this is the first time i've read through a watchtower magazine in about a year.
although i've been our only 8 months it really git me how crazy i must have sounded when i was a jw talking to non jws.. while other bible based religions talk about the 4 horsemen and back up their theories with other scriptures or historical evidence, the watchtower have taken so such steps.
1914 is thrown in there as if it's universally agreed that jesus started ruling since then.. even when i was a jw i never really understood why, if the pale horse represents jesus, why is he first?
I agree with those that say it can't be Jesus. It makes some sense when you throw in 1914 and say Jesus came 1'st as king followed by the other world conditions.
I think it best understood as Rev.1:1 says, Jesus shows John in a vision or by signs what he had described by only words to his disciples.
Matt 24:5-9 mark13:5-8 Luke 21:8-11 . False Christ, wars, Famine, death.
i know that it must seem silly to ask, but my brother and his family think that the big a will arrive before they die.
i tried to explain to my brother that everyone else who has ever lived in the past has died and only jesus has [physically] rose from the dead.. it is amazing that anyone could buy that line.
what crazy cult culture that could make people believe such nonsense?!.
Some years ago when I was "in" I use to give a talk entitled (can you live forever? will you?). It expressed the idea that man had with in his self, if everything was working properly, the means to live a long life or possibly forever. It was only the sin we inherited from our 1st parents that caused our life to end. We could transfer our parentage to Jesus as adopted children and keep living. I though also we might be living in a time of history when something could happen.
As time in the organ, past and things did not happening as they said, with teaching and doctrines changing I lost all faith in WT beliefs. The hope of living, however is a bible teaching not just a WT doctrine so I don't know if I have given up on that. Some days I think Yes other times or most times I just don't know. You might say I'm Stuck in the middle
60th anniversary – i was baptized 9-1-56 .
my parents weren’t witnesses at the time, but my witness uncle studied with my brother and i. i think the only reason my parents let him was because my brother was having mental issues and were hoping it would help him.
my father surprised me a few years later, started studying and was baptized in 1961, later appointed an elder.
Hecce; How are you?
I should have been more detailed, I was trying to be brief. I was referring to the pre qualifying questions that a person must go over before baptism. They're found in the back of the Organization book, New book now I think There were about 124 I believe. 3 elders reviewed them with you, then meet together to see if you qualified for baptism. I went over them a lot with people.
Yes, I think they always had the two at baptism they weren't a problem. Look at the information again and the referral to JW FACTS. Need more information let me know.
60th anniversary – i was baptized 9-1-56 .
my parents weren’t witnesses at the time, but my witness uncle studied with my brother and i. i think the only reason my parents let him was because my brother was having mental issues and were hoping it would help him.
my father surprised me a few years later, started studying and was baptized in 1961, later appointed an elder.
I liked you story. It is the same time period as when I was baptize Aug. 1955. A small assembly in southern California held at Ganesha Park down by Pomona Calif. I still have the lapel badge. You didn't have to answer any questions or tell any one, it was just between you and God.
Let me till you a little bit about my 50+ yrs. it hard to do in a few paragraphs so I'll just high light a few things
We(mother, sister and I)moved from the Midwest(Indian Territory) To a small town in central Calif. (It was only about 12 miles out side of town that James Dean was killed on his way up to the Monterey Peninsula we went out a week or so later to look around there was nothing to see) This is where we came into contact with Witnesses 1953. A guy (jw) moved in to town and we became the best of friends we went to high school together and all the large assemblies in Los Angles and the small circuit assemblies around central Calif. he was the best man at my wedding and I was his. He was killed in the early 70's .I Also went to a lot of R&B dances at the boardwalk in Pismo beach.
There was no work in that area so after high school we moved up to the San Francisco bay area
This was a great place to grow up and a great time. It was the 50's Rock& Roll, witness party ever week end ,the beach at Santa Cruz. My friend from high school came up and spent a lot of tine there too. This place had it all. I also hung around with some great guys we all were witness and knew what the limits were. No one ever told us what we could or couldn't do. I was the WT conductor for awhile I told them I thought I was to young. I also went around to the congregations in the area giving talks but sometimes we also went up to North Beach in San Francisco to look around.
Went to New York for the big convention in 58 The next year(I got to tell you this) I met the best girl she wasn't a witness I didn't care no one has ever told me what to do even in prison. I went with her for a year and got her to marry me.She surprised me and got baptize so we were married in the hall.
Two years later they came and got me and put me prison. My wife moved down to Tucson to be close. She was only about 18 at the time I was able to sell some land to help her while she was there They had visting ever Sunday and she was always there. Sometime we were the only ones. Went to the Rose Bowl in 63 had a good reunion with the guys from prison.
I was living in northern Calif. when we went though the 1975 thing. Had two sons by then and I stopped going for a while because of 75 and some odd articles in the magazines they retracted them a little so I want back.
A few years later we (wife and I) went back to the Midwest(Indian Territory) to see if we could help a small cong. and to see if I could talk to the Indian people. we had a lot of success I'm now sorry to say.
Went to Utah was there for some time. It was fun talking to the Mormons. While I was there I went to Moab for a quick build hall a bad experience it was the worst work I have ever seen I don't tell anyone I worked on that hall. I did do some work on Robert Redford's Sundance Ski Resort and on his house It was while he was preparing for the movie Horse Whisper. It was while we were there that my wife got very sick and still is. We had to leave for her heath we moved to Las Vegas that's when I began to take a hard look at this religion There had been times in the past when things just didn't feel right I remember at an assembly in ok.city I just got up and left I couldn't listen to it any more or there would be times during the WT study when I would have to go out side for awhile. I now began to see things that had been there all along. I gave up my elder position and quite no more meeting or service. The last meeting I went to I ask a couple elders to go in the back I talked to them and left. A short time later they changed all the cong. around moving every one to a different hall. I may have got lost in the mix We left Las Vegas. a few years later. My wife and I have moved to Arizona. I was a little worried how my wife was going to take all of this. but like I said I married a great girl we're doing OK.
http://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/local/crime/article39058014.html#1.
church shouldn't have divulged child-porn suspect's alleged confession, attorney says.
elders in the jehovah’s witnesses church violated the confidentiality of steven lindhorst of paso robles when they told police about an alleged confession he made regarding child pornography, according to a defense motion.. .
Anytime I see the word or name Paso Robles it gets my attention I spent a lot of time in that part of California. I knew Steve when he lived in Sacramento early 90's I think. Last I heard of him he had moved to Atascadero which is about 10 or 11 miles south of Paso. He was a elder there I believe, maybe at some point even the P.O. I didn't know he had moved to Paso Robles or when.
Steve was a (life of the party, center of attention, kind of guy) when you met him it was hard not to like him.
When I saw his picture I didn't recognize him, it had been a long time, but the name rang a bell I ask my wife and she though it was him. I called a person ( jw) that knew him well. He said that was the name, he looked at the news story and said that was the same person. He then got mad at me, thought I was making fun or going to say something about Steve or the Organ. and hung up on me.
i'm just curious as to how it all happened.. to explain.
many years back, before ex-jw websites, i called on a local lady in order to design an extension to her already enormous house.
she was a young, voluptuous gal, married to a much older local business man who spared little expense in order to give his young wife whatever her heart desired.. we chatted for ages.
"the creative day" how long was each day?
defend.
maybe this was posted before but i found this site.. search the above site.
It was all explained in the book 'new heavens and new earth". The evening and morning were figurative in that, at the start of the day, what it was to accomplish was unclear but at the end of the day it was clear and bright as the morning sun. At the time it made sense to me. I'm not sure if they've stepped back from the idea or not I know they haven't mention for some time.
this morning i stopped at dollar general to get a cheap container for waste paper.
it was 11:30 am and there were two jw literature trolleys parked near the store and manned by three jws, on old man in a rolling chair, a 30 something man, and 30 something woman.
as i walked by them i glanced at the their literature rack and proceeded into the store.. i was in the store for 20 minutes and made my purchase.
how in the world did they justify this torture?
imagine the children forced to sit in the summer heat at yankee stadium for 12 hours a day.
for 8 days.
We were living in northern Calif. in 1958 and went to that assemble as did every one we knew. It was and remains one of the highlights of my life as a witness. As we drove back and got closer to the east coast the roads were covered with witnesses all the parks, roadside rest areas people waving, it was like a big family reunion. We got there a few day early so we went up to see the farm. When we got back and entered New York they had people on the road to help you find your way. All my friends from the bay area was there we had a time at Time Squire in the evenings. Met a nice girl from Florida spent most of the assemble with her. The main stadium was to full so we spend most of our time at the Polo grounds. In the big blowup pictures of the assemble I can see a friend and I sitting there during the main talk.
After the assemble we took a tour of the factory. Just had a great time I was convince this was the truth and this was God's organ.
I also remember the 63 Rose Bowl I had just got out of prison (Tucson federal) a few months earlier and we were planning a big reunion(the jws I was in prison with) .Had a good time, I still thought it was God's organ. It took me along time to leave.
at the last assembly i attended in 2005 the cost was $11,000 per day in yuba city (just over two hours away from our circuit).
this always seemed a bit high for a facility that was built on donated land and whose construction loan had been paid off for 20 years.. i just looked up the cost to rent the redding civic center, which is just as nice if not nicer and a whole lot closer for our circuit, and it only costs $2,500 a day plus $250 for consumables (parking included).
if it would save the brother's and sister's $8,250 a day and they could have the assembly locally why wouldn't they do it?.
