, "the father brought him before the elders of his family to be examined: if he was healthy, he was given back to the father to be reared; if not, he was thrown into a deep pit of water."—History of Western Philosophy.
Rigidity and austerity, not happiness, marked such a ruthless state. (Compare Ecclesiastes 8:9.) No doubt the Spartan authorities felt that they had a good case on the grounds of efficiency, but their conduct was devoid of all compassion or kindness. Their way was not God’s way. (Psalm 41:1; Proverbs 14:21) In contrast, overseers in the Christian congregation remember that all of God’s sheep are precious in his eyes, and they deal rewardingly with each one of them. They care not just for the 99 who are healthy but also for the one who is weak or emotionally disturbed.—Matthew 18:12-14; Acts 20:28; 1 Thessalonians 5:14, 15; 1 Peter 5:7.

Elsewhere

So long as elders and the WTS have absolute power, they will be absolutely corrupted.

Elders CANNOT really simply just deal with the person. The Society puts too many rules and regulations to preven simply showing love. If a person committed a sin and literally were so distraught, they wanted to kill themselves, the elders still HAD to give them restrictions per the Organization.

MerryMagdalene

Interesting question...so which best describes the elders I knew?

Were they more concerned with the needs of the people they served OR with the procedural requirements of the organization they served?

Seems to me the two were constantly at war with each other within the elders I knew and procedure almost always (if not always) won out...

Which describes me? I have no procedures to follow so I'm for the people all the way

~Merry

LittleToe

I was always a people person, as an Elder, but I knew the rule book backwards. I also loved playing devil's advocate, and so confounded the bullies. It got to the stage where I only needed to give a certain look and they knew they were in for a fight.

Legalists tend to be tenacious, however, and eventually they wear you down.

jgnat

As a civil servant, my entire career has been bound by rules. My dad set me free when he explained, "Why was the rule written in the first place? Because people forgot to follow common sense. Always remember why the rule was written in the first place. If application goes against it's original purpose, ignore the rule."

Rules are simply a tool to help get work done more smoothly. The tool should never be exalted above the people it was built to serve.

sweet tee

Woe to you scribes and pharisees. Hypocrites! That's what the article brought to my mind. Legalism is first and foremost in the b0rganization. If you try to buck the system they'll throw you out on your arse and never look back!

crazyblondeb

Where I grew up at it was ALL about looks and rules!! If they couldn't find one that applied, they made something up. It was always about who had what. (possessions, titles, etc.) Who could get the dirt on someone first. Who would be the first to "counsel" someone. They had not a clue how to actually HELP someone. They helped by threats. By the time they were done, you wanted to committ suicide or homocide!!

DanTheMan

pssht - whatever

This is what they put in print, then the CO comes around and tears the BOE a new one for being too lenient in JC's, etc.

They're always shifting around. I had a JC back in 2001 that was right on the heels of a WT article that encouraged™ the elders to exercise mercy™ in JC's whenever possible. So I got off with losing my priveleges™, when a dub facing the same charges in a different cong with a different JC in a more strict period (like right now) would've gotten disfellow-whipped in a heartbeat.

diamondblue1974

Although I was not an elder nor did I hold any position of dictatorship I was a people person; my best man (and father figure while I was growing up) was disfellowshipped for reasons which I couldnt begin to comprehend as a human being and I refused to shun him the way I was expected to.

My view was that even if your friend falls off the beaten track and wonders and this subsequently could put their live in danger surely you would spend more time with that person in order to bring their spirituality back into play and not leave them to wonder to their death. Apparently though this was human thinking and not spiritual thinking....one word...Bollocks.

I questioned my mother on this point actually because she was going on about how the churches have an hierachal (sp?) structure and I remember looking at her in disbelief and asked why she thought the WTS was any different; apparently she doesnt see the bureaucracy and the autocratic structure of the organisation at all and the legalism the follows doesnt even register...with me however the individual was and even now I am out is still key.