Posts by maksym

45

How far are you on your journey away from the JW Org?

by punkofnice in

i mentally left the org in march 2010. i stepped down as an elder after my lad got into trouble.

i researched the publications to make myself 'spiritually strong' but it backfired.. i was in mental and emotional turmoil, still on fs, the platform and meetings etc.

i had to force myself to conform to ever failing jw doctrine.. i announced to my family that i was not going back to meetings in august 2010 after the 'overlapping' joke of 'new light'.. i told the elders not to call.

maksym

@moshe,

That picture you put up reminds me of the place I went to right after I walked away from it all physically. Boy does that bring back great memories.

45

How far are you on your journey away from the JW Org?

by punkofnice in

i mentally left the org in march 2010. i stepped down as an elder after my lad got into trouble.

i researched the publications to make myself 'spiritually strong' but it backfired.. i was in mental and emotional turmoil, still on fs, the platform and meetings etc.

i had to force myself to conform to ever failing jw doctrine.. i announced to my family that i was not going back to meetings in august 2010 after the 'overlapping' joke of 'new light'.. i told the elders not to call.

maksym

Well I was raised in the cult. I left physically by literally leaving my country and went to live in the tropics. That was about 8 years ago. I then left mentally about 5 years ago. That's the moving out part. The finding a new path part came over a few years. I studied religions and ancient Christianity from a historical perspective.

Last year one week before Easter I was baptised and Chrismated in a Christian church. I am a regular attendee. All that mind control and baggage of the Watchtower Corporation is gone. I have a new faith and good direction. The people in my church are the best group of loving people. Much better than the critical witnesses.

I therefore have replaced nearly all my social network with new Christian associates. The one area lacking is family members mom and dad and my brothers family. This summer I plan to witness the correct faith to them.

Technically I am not considered DA or DF yet. I won't attend any meeting because I don't believe in their authority nor their labels. So if it is annouced that I become disfellowshipped and I am aware of it I still won't use that term when talking to people such as other witnesses. I have no fear and they have no labeling power or authority over me.

This summer I will be preaching my new faith to family. Hopefully I will find others that are suffering and want out. By my actions my sister has left and she now is getting ready to attend a church and will be baptised this Easter. My daughter is out because of me and she someday may find a church to go to as well.

God bless you all in your journeys

70

"Who else are we to go away to?"

by simon17 in

to the intellectually honest witness, it seems like it often comes down to this principle.

"fine, if the witnesses aren't the truth, then show me the better answer and i'll consider it.

" and how do you deal with that?

maksym

Dear Simon17

For me I reasoned that since the first churches (congregations) in the New Testament, which were set up in the first century, was where the people went. Granted before Christianity became legalised people networked underground such as being in house churches and secret locations. However there must have been places of worship to go to for all the people since then until 1879 when our so-called God's organisation came onto the scene. We are talking about nearly 1900 years of the WTBTS not being around or existing.

I asked myself where would I go if the WTBTS was not here or if I lived before 1879. I think this is a good question because it places the historical significance to the issue. It would be just the same if one was a scientologist and reasoned the same as to what would they do before 1950. The Watchtower Corporation is just a young upstart religion when put in this context.

Assume the year is 1825 and you want to go find God and a Church. Where would you go? I asked a JW this one time and He said "no where", but I don't think he realised he was effectively saying that God just abandoned all those people and true salvation would come in the future. Ridiculous! It is as if a JW knocks on your door today and you tell them the TRUE religion won't be set up on earth here yet until another 150 years (insert years of choice). I'm sure he'll have a puzzled look on his face.

Mind control at its finest.

22

The Worlds Most Livable Cities

by finallysomepride in

jw
friends

it's that time of year again & it looks like canada & australia are winners.

1. vancouver, canada (make simon happy).

2. melbourne, australia.

maksym

Thank you Broken Promises and Mattieu!

My flat is close to an Irish pub. I'll look you guys up when I get there and PM you.

22

The Worlds Most Livable Cities

by finallysomepride in

jw
friends

it's that time of year again & it looks like canada & australia are winners.

1. vancouver, canada (make simon happy).

2. melbourne, australia.

maksym

I'm tired of living in the States (no jobs). It looks like I will be getting my visa for Australia soon. I got an apartment in Melbourne. Never been there but this is good news. I'm moving there 3rd of May this year. Just bought my ticket. Plus I met a hot Aussie honey too

I guess I'll stand out like a sore thumb with my American accent.

Cheers to all you Aussies

152

Are you a TRUE Christian?!?

by brotherdan in

i've been thinking alot over the past few days on what makes a christian a christian, and i'm coming to some different conclusions than i ever have.... the watchtower likes to use the term "true believers" or "true christians".

i'm at a loss here lately.

you are either an atheist or you are not.

maksym

I think many people claim to be a Christian and the title is used by many peoples. To me there really is no such thing as a True Christian or False Christian. You either are a Christian or you are not.

The other issue is we need to have a working definition of what a Christian is in order to classify people if they are or are not Christians. Here is where it gets sticky and may seem a little biased. But I will put forth one that is better than the dictionary.

I believe we need to define a Christian with a definition based on historicity of the term and what the general consensus of today is. It should be taken from the majority of the group to define itself both now and historically. If we use this method we can define a Christian based on several things all Christians in the mainstream have in common.

Primarily the definition of Christians historically has generally fell into those people believing in the Nicene Creed. Even today with over 30 000 different denominations the creed has the foundations of faith for those people that identify with one another.

‘The Nicene Creed’ contains twelve fundamental statements, essential to the Christian faith. These are:

1. The fundamental nature of God –Three distinct persons and yet one God;

2. The eternal God, the Son;

3. The true divinity of Jesus Christ;

4. The salvation of God brought through the incarnation;

5. The suffering, death and burial of Christ;

6. The Resurrection of Christ from the dead; (Jw's only believe he was raised a spirit creature and not with a fleshly body)

7. The ascension of Christ to His Father in heaven;

8. The expected return of Christ to this world;

9. The true divinity of God the Holy Spirit;

10. The nature of the Church – One, Holy and Apostolic;

11. Forgiveness of sins that comes through baptism;

12. The Resurrection of all people and eternal life.

Although not everyone goes by the Nicene Creed exactly as it was originally written the above principles are held in belief amoung the majority of Christians today in whole. Although some portions contain elements that are not adhered to by some protestant churches, it is true that all they hold the view of Christ as the same. All the ones marked in colour are not a belief of the Jehovah's Witnesses or Muslims or Buddists or Unitarian churches.

Acts 11:26 tells us that it was at Antioch that they were first called Christians. Today it is modern day Damascus. Those early churches are still there. Look up those churches and see what they were like.

While my answer to your question will be rejected by some, one must be start with a common ground to define themselves and historically Christians have always sought to preserve a teaching and faith in the above. Any deviation from this and others were not called Christians but were referred to as heretics, Arius being an example.

Based on this, the Jehovah's Witnesses are not Christians nor will ever be unless the change their teachings. Of course everyone is welcome to redefine the term and then mold themselves into fitting that definition.

Those that believe in this definition would be over 1 billion Roman Catholics, 350 000 Eastern Orthodox and probably an estimated 500 000 protestants of various sects. This number represents probably about 97% of all those claiming to be Christian. These principles of being a Christian, as illustrated above have also been written about historically and extensively since the first century. This puts the number as being astronomically high and defendable to all times.

This is what is meant in saying, "he who believes in the Christ.....".

God bless BrotherDan and may the Lord Guide you in your journey.

In Christ

Maksym

99

Jehovah's Witnesses - Once Again the Fastest Growing Faith in the U.S.

by davidl7 in

jw
friends

according to the latest statistics published by the ncc in its yearbook of american and canadian churches, the jehovah's witnesess had the highest growth rate, in 2010 growing 4.37%.

this is, i believe, is the 4th year in a row, that the witnesses had the highest growth rate.

roman catholics grew by less than 1%, as did most of the other churches listed.

maksym

I think the survey is suspect. The survey that reported the increase reports:

"Ranked 20th in size, the Jehovah’s Witnesses denomination reported a 4.37 percent gain in membership, with 1,162,686 members total"

This number is lower than the actual published numbers by the WTBTS. They report:

2010 active publishers 1 178 349, published in the Watchtower.org website (stats for 2010)
2009 active publishers 1 154 275, published in the yearbook 2010 (stats for year 2009)

Difference is (Increase) of 24 074. This equalls 2% straightline growth in the United States regardless of deaths, births, new baptisms, or faders.

I personally would consider the published statistics the most accurate. If the WTBTS wants to lie they would have done so in their own print to give it the most weight to JW's.

IMO... I think the survey is skewed or they received inaccurate information deliberately so that a "good image" would be presented. I don't know of any other explanation.

86

Are you a fader, Df'd, DA'd, or Still In?

by brotherdan in

i thought this would be an interesting poll that would show everyone the backgrounds of all of us when we left, if we have.. for myself, i am not df'd, but i am attempting a fade.

i still go to some meetings with the wife to help with kids, but that's it.

no commenting or field service.. what about everyone else?.

maksym

... No need to DA for me, their game, their rules, and I'm not in their game. -quote from Blondie

Been out for maybe 8 years or more. But I don't recognise their authority or labeling in any way, like Blondie said.

I'm just a former member of the Watchtower Corporation and their affiliates.

26

2011 Yearbook (2010 Grand Totals) Stats

by Inside Man in

jw
friends

here is a recap of last years service year.. 116 branches down from 118.

236 lands reporting same as last year.

107,210 total congregations up from last year total of 105,298.

maksym

7,508,050 Peak Publishers up from last years 7,313,173
294,368 Number of people baptized which is up from last years total of 276,233
If we subtract 2010 years peak active members (publishers) from 2011 we get 194 877 increase in one year.
If we subtract 194 877 from the newly baptised ones from 2011, 294 368, we end up with 99 491 missing!

Over one third of all those baptised just walked out mathamatically speaking.

That calculates to only an aproximate 1,3 percent increase in growth.
If I am not mistaken the U.S Census says that the world growth rate is around 1.2 percent
I guess that means there really is no measurable growth at all.
This is pathetic but good news to me.

22

Don't know how to leave: FADE or DA letter?

by porfiada in

hi folks.

i wondered if any of you ex elders can help me to figure out what my status is and therefore how to log out from the borg.

i was baptized at 15, faded at 18. never heard anything from the elders after their first visit, which wasn't about a big deal and had no conclusion.

maksym

Hi, Porfiada,

I signed up on this forum just to tell you a few things. I have been "out" for more than five years and have never taken any action to make myself known to the elders or make a "scene" with my family. I have recently been baptised and made a Christian in another church.

The point I want to make and I think it is very pertinent to all former witnesses it this....While we were "in" the organisation we assumed or believed they had authoriy over us. In doing so we upheld their values and rules for this relgion. But after leaving many have held to those rules without even knowing about it.

Imagine for example if you had a former employer that said if you leave you must do or say certain things in order to justify your actions of leaving the job. Most people would just say, " get lost", I'm a free person and I don't answer to you. Does that make sense.

In the same context former watchtower member should treat their religion the same. Their is no obligation on your part to do anything the say if you leave. You are not under contract in any way legally. It is a belief system, nothing more. When you stop believing you stop doing!

To put a dissident attitude toward them you should be strong and do NOTHING! Because if you believe they are false then they don't deserve the respect of anything period.

I have faded and although they can call me by any name I refuse to be labeled. I am not an apostate. I am not disfellowshiped. I am not dissacciated or otherwise. Nor will I ever be. Nor will anybody on this forum be as well.

That is if you stop saying that they have any authority over you.

Here is the kicker. When an jehovah's witness approaches me and asked me if I have been disfellowshipped, I say NO. Why, not that I want to lie but because I don't recognize their authority over me OUTSIDE their system. I will talk with the person. It gives me an opportunity to witness the true Gospel with them.

Just as I don't recognise my former employers labels on me I also don't recognise my former religions labels on me.

My best advice is to fade away and not pervert yourself into their system. You will lose your dignity and self respect. By acknowedging that you go along with their judicial system you also agree to the consequencing and accept the outcome.

Do nothing! Don't accept them! It's the ultimate slap in the face for them. They are nothing but men parading as authority figures.

The elders are just men. The governing body men are just men. They and there policies mean nothing.

If any of your family or friends asks you what happened just say nothing.

I am free and no longer a JW. Are you dissacciated or disfellowshipped. The answer...No. I am just not a watchtower member anymore.

End of story.

May peace be to you and God bless you

Maksym