Posts by shepherd

45

If you were a Witness, when did you realize the Governing Body was apostate?

by matt2414 in

for more than 30 years i believed everything that came from the watchtower society, especially since i lived at bethel for a while and i knew a lot of the gb members, who to me seemed intelligent and personable.

at the beginning, the emphasis was on the bible, the kingdom, jehovah and jesus.

but gradually over time, there would appear an elephant in the room that no one seemed to talk about, such as the change in the understanding of "generation.

shepherd

There were always things that did not add up, and I think most thinking JW's have these, but we were trained to put them to the back of our minds. However, the Daniel book made me realize I was being conned. The description of the 1260 days being from one convention in 1919 to another in 1926 was hard to believe, but when I noticed the actual dates of the conventions were ommited I decided to check because if it were true it would be impressive (I also wondered why a day in Daniel was a year when it suited them, and a literal day when it didn't). However, on checking I was shocked to see a variation of 20 or more 'days'. Would God have got the number of days wrong? A realization occured - not only were the GB wrong, but they knew they were conning me! Waiting for new light is one thing, but this was not a misunderstanding, this was fraud.

Once I read COC, and I related to almost everything written there, the chains were forever broken. I was free of this lying cheating GB.

116

The "30 Other Lands" in the Worldwide Report - revealed!

by cedars in

i've just uploaded the third article in my four-part "under the microscope" series - looking at the society's claims to be god's sole channel with mankind.

a link is below:.

http://jwsurvey.org/cedars-blog/under-the-microscope-the-watch-tower-societys-claims-to-divine-direction-part-3.

shepherd

Interesting that the countries are all bunched together along the equator. I guess hot people don't like Jehovah :)

16

Is the average Jehovah`s Witness judgemental ?You tow the line you get blessed ,if you dont get blessed you must be doing something wrong.

by smiddy in

it was another thread that prompted me to start this one , not appropiate for the former thread.

and it`s because the wt often promotes that jehovah/jesus protects and looks after his loyal followers ,that when something adverse occurs , the suspicion/judgement is "oh they must have been doing something wrong that nobody knew about, but you cant hide it from jehovah."mentality.

i`m sure you have.. smiddy.

shepherd

Of course. The announcement that someone has left the Org. does not state the reason, so what people don't know they make up. If someone leaves because they have a problem believing the JW doctrines, they must be spiritually weak, having lost God's Holy Spirit because of some secret sin. Or they have become proud and self-seeking. It's too much for their brain to accept that it may just be they don't believe.

66

Is the WTS and the JW's going to collapse in 2014?

by braincleaned in

jw
friends

two years to go, and an embarrassing whole century will have gone by after 1914 -- the date of armageddon.

in no world is that a "short period of time".... .

let's put things in perspective, since the wts claims to be the channel god has choosen.

shepherd

They may point to Genesis and that the warning for the flood was given 120 years before. That buys them another 20 years, by which time they will have decided it began when JW's got their new name, gaining them a further 20 years and so on and so on. Most JW's are so conditioned they will hardly blink at any new explanation. Doubting the GB is tantamount to rebelling against Jehovah, after all :)

61

I too have been charged with apostasy! Stunned.

by FinchAndWeston in

jw
friends

my wife and i got a letter sent to me stating we are being called before a judical hearing to discuss allegations of apostasy!

we haven't gone to the meeting in 5 years.

are the jw's on a witchhunt lately?

shepherd

Follow my ex FIL's example and say they are not Xmas lights at all, but part of your wedding anniversary celebrations. He had it all worked out for years, having got married on Dec 26. Turkey, gifts, decorations and even Xmas Crackers. And he was also the PO at the time....a complete bast@rd...

48

what was the reason for canceling the book study in private homes

by reds in

jw
friends

shepherd

"I noticed that those that hosted BS were becoming less gracious about it. "

As someone who used to host these meetings I have to take the opposite view. Many attendee's were less and less respectful of being in another person's home. I used to have to hide a lot of ornaments etc because the parents did nothing to control their wayward children. As the years went by I found the situation got worse and worse.

25

Regular pioneers to be nominated by BOE

by yalbmert99 in

apparently the regular pioneers will be nominated by the body of elders, not bethel.

however, elders will have to send bethel a notification when a pioneer is nominated or removed..

shepherd

Once upon a time being a pioneer was 'special'. You had to be specially appointed, you had 'personal' letters sent to you from Bethel (everyone got the same letter, but they made it sound special) and when it came to the conventions you had free food tickets. Oh, and the literature was half price.

Now it means zip, except for local 'respect'. So it's no surprise really that it is now handled locally.

9

How's The Governing Body Going 2 Save Jehovah's Witnesses From Alien Invasion?!!

by mind blown in

jw
friends

forget go to bags!

.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pc5-nlfxbok.

shepherd

They will say violence is wrong. They will say they don't take sides. Then they will promptly make use of whatever services the government provides for their safety, including military personnel and resources, and justify the hypocricy somehow in a way all JWs will immediately accept.

29

The Great Watchtower Internet Retreat

by DT in

jw
friends

there has been a lot of talk about the new watchtower internet strategy.

it appears that the watchtower is trying to improve their internet presence.

this could be true, but i think there are good reasons to think that the opposite might be the case.. i suspect that this new internet announcement was primarily designed to draw attention away from the announcement that they are cutting down on the printing of the magazines again.. they are basically dropping two of their websites and redesigning a website on a url that has the lowest rating of the three.

shepherd

I can see the logic of moving away from being known by the name of your magazine rather than your religion. It's part of their attempt to reposition themselves as a mainstream religion and not a 'Watchtower Society'.

What annoys me to death is this: "The Internet is a technology that Jehovah’s organization is using to good advantage to spread the good news"

They always have 2 standards, one for the members and one for themselves. So, no Internet it's full of poisoned snakes (remember that illustration from the GB?) and no going to college (Bethel is full of men with degrees - lawyers, doctors etc, and no, contrary to the common perception they did not qualify and then become JWs), no real planning for your old age even though they continue to work on long term plans for their organization.

The hypocricy is astounding. I'm jusy waiting for the JW official FB page! Don't think that will never come, they are so full of sh**.

9

Was Last Supper a Passover meal ?

by Phizzy in

according to russell in zions watchtower of march 1896 he wanted his little church in allegeheny to celebrate the last supper on nisan14 becuase jesus instituted it then, some time after 6pm, by 3pm the next afternoon, still nisan14 he was dead.. at 6pm three hours later nisan15 began, passover began, and the jews would eat the lamb and bitter herbs, when the sun was down... so russells view was that jesus did not celebrate passover, being dead, on preperation day.. thus jesus died at the time the lambs were being slaughtered in jerusalem.. if i am correct the wt's latest explanation on this is not quite as clear as russells.

they seem to infer the last supper was a seder, a passover celebration, and that the slaughter of the lamb ,eating of the lamb, and jesus death all took place on nisan 14, have i got that right, or as usual is phizzy in a mucking fuddle ?

.

shepherd

The bible itself does not agree on the day, so you are unlikely to pursuade a JW. However, it seems likely they are celebrating on the correct day, Nisan 14, the day before the passover, although JW's wrongly think that Jesus also celebrated the Passover first. Even if they have the day right they still ignore his instructions to partake.