Posts by CornerStone

6

Let the Watchtower Society Speak!

by professor in

jw
friends

come on wts (or the governing body recently seperated from the watchtower society so they can dishonestly steer clear of the legal consequences of their actions)...... speak for yourselves!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.

tell the world why you should still be respected after falsely prophesying in god's name over and over and over again predictions of the end which the simple element of time has proven false!!!!!.

let's let a member of the governing body or an official representative of the watchtower society try to give us a good reason why ex-members are shunned by their relatives which violates jesus's teachings.

CornerStone

Hello Professor,

They CAN"T speak up about the wrongs they have done. There in too deep. Their hands are too dirty. Not all the confessing in the world can wipe clean over 120 years of taking trusting peoples time, their money, and their lives, (both real and figurative).

And speaking of money, that, I believe, is THE most pivitol reason they continue on like nothings wrong.

IT'S ALL ABOUT THE MONEY!, MONEY!!, MONEY!!!

A bureaucracy, by it's very nature, has as it's number one goal, to survive, to continue, to perpetuate itself. The org may call itself a "theocracy" but I ask in all fairness, "What transsendent qualities does it posses that give the impression that it's "directed by God?"" Here's a hint org, LIES AND FALSE PROPHACIES ARE NOT IT!!! The org, therefor, falls directly under the definition of a man made bureaucracy, IMHO.

The orgs biggest strength is their ability to manipulate people to get their money, and they know it. They have been doing this for so long, they are not going to let a few dissatisfied "whiners" ruin their cash cow, (trusting men and women).

So Prof., the only confessing the org will be doing is throwing the public a few bones to the media using words like "oversight" and "saddend" from their batch of lawyers. They have been the head of their "gang" for so long, they would rather take a bullet in the head than give up one iota of the power and control they have enjoyed these many years.

Boy, what a rotten way to start the day, talking about the org.

CornerStone

31

How would you respond to this?

by openminded in

jw
friends

i got this letter today from a friend of my dad who i have not seen in years.

please respond to any or all of it as you see fit.

it pretty much sums up witness mentality.

CornerStone

Hello Openminded,

When trying to reason with a sincere JW the best approach, I've found, is to test weather their convictions stand up to the light of scripture. What I mean by this is weather their convictions, both doctrinal and emotional, are DIRECTLY supported by the Bible.

An example:

Probably the one thing that stung the worst in my more "active" JW life is the almost paletable lack of sincere Christian love I encountered among the brothers. Since I knew Gods spirit produced love I reasoned a lack of love ment a lack of Gods spirit. The scripture says at John 13: 34,35

34"So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. 35Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples."

So based on just these scriptures I could, and did, reason that I do not see fellow JW's showing the love Jesus COMMANDED believers to show and futher, it would be against my Bible trained conscience to try to recruit others, unsuspecting victims, into an aneimic form of worship to God. The true Jesus type of love was the absolute PROOF of desciplship and the true followers of Jesus.

All other so-called "proofs" of being the true religion ment nothing in light of that one simple scripture.

This is true as regards my conscience and convictions. Perhaps your dads friend can share with you what he considers very important about JWism and you can test weather, in the light of scripture, his thoughts have a secure foundation.

Well, I hope this made sense.

CornerStone

8

Saying Jehovah's name

by jurs in

jw
friends

when i first started studying 10 years ago with jw's i felt uncomfortable using jehovah's name.

i can't explain why but i avoided using it.

after awhile it became a beautiful name to me.

CornerStone

Hello Jurs,

I used to use the name Jehovah a lot but now find it has an appropriate place and time for me. Being in the borg has, at least, taught me to seperate Jah and Jesus in my thinking when warrented. It's useful for my 2 meeting a month limit. :)

CornerStone

11

I Never BELONGED in the BORG, Did You?

by BoozeRunner in

jw
friends

in recent years, i have come to the realization that i never really beonged in the wts.

you see, i was born into the religion, so therefore it was all i ever knew.

but as i have examined my inner self, i realize that i simply dont have what it takes to be a witness.

CornerStone

Hello B.R.,

I never felt I "belonged" to the association of JW's because everything was just sooo conditional! Charity was a concept only reserved for "spiritualy strong" individuals, i.e. making all the brainwashing sessions, er.., I mean, the meetings and plenty of watchtower sales, um.., field service, that is. :)

I showed my love for my brothers and sisters by volenteering for everything that needed to be done. I had no idea that in their minds my gift of love was perverted, that it was realy a "privilege" for me to help with the duties in their eyes. So when I started the evil "question asking" thing about blood and disfellowshipping they gradually began releaving me of priviliges and I saw with eyes of understanding how VERY conditional EVERYTHING, and I mean EVERYTHING, even love, was to the borg.

Funny, true to borg of Star Trek fame, even love is irellevent.

So, there is realy no "belonging" to such a group who will treat you like snot on a used tissue at the drop of a dime. Ofcourse, there are JW's whose lives are well intergrated into the org way of doing things but they live under an illusion. And they find that out when they make a mistake and require the orgs "loving provisions", i.e., elder kindness and love. Yeah right! Good luck!

Puke!

Puke!!

PUKE!!!

Boy, just saying those words realy cleaned me out!

CornerStone

21

No more hiding!!!

by BugEye in

jw
friends

well, here is my real picture.. i have decided to stop hiding and show my real face.. i hid behind an artificial facade (data) for a long time, fearful of facing the consequences of deciding that my former beliefs were incorrect.. i made the concrete decision in march of this year that jehovahs witnesses do not have the truth and in fact that they were totally wrong.. however, since i have been inactive for 5 years and i do have some people that i care about still in the organization, i decided that i would not reveal who i was so that i did not lose my friends and family.. however, i have now decided to be who i am and my change in my picture icon represents that change.

the consequences are still the same, and i am likely to lose most if not all of my borg friends, but that is the consequence of my decision.. no more hiding for me .

bugeye

CornerStone

Hello BugEye,

Your a better man than I. Stay stong. :)

CornerStone

5

Does the WTS hold to the truth in love?

by CornerStone in

jw
friends

i was reading my bible this morning,(some of us still do :) ), and i came across these verses;.

11he is the one who gave these gifts to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.

12their responsibility is to equip gods people to do his work and build up the church, the body of christ, 13until we come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of gods son that we will be mature and full grown in the lord, measuring up to the full stature of christ.. 14then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth.

CornerStone

Hello L.B.,

You said;

"It seems that the higher your morality develops, the less likely you will stay a JW!"

Your right!

A "higher" sense of moral thinking forces us to place more value on what we understand to be "right" or "good". However, if we value our comfort or safty the same as we value what we believe to be right or good, then we stagnate in our spiritual growth.

G. T.,

Thanks for the info. The org does stablize lives but ONLY to make them better robots. Kind of like the man whose only job is to push a yellow button once every 2 seconds on an assembly line. Nothing else!
One day the org will see that instead of thinking of herself as the "mother organization" she will infact understand that she has been portraying the part of the harlot who spills the blood of the people!

BTW, I enjoy reading your post. :)

CornerStone

5

Does the WTS hold to the truth in love?

by CornerStone in

jw
friends

i was reading my bible this morning,(some of us still do :) ), and i came across these verses;.

11he is the one who gave these gifts to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers.

12their responsibility is to equip gods people to do his work and build up the church, the body of christ, 13until we come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of gods son that we will be mature and full grown in the lord, measuring up to the full stature of christ.. 14then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth.

CornerStone

Hello All,

I was reading my Bible this morning,(some of us still do :) ), and I came across these verses;

11He is the one who gave these gifts to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. 12Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ, 13until we come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature and full grown in the Lord, measuring up to the full stature of Christ.
14Then we will no longer be like children, forever changing our minds about what we believe because someone has told us something different or because someone has cleverly lied to us and made the lie sound like the truth. 15Instead, we will hold to the truth in love, becoming more and more in every way like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. 16Under his direction, the whole body is fitted together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.

This made me think of the GB and verses 14 and 15 in particular. I sat wondering if ANY member of the GB realy understands the relevence of these verses and the society's history.

My sad conclusion is the ruling class does not. And those members that do are too scared to speak out about their concerns.

They, the ruling class, have come to regard lies and changing doctrines as their "birthright". And as far as "holding to the truth in love", how can you when you use fear, (from elders), intimidation, (from WTS legal), and the threat of dissfellowshipping to keep everyone in line?

Blinded by power and making money, the GB are no longer able to understand a few simple truths of what love is; love does not lie, love is always consistant.

CornerStone

25

Prof. Jason BeDuhn letter on the NWT/KIT (part 1)

by bj in

jw
friends

some days ago i asked you if someone wrote to prof j. buduhn who is quoted in the watchtower 1 february 1998, p. 32. here's what i received from him.

as every translation does.

jesus one can say "my god.

CornerStone

Hello G.T.,

I find it a very mature and reasoned respone you made to J. BeDuhn's answers. Because of how the org. has hurt so many of us it is very difficult to think they can do anything in a somwhat honest way, damm them! :)

I think most on this board, however, believe that the orgs. "translation" of John 1:1's "A god" was due to doctrinal beliefs. Even if "A god" had SOME literal basis for being there, depending on how one looked at it, ( ala F. Franz), the question that I think is important to ask is " What is the most common way that John 1:1 is rendered, (translated)?"

In my humble opinnion, the orgs. use of "A god" can be likened to going to a dictionary, looking up a word, seeing 5 possible difinitions for that word, and then choosing the 5th difinition as being the most accurate while ignoring the 4 more likely difinitions for that word. I think, if this analogy can be used in the case of the org., that such actions would be scholasticly and moraly dishonest. And after 120 years of false prophecies and ever changing doctrines, would one think this beyond them?

CornerStone

2

WTS Corporate responsibility; TAXES!

by CornerStone in

jw
friends

i was looking at the freeminds website and noticed a page that listed a mess of the orgs forms that are used to report to the borg, i mean org.

that is one heck of a pile that is used by the r&f as well as elders and such.

i was thinking, (no comments please), that with all the massive paperwork and strict control that members have to deal with, and with the mandatory reporting upon pain of punishment that every r&f have to undergo, does'ent this take the religion clause out of the wts's religion with charitiable tax exempt status?.

CornerStone

Hello M.A.,

The Constitution does indeed guarantee freedom of religion. And yes, one would be hard pressed to declare Jehovah's Witnesses as not being a religion. My perspective, however, had to do with how close the WT religion "mimicked" a secular institution or organization, like MicroSoft.

In the same sense that MicroSoft would be hard pressed to declare itself a religion and thus qualify for religious tax exemp status it SEEMS that the WT religion should not qulify for the same status as it gets closer and closer to looking like a for profit corporation.

"WHEW" I hope that made sense.

The more the WTS conducts it's "business" as a coporation, with millions in the bank, and the more the "flock of God" are REQUIRED on PAIN of PUNISHMENT to conduct corporate business, the easier it will be to convence the FED's or state governments that the good ol' org owes them money, BIG TIME!

CornerStone

17

U can leave the truth but the truth cant leave U

by skeptical 1 in

jw
friends

forgive my brutal honesty but thats my take on this site so far.

thats not to say that it serves no useful purpose.

but it does seem that many of you are totally consumed with proving to yourself and others that jw's don't have the truth.

CornerStone

Hello S1, welcome,

As a Christian I believe the TRUTH is unchangable. Jesus Christ and God's Word are TRUTH to me. The WTS does NOT have exclusive use of or control over God or Christ, as they claim in so many words. So, INHO, leaving the WTS CANNOT be construed as leaving the TRUTH.

It is true that people who leave the WTS are in some cases leaving somthing the once may have believed in, this may be God and Jesus, and so are invariably leaving a part of themselves. This is very sad. People need more than human emotions to live on, we need faith and hope. Like Jesus said,

"People need more than bread for their life;
they must feed on every word of God."

Matthew 4:3b NLT

The societies rules and doctrines may stick with those who leave to different degrees but I would not constru those things as TRUTH. For me at least, only what God and Jesus teaches through God's word can be construed as truth. Just my opinion and thanks for posting.

CornerStone