Is the preaching work, no longer the number 1 priority? (page 7)

Village Idiot

@ Ignoranceisbliss: It seems that insidetheKH lives up to your name.

DATA-DOG

Factual thoughts?!?! Are you serious?? You're basing your logical argument off what?? WTBTS figures perhaps? Yeah, those are totally reliable since they are based of congregation records....

DD

Rattigan350

There is a saying in the business world that you can't manage what you don't measure.

That would be a logical reason for the counting and reporting of field service time and placements. That way they can better manage the territory, the placements, the literature, the publishers. But it is never done like that. They don't care about efficiency and getting more for less, but the controlling of the people and pushing them.

flipper

I think you hit the nail on the head- " overseeing material assets " is the # 1 priority for the WT Society and GB now. Preaching is WAY down low on the list of priorities.

And this statement, " The organization will be sending " maintenance trainers " to each Kingdom hall and teach everyone locally on how to properly maintain Watchtower assets , I mean Jehovah's house. "

So the control gets ratcheted up several notches due to the fact that WT Society now has title and ownership of most all of these Kingdom halls now. Wow, just wow. This is 1984 and George Orwell all over again. Big brother is alive and well. Run for your lives lurking JW's ! Peace out, Mr. Flipper

insidetheKH

" overseeing material assets " is the # 1 priority for the WT Society and GB now. Preaching is WAY down low on the list of priorities.

sigh...What did you expect... on a meeting that is entirely about material assets, building and maintenance?

OrphanCrow

a meeting that is entirely about material assets, building and maintenance

Exactly.

ToesUp

We are born in's like many on this site. When you have watched for 50+ years your family give their blood, sweat and tears into the "preaching work". Now we have to watch these older ones in our family struggle financially and do hard labor in their old age because they were told all their lives that this generation will not pass away. This is the hope that they (and us) were baptized under.

Now things have changed a bit. It's called, changing the rules in the middle of the game. Makes ALOT of these older ones scratch their head in disbelief.

So for these older ones to have to sit their and see the order of importance go to the Watchtowers assets, it's incredible. They certainly do see it...we are hearing it first hand.

westiebilly11

again ,from my own experience, with each meeting I attended in my early years in, I was surprised to discover how expansion/attendance came from horizontal connections rather than new ones from outside, as someone has said earlier, families bring in extended family members and aunts/uncle etc etc.

Rarely did I ever see freshers come in from the world, it was usually through family connections, even if such connections were only tenuous or temporary in attendance.(curiosity no doubt). Thankfully none of my family did come in, something which made my exit almost painless....although I did miss some genuinely nice people.

Giordano

In my opinion most of the growth of the JW religion comes through family connections. Followed by born-ins and conversion.

Here's a simple example........ my mother was a JW convert. A knock on the door put the following into play. My sister and I were then brought up as JW's. Mom converted her cousin and of course her two children became witnesses. My sister had one daughter who in turn had two children of her own all JW's

I don't remember my mom bringing anyone else in re a bible study.

I did bring in a HS buddy who pioneered with me though neither of us ever had a study where they became Witnesses .

So all told that original knock on the door generated 10 JW's. Of those 10 JW's ......I and my friend faded. So not a bad return for one original conversion.

Now in these same educated countries with thanks to the internet most people have wised up when approached by a JW in FS.

In poorer areas of the world western culture is sought after because it represents a better life style. But the JW's are not unique in converting people any number of other Christian churches are extremely active as well.

The Numbers however may not add up if an independent study is not available. For example take the Mormons: http://religiondispatches.org/mormon-numbers-not-adding-up/ :

Official LDS Church statistics for 2011 count 6,144,582 Mormons in the United States in 2011, comprising about 2% of the nation’s population. Church statistics also show a 30% membership increase between 1990 and 2008—a rate double general US population growth.

But recent studies tell a different story—different because whereas LDS Church records count anyone who has ever been baptized, demographers and pollsters count only those who currently identify themselves as Mormon. Those are the parameters for the landmark Trinity College American Religious Identification Survey: a two-decade project that has produced the largest and most accurate database of self-reported religious identification ever compiled, with 100,000 randomly sampled participants. According to Rick Phillips and Ryan Cragun, the authors of a study of Mormons based on ARIS data, self-identified adult Mormons make up not 2% but rather 1.4% of the adult US population—that’s about 4.4 million LDS adults.

Phillips and Cragun also place LDS growth rates not at 30% but at 16%—a rate on par with general US population growth. “Despite a large missionary force and a persistent emphasis on growth,” Phillips and Cragun write, “Mormons are actually treading water with respect to their per capita presence in the U.S.” In fact, additional studies by Cragun and Phillips show that retention rates of young people (young men especially) raised Mormon have dropped substantially in the last decade: from 92.6% in the 1970s–2000s to 64.4% from 2000–2010. Rising rates of disaffiliation go a long way towards explaining the gap between LDS Church records and the ARIS population estimates."

flipper

INSIDE THE KH- Let me ask you this - in your years as a JW have you EVER heard of in the WT Society's 136 year history of a " need " to send appointed WT " brothers " to Kingdom Halls to " train " rank & file JW's of how to clean or maintain their kingdom halls ? The answer is NO. Because the WT society didn't have a vested interest in ownership of those Kingdom halls - they didn't care if kids urinated on restroom floors. NOW - the stakes and game has changed. The WT Society control has amped up and EVERY SINGLE MOVE will be scrutinized of rank & file JW's because the WT Society has stripped ownership of Kingdom halls from the " brothers & sisters ". Overbearing much ? Yes. Controlling much ? Yes. If you don't GET that you are just burying your head in the sand regarding any logical feedback concerning the WT Society's land grabs. Just putting some real into your version of reality

Is the preaching work, no longer the number 1 priority?

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