as most of you know i live in the wilderness..my ranch house has a nice big front window.so it`s like a giant tv screen tuned to the nature channel.....right now i have a beautiful deer in front of it.shes a gold colour with bits of yellow in her coat,and a white tail and bum.she`s grazing peacefully,flicking her tail now and again.chewing on fiberous desert plants that will soon be burned off by the desert sun next month..when that happens she will eat hay left out for the cattle..or..graze on plants that have been shaded by the abundant pine trees here.....behind her some 50ft away,are a family of groundhogs.all standing like little soldiers,by the caves and tunnels they have dug for thier home..i left peanuts in the shell,out for them.they didn`t know what to do with them..lol!
!..so i opened a few and left a few in the shell..it took me a few days..but..i taught the groundhogs how to get the peanut out of the shell..lol!
!.....there`s a hawk that lives here.he`s in charge of groundhog population control,now that "squirrell eat`n dawg" is gone.....oop`s!..
amazing picture you've painted Outlaw.
I used to leave peanuts in their shells for the squirrels in my garden but stopped when I discovered they'd dug up my plants to bury them. Now they just call hystercally to one another when they see me come to dig in my garden. I still find peanuts scattered about. Maybe I should sit and eat them and let the squirrels come and join me. lol
i've been studying with the jw's for a few months and i've attended a few meetings but things are feeling somewhat strange...i don't quite get the jist of things but i feel that i'm learning more of what the watchtower teachers and less of what the bible actually says.. i never open my bible.. i'm always reading the watchtower pamphlets.
i really like the people i've met in the congregation and the guy thats been doing the studies with me has been an awesome friend.. .
but i'm just having some issues.. i mean.. they translated their own bible to suit their own doctrines it seems.
Hi michael
I mean who really knows? They could be finally getting it right. I don't know.. I'm just a lost person.. wanting to please the creator but afraid that one way is the wrong way, and i'm too stupid to find the right way. Blah. Why is this path so difficult?
Please take the warnings on here seriously and trust your gut feeling that something is very strange and not quite healthy about JW teachings.
We all feel lost and ask ourselves 'why is the path so difficult? its part of being human - make friends with that feeling.
Jesus described the kindom as being within you. Sit quietly and meditate on that. Gain confidence in your own intuitive spirituality.
The problems with the JW's is that they will exploit your feelings of being lost and they will use that to build confidence in their own organisation and then they will tell you the organisation (posing as God) wants you to do more and more and more.
best wishes to you
bernadette
does your real-life experience and what you observe in nature lead you to the same conclusions that are presented as fact in the bible?
.
or do you believe because of the power of suggestion?.
thanks JamesThomas - gnosticism seems have to some pointers to what you are describing and I was also reading something about emanations of unfolding reality. But the important thing is not to cling or become attached to human descriptions and definitions.
i have a bread machine and lately its been squeaking so i sprayed wd40 on the mechanism... and now the whole house smells like parafin and my bread is probably ruined.
more importantly has the squeaking noise gone
does your real-life experience and what you observe in nature lead you to the same conclusions that are presented as fact in the bible?
.
or do you believe because of the power of suggestion?.
JamesThomas
I have been following your beautiful words here - but I have a question. How does the cruelty and distructiveness in nature fit in with a loving reality?
thanks
bernadette
anyone looked into the links between the lucis trust and the u.n?....also the background of the organisation...who was alice bailey?...what were her links to madame blavatsky?...pretty interesting.....
hmm..... ninja, 1919 figures prominently in Alice Bailey's life, - wonder if ole Charles T Russell was in cahoots with her too after he'd passed - if so he probably knew what Rutherford would do with his legacy.
a little biblical humor.
q. what kind of man was boaz before he married ruth?
a. ruthless.
nvr - hehehehe
Who had the stretchiest skin in the Bible?
Abraham.
He tied his ass to a tree and walked up a mountain.
any more anyone?
a little biblical humor.
q. what kind of man was boaz before he married ruth?
a. ruthless.
Bikerchic
here are some more (groan groan groan)
Q. Who is the shortest man in the bible?
A. Knee high miah
Q. The fattest woman in the bible?
A. The woman of some area.
Q Did Jesus use American slang?
A Matthew 8:18. When Jesus saw a crowd around him, he gave the command to shove off for the other side.
i was just reading a thread on this forum called saviors of the world?.
http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/136105/1.ashx.
that thread discussed similarities between the various saviors, or messiahs that are said to have walked the earth, most of them appearing long before jesus supposedly emerged.
I though the following points were very interesting.
The development of the Jesus Christ story is best explained not as simply a "paganization" of Judaism, but as a part of Jewish literary tradition. What did set Christianity apart, however, was its crossover status into non-Jewish communities, where Jewish literary traditions were not understood. A combination of factors then led to its growing acceptance. The destruction of Judea left many diaspora Jews in despair and without a grounding for traditional Judaism, so the story of Jesus had appeal to them. Unlike most of the Greek and Roman religions, Christianity was highly evangelical with its claims of salvation and "truth". People living in the Roman Empire had grown up with messages of confidence and strength, but in the 3rd and 4th centuries Rome went through a series of hardships so the Christian story of suffering, redemption, and humility, rooted in the history of Jewish hardships, appealed to a people who were surrounded by religions based on a culture of superiority that was now failing. For those who looked deeper into the religion, many were impressed with the degree to which the life of Jesus seemed to have been so completely foretold by the earlier Hebrew scriptures. The numerous parallels between the Gospels and the "Old Testament" convinced many that the religion "had to be true", how else could one account for so many "fulfilled prophecies"? They declined to understand, however, that the parallels are there because the Gospels are made-up stories based on the Hebrew scriptures. As Christians began filling the ranks of the military in the 4th century Constantine and other emperors had reasons to cater to the religion, and they found that people who were willing to die to spread their religion to new lands made for good soldiers.
iii, p. 712).
vi, p. 137, pp.
cit., pp.
terry
I really like your illustration of the river
History is the river that runs through it.
Imo history too is subject to mythos depending on the perspective of the ones telling it.
I'm kinda seeing all of human knowledge as being the banks of the river and life as the river itself. So then we can allow for changing perspectives and interpretations, depending on our vantage point, while still acknowledging that our experiences/input shapes the course of the river but not the river itself.
The most enlightened people straddle the two sides of that chasm.
I want to take it further and say that that the most enlightened people stay fluid in their thinking like the river.
