Leviticus 19:28: "You must not make cuts in your flesh for a deceased soul, and you must not put tattoo marking upon yourselves. I am Jehovah."
I like the preceding verse: "You must not destroy the extremity of your beard."
a week ago my wife and i ran into a jw nephew and his wife at the supermarket.
despite knowing that my wife and i are no longer jw's, he was very gracious, giving his aunt and i a warm hug and introducing his wife to us.
he casually mentioned meeting with the elders and their decision to disfellowship.
Leviticus 19:28: "You must not make cuts in your flesh for a deceased soul, and you must not put tattoo marking upon yourselves. I am Jehovah."
I like the preceding verse: "You must not destroy the extremity of your beard."
i went to 2 parties yesterday.
i actually was invited to 4 this year.. i started out at my daughter's at 7:30 a.m. and my daughter, sil, 2 grandkids and my ex gave presents to one another.
95% of the gifts were for my 2 year old grandaughter because it was really her first xmas to unwrap presents and get into the "spirit".. then i went in the afternoon to my gf's and they had a big spread and we (once again) exchanged gifts.. here's my bottom line: i enjoyed the family and friends getting together.
Clyde and I don't get into it much. No tree, no decorations. But we have nothing against it. It surprises me that some of our "worldly" friends don't do much either, but it's mostly the ones who don't have kids. Our son and daughter-in-law aren't celebrating it either even though they have two children. They don't mind our granddaughter taking part in the school festivities though.
my wife took our dog for a walk this morning around 9:30 a.m. and saw a ''service group'' leaving my uncle's house this morning.
she said there were about 8 people getting in 2 cars.
she asked me, ''why would they go out today when people are celebrating christmas''?
I remember a woman who came into the "truth" when somebody visited her on Christmas Day.
this week's congregation "bible" study.
the drone running the show asked an auxiliary question (tm):.
"so, what could be some of the consequences if people weren't honest in reporting their field service?".
Years ago I remember a pioneer sister from Alaska who moved to our area with her family. She never failed to get her hours in even during the move. Wasn't hard. She would just place magazines at every gas station on the way and count the time in between. Even when settled in our territory, she would go out a little bit, then go home and when her children got home on the bus, she would continue counting her time while she had a Bible study with them, or so she said.
Come to think of it--wayyyy back when I pioneered, I would start my time by writing a letter (or at least get a paragraph done), then drive to the KH for the meeting for FS, then go in service, then stop my time when I got back home and finished the letter. I felt I was being honest, however, by deducting the actual time we were at the KH. Well...I had to be creative. Had to get 100 hours in back then.
Bonnie
That is neat, and to think...I almost didn't open it. Clyde laughed his head off.
didn't see this posted anywhere, my apologies if this is a repeat..... in a letter to all congregations dated 12/9/09, the society wrote out some highlights of the previous service year.
the letter is to be read to the congregation "at the first service meeting after its receipt".. here are the numbers they report (all numbers are for us only):.
-- average publishers - 1,096,502. this is about a 4% increase (3.5% if you don't round) over the prior year's average of 1,059,253.. -- that "4% increase" in average publishers is the largest since 1992.
5 or 6 years ago, they added a provision for very old or very sick publishers that 15 minutes is enough to be counted as a publisher. But that doesn't apply to everyone, just those approved by the service committee. In my expereince, there are very very few who get approved that way, far less than 1 per congregation.
Actually, I was approved--not because I was "very old or sick" but because my time was taken up with caring for my very old and sick parents. I didn't ask for the approval, but when the elders came to visit, they gave me the OK. I didn't take them up on it.
one of the things that made me start doubting the wtbts and jws was the way jws treat their jw employees.. i worked for jws several times.
the experience was always the same.. 1. pay was less than the going market rate for the same work at "worldly" companies.. 2. there were no benefits of any kind, no paid holidays, no sick time, no overtime, no insurance.. 3. whenever possible the jw forced the jw employees to pay their own company related expenses like gas, pager, company uniform, etc.. 4. any attempt to discuss the poor working conditions was always responded to with "but you get to make all the meetings and you get to go to the assemblies and you get to work for brothers.
" and, if you said "i would go to meetings regardless of who i worked for" and pushed back on that answer then they started in on your "loyalty" and you were unspritual if you questioned a "brother" and were not "loyal" to your employer.. 5. any attempt to find another job was met with harassment, being told you could not give the jw employer as a reference, being threatened with lawsuits, etc.. 6. the jw employers themselves were lazy and would not do the things they expected of their jw employees.. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
My current manager is a JW, but I'm not sure if he knows my background. But he's a nice enough guy that if he did know, he wouldn't make it an issue. He knows that I'm a valuable worker. I work solely on commission, and the more I make, the more he makes. It wouldn't make sense for him to rock the boat.
one of the things that made me start doubting the wtbts and jws was the way jws treat their jw employees.. i worked for jws several times.
the experience was always the same.. 1. pay was less than the going market rate for the same work at "worldly" companies.. 2. there were no benefits of any kind, no paid holidays, no sick time, no overtime, no insurance.. 3. whenever possible the jw forced the jw employees to pay their own company related expenses like gas, pager, company uniform, etc.. 4. any attempt to discuss the poor working conditions was always responded to with "but you get to make all the meetings and you get to go to the assemblies and you get to work for brothers.
" and, if you said "i would go to meetings regardless of who i worked for" and pushed back on that answer then they started in on your "loyalty" and you were unspritual if you questioned a "brother" and were not "loyal" to your employer.. 5. any attempt to find another job was met with harassment, being told you could not give the jw employer as a reference, being threatened with lawsuits, etc.. 6. the jw employers themselves were lazy and would not do the things they expected of their jw employees.. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
My current manager is a JW, but I'm not sure if he knows my background. But he's a nice enough guy that if he did know, he wouldn't make it an issue. He knows that I'm a valuable worker. I work solely on commission, and the more I make, the more he makes. It wouldn't make sense for him to rock the boat.
one of the things that made me start doubting the wtbts and jws was the way jws treat their jw employees.. i worked for jws several times.
the experience was always the same.. 1. pay was less than the going market rate for the same work at "worldly" companies.. 2. there were no benefits of any kind, no paid holidays, no sick time, no overtime, no insurance.. 3. whenever possible the jw forced the jw employees to pay their own company related expenses like gas, pager, company uniform, etc.. 4. any attempt to discuss the poor working conditions was always responded to with "but you get to make all the meetings and you get to go to the assemblies and you get to work for brothers.
" and, if you said "i would go to meetings regardless of who i worked for" and pushed back on that answer then they started in on your "loyalty" and you were unspritual if you questioned a "brother" and were not "loyal" to your employer.. 5. any attempt to find another job was met with harassment, being told you could not give the jw employer as a reference, being threatened with lawsuits, etc.. 6. the jw employers themselves were lazy and would not do the things they expected of their jw employees.. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------.
My current manager is a JW, but I'm not sure if he knows my background. But he's a nice enough guy that if he did know, he wouldn't make it an issue. He knows that I'm a valuable worker. I work solely on commission, and the more I make, the more he makes. It wouldn't make sense for him to rock the boat.
my wife is going to a jw baby shower today............
My daughter-in-law gave a very nice baby shower for her cousin's wife. The next day at the meeting the elder husband of one of the attendees counselled her about the games. He read something from the WT which my daughter-in-law couldn't remember because she was in so much shock. I was at the shower, and there was absolutely nothing wrong with any of the games, even though they weren't Bible games. For one of the games, they passed around little bags with a different baby item in each bag and they ladies had to write down what they thought was in the bag. One of the items was a breast pad--was that bad? Another game had something to do with crossing the leg. Somebody made the remark that the mother should have kept her legs crossed.
One good thing came out of this. Daughter-in-law stopped going to meetings.