I have to say, I often had a decently good time in service. If you manage to be with people you like you're in pretty good shape. There were some crazy stories that came out of service so I'm happy about those. I was never with people that were gung-ho, so we basically just said hello-goodbye to householders--nothing too stressful. That was the last thing I stopped doing actually. Sitting silently in meetings or pretending to believe things was that are clearly not true was the brutal part. Of course, a good amount of the time I did NOT want to go out in service Saturday mornings but its not like THursday night or Sunday afternoon when I'd be missing out on big games or school parties and stuff. If service was, say, once or twice a month, I really wouldn't have much negative to say about it.
simon17
JoinedPosts by simon17
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18
You have never heard of anyone have a bad day in field service, Right!
by life is to short ini grew up hearing that over and over.
i used to think about those bumper stickers that say i would rather be golfing or fishing.
jw's should have bumper stickers that say i would rather be going door to door.. once i got old enough to understand it, i used to beat myself up all the time because some of the most hellish days of my life have been out in service.. for so many reasons even more then i will list!.
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The tower of Babel- full of holes?
by highdose ini was thinking the other day about the tower of babel ( like you do) somthing that always puzzled me about reading the account in our modern day times is that we have today buildings that would have been vastly taller than the tower of babel.
even if purely because the materials needed to build modern sky scrapers have to be light in order to acheive that height.
accient heavy bricks just wouldn't have done it.. just why was god so threatened by a building???
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simon17
As far a Babel and its tower was concerned, it at some level interfered with God's overall plan for man to spread out and create nations and nationalities, etc. And forget about the peaceful, one-language concept here. Babylon was corrupt. Nimrod had already begun hunting humans for sport. So this was the beginning of an oppressive society like Nazi Germany, who if they had not been stopped likely would have killed off anybody in the world who wasn't Aryan. So it was that kind of a sick society that God interrupted. They were direct rebels and terrorists and opposed to God's policies so God stepped in and forced them to do as he intended, which is the right of a "god", is it not? When the clay starts to tell the molder how it wants to be molded then the clay learns a lesson.
No, this is totaly backwards thinking.
Apparently the clay already challenged its molder and now was given a chance to rule themselves to see if they could do better than God. If we are to believe that God accepted this challenge than he has NO RIGHT to intervene until the results bear themselves out.
And now you are saying God intervened to PREVENT man mis-ruling himself? Why? Thats precisely what NEEDS to happen for him to win the challenge of universal sovreignty! If man had become totally corrupt and a total disaster that quickly, than this challenge could have been answered decisively THOUSANDS OF YEARS ago. If Babylon was about to be enough to prove mankind needs God's rule, then we would not have had to endure the pain, death and suffering since then. Think about it.
Either interpretation you conceive of, this action was completely out of line.
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Does anyone have the 2012 Memorial Talk outline?
by Alfred injust wanted to see if they included 1 cor 11:26... or if they elaborate on that text... thnx.
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simon17
Sounds about right... the biggest part of the outline boils down to: "DON'T PARTAKE DAMNIT! Stop making us look stupid!!!!"
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The tower of Babel- full of holes?
by highdose ini was thinking the other day about the tower of babel ( like you do) somthing that always puzzled me about reading the account in our modern day times is that we have today buildings that would have been vastly taller than the tower of babel.
even if purely because the materials needed to build modern sky scrapers have to be light in order to acheive that height.
accient heavy bricks just wouldn't have done it.. just why was god so threatened by a building???
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simon17
At any rate, it would have poloarized the population there for longer than Jehovah intended so the project was cancelled.
Wait, hold on... are you suggesting the real reason God disrupted the Tower project is because it might have polarized the population? So he confused the languages and provided the ultimate polarization of population in the history of human kind?????
Surely this is one of the most ridiculous stories in Genesis (which is saying a lot)
* Not only does it make no sense that God would be threatened by a tower's height reaching the heavens, but it would be impossible for them to build a tower nearly as high as those built today.
* Also the reason given is that they must be disrupted because soon "nothing would be impossible" for the builders if they were allowed peaceful under one language. THis is a BLATANT sabotaging of the human race and their potential. Besides being cruel and petty, it also is an entirely unfair handicap to put on humans in God's case for universal sovreignty! If God was trying to show humans couldn't govern themselves, he could NOT have interfered to mess humans up like this and claim this was a fair test. What he introduced (difference due to language) is the #1 cause of humans not being able to get along peacefully through the centuries.
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WARNING.... Extremely disturbing and racist Awake! magazine (October 8, 1977)
by Alfred inwarning: offensive and racist awake!
magazine.... really, how great are racial differences?
are they of such a degree that people of different races cannot live together as equals, and take real pleasure in one anothers company?
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simon17
Why would you be offended by this? That makes no sense at all. The point of the article is to say those prejudices are wrong.
Did they write the article in a bit of a wierd, out-of-touch way? Looks that way. But what they were trying to say was the right thing.
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12% of JWs Think Gay Is OK? Really?
by metatron ini was reading pat buchanan's book, "suicide of a superpower".
on page 71, he speaks about the growing acceptance of homosexuality amidst religions.
he claims that 12% of jw's think gay behavior is ok.. really?
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simon17
If interviewed annonymously I'd say its 12-20%, yes. I know a lot of JWs in a private setting pretty much made no judgement of gay people (although they did believe god would "fix" them in the new system). Of course, this is because there is probably about 10% of JWs who remain so solely because of family and way to get out without getting shunned and ostracized. And then the rest is just liberal witnesses, which is I guess a bit more prevalent in California.
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By what age can a child be indoctrinated?
by jwfacts inmy step daughter went to the memorial, which is her first meeting in many months.
a 7 year old girl came up to her and asked if she is baptised and when will she get baptised.. my sister has a 4 year old daughter.
when she was introduced to another 4 year old one question she asked was "does he love jehovah.".
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simon17
Children start being indoctrinated from the moment they arrive. They are constantly percieving and learning from their environment. What actions cause various responses. What actions cause a smile. What actions cause a slap on the behind. What actions cause someone to look at them. How mommy and daddy view members of a different race. What situations seem stressful. Then when they can understand language, they are constantly learning from their parents, teachers, playmates, siblings of how to act. Most of this, of course, is very good. But if you start putting dangerous messages in front of them, they'll soak that up to.
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Is there one Bible Prophecy.....
by Phizzy inin the form of a prediction, that can be proven to truly be a prediction,i.e written before the event, and it came true ?.
it would be good not to have time wasters on this thread in the form of the common ones that are brought up to demonstrate the bible's prophetic prowess, like cyrus being named , these have been debunked already.. but does there seem to be a genuine prophecy in there somewhere ?.
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simon17
Only thing that I can think of which is actually written before is for a certainty is the whole Christianity will be overrun by apostacy that creeps into the congregation which, with it mixing with Roman pagan religions on its fast track to the mainstream, is easy to see a 'fulfillment.' At best its a prophecy that is non-specific with many possible fulfillments, but that one is at least a pretty major, notable change.
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I don't believe the Bible is Inspired of god - Why do you / don't you?
by cantleave inmany of you may know that i was brought up a witness and stayed in until the age of 42, even reaching the dizzy heights of being a congregation elder.
i was unusual in that, even as a witness i studied to degree level, on a part time basis, sponsored by my employer.
my first was in chemistry and my masters is in business administration.
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simon17
Says who? It means we are free to define and set our own values and goals in life, or not, as we wish. Belief in a God gets in the way of the process
And the Christian is not free to set their own values and goals because you find it to be rubbish?
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I don't believe the Bible is Inspired of god - Why do you / don't you?
by cantleave inmany of you may know that i was brought up a witness and stayed in until the age of 42, even reaching the dizzy heights of being a congregation elder.
i was unusual in that, even as a witness i studied to degree level, on a part time basis, sponsored by my employer.
my first was in chemistry and my masters is in business administration.
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simon17
I believe that 1 Tim 3:16 describes the process of which it was written by God.
You've made a littany of notes about special pleadings in Genesis. Day doesn't really mean day. Morning doesnt really mean morning. Light doesn't really mean light. Creating sun/moon/stars doesn't mean he really created them then. Every single verse seems to require some sort of note or explanation. When did people start making those special pleadings? Only after science debunked the logical reading of the book for thousands of years. Bible believers ALWAYS believed the world was created in 6 days. Any idiot would. Only when science showed this was wrong did people reinvent the words. The way it is written led men of science to believe in a geocentric universe for thousands of years. Its only logical. When scienced showed this was wrong, people reinvented what Genesis said again. No one in their right mind would ever read that and think the sun/moon/stars were created BEFORE flowering plants. It clearly doesn't say that. Only after science showed how things works does it get reinvented.
If it was really inspired, it would just describe things in an elementary way, sure, but in a way that wouldn't have MISLED EVERYONE WHO EVER READ IT before science figured things out. Is it that hard to say "In the beginning, there was nothing. Then over a great deal of time, god formed all of the stars, including our sun, creating light. Then over a great deal of time, he formed the earth. " etc etc... Its not hard to write a simple write-up of creation that is not obviously inaccurate (or, for a believer, entirely misleading!)