humbled

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Posts by humbled

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  2596

  The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

  by cofty in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

  we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

  they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

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  humbled

  Can we think beyond the pastor's admission that God did nothing to stop the death of 250,000 people?

  It has been hard for me to stop squalling about natural phenomena and its impact on humans.

  Here is a fact that could split fairly between Theo did or Theo did not do anything. Or---maybe it has nothing to do with this topic:

  A ten-year-old tourist from Oxshoot, Surrey knew the signs for a tsnunami. A bunch of illiterate stone-age islanders knew the signs of a tsunami.

  In the case of Tilly Smith (thanks to her good schoolteacher's lessons and her very loud mouth) her family and around 100 others lived through the disaster in Phuket, Thailand.

  In the case of the islanders of the Andaman group, only the "primitives" survived(Jarawa, Onge, Sentinelese, Greater Andamanese)--The Nicobarese natives who had assimilated to western values ( and--perhaps notable--had become Christians), these died by the thousands--they had lost the stories of their fathers.

  The earth cracks, the skies send rain and wind, Why don't we remember? Why don't we teach?

  Why don't we remember and teach--not about God or about punishment--but about the earth we live on?

  See the info on line: Tilly Smith

  Islanders survive tsunami
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  34

  What Drew You To The Witnesses?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i did believe for the first 30 years of my life that they had been picked by jehovah god to dispense the truth as best as imperfect humans could.

  then, everything became questionable.

  i had read anti jw books in the past but franz's books really got to me but not immediately.

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  humbled

  It was hearing that they would die rather than go to war. I was sick of the way soldiers were treated in Vietnam and what they had done in Vietnam. War seemed unchristian.

  That was what got their foot in the door.
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  2596

  The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

  by cofty in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

  we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

  they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  humbled

  A while back I posted one of many links to the account of indigenous, uncivilized, NON-christian islanders of Indonesia who survived the Tsunami.

  What saved (if the term is not too loaded) the primitive islanders from death?

  Is it relevant to the discussion to mention that a whole class of people survived who had lived in a virtually unbroken line of natural/traditional relationship with the ocean and the land? The ones who refused conversion to Christianity lived, as I mentioned. Another group of the islanders had been christianized,westernized and they died by the hundreds in the tsunami.

  I would ask the pastor what he makes of that.
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  34

  AUTISM and JW children

  by apostatekate in

  1. social
  2. family

  i was a jw kid.

  i remember having to sit still through long, boring meetings.

  i remember being taken to the book room for numerous spankings.

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  humbled

  Nugget,

  I love how you reasoned: when there is no more violent, threatening talk of killing and judgement----your child could endure a meeting. AND THAT WOULD NEVER HAPPEN. Out you all came.
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  2596

  The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

  by cofty in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

  we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

  they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  humbled

  I recall a great account of some "primitives" surviving the tsunami. It is notable that they had resisted conversion to Christianity. Islanders who had become modern and Christian died.

  I'll find the link.

  Edit:Here it is--Survivors of the Tsunami/Cultural Survival
• 
  2596

  The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

  by cofty in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

  we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

  they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  humbled

  Gladiator--A quote similar to the one you gave "Fortune favours the brave" is one from Terence McKenna "Nature loves courage".

  Just this morning I was discussing this thread with a son of mine. He and I have been pondering the conflict of old stories of god that do not meet the description of love, justice, mercy and power-- these taught as the sine qua non of godship.

  We discussed McKenna's commentary of "Nature loves courage" as perhaps the disembodiment of an entity/god but more as the realization that is courage is love--love that faces peril and loves in spite of fear.

  Our discussions encompass something that doesn't disappear even if "god" does. The value of love, the need for love. Especially in the face of disasters and cruelty.

  "Love is good" is all the more true if "God is not love".

  Cofty indeed makes it clear that there is no evident love in the aimless work of nature. No mercy, no justice.

  The rest of the McKenna comment bears reading (if not posting here).Our ideas of spiritual life are hard to discuss coming from caged, narrow ideas and traditions. Locking the Carpenter into a box made by Paul is not where I can put him any more.

  I can see the honest carpenter saying "Nature loves courage". "Perfect love casts out fear" may not be the equivalent but it's in the rough region of it.

  Thanks for the great subject and clear destruction of the pastor's arguments, cofty.

  
  
• 
  2596

  The Pastor of my Old Church Tried to Re-Convert Me Yesterday

  by cofty in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  yesterday evening my wife and i were invited to friends house for new year's eve.

  we met them when i was a christian and we have kept in touch.

  they had a few other friends there as well, including the new church pastor and his wife.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  humbled

  All good points, cofty.

  God celebrated the 10th anniversary of you not believing in Him by setting you up with Pastor John. ;)
• 
  34

  Are You Embarrassed Because You Were A Jehovah's Witness?

  by minimus in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  i am not.

  everyone makes mistakes..

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  humbled

  I am not embarassed to say I WAS one.

  It is important for me to warn others not to get involved in any JW free home Bible study. To warn them of their hijacking of faith and family. Their shunning and abuse of power.
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  17

  John 14:14

  by InChristAlone in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  john 14:14, in most translations, says something to the effect of, "if you ask me anything in my name, i will do it.

  " (my emphasis on "me") the kjv (and relative translations) and the nwt do not have "me" in it.

  most of the translations that keep the word were based on the westcott and hort which has the greek "me", however the kjv doesn't because it was based on the textus receptus which does not have the greek "me".

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  humbled

  Isn't the real hurdle to cross in the question of how the reader might perceive the meaning of either translation?

  Of course, that's why we have the WT literature, it doesn't matter how WE read it, they will tell the reader what it means.
• 
  17

  John 14:14

  by InChristAlone in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  john 14:14, in most translations, says something to the effect of, "if you ask me anything in my name, i will do it.

  " (my emphasis on "me") the kjv (and relative translations) and the nwt do not have "me" in it.

  most of the translations that keep the word were based on the westcott and hort which has the greek "me", however the kjv doesn't because it was based on the textus receptus which does not have the greek "me".

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  humbled

  Sorry for the double post.