How about leading from example?
Seems they are following their Master Jesus Christ who once slipped away from an angry crowd:
John 8:59: At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds.
Drearyweather
JoinedPosts by Drearyweather
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Be Couragous! - (Like The Governing Body?)
by pale.emperor ini was watching lloyd evans rebuttal to the saturday program of the be courageous convention.
lloyd pointed out something that had occurred to me as well:.
all this talk and examples of courage, whether it be standing up in class defending intelligent design, putting up with being imprisoned, not running away from bullies, always having a reply to someone who tries to ridicule your faith... the young ones are encourages - nay, commanded - to stand their ground and be courageous.
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Drearyweather
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Drearyweather
JW can have bibles in Russia. Just not their bibles. JW can have magazines in Russia. Just not their magazines. - Mr Roboto
Nonsense. It is like telling a gay in Russia:
You can love - but only someone of the opposite sex., You can marry - Just not of your gender, You can have sex - just not with someone of your gender
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Drearyweather
This kind of deception is bad religion.... kudos to Russia.
It's utterly disgusting to see people salivating at the prospect of seeing the individual rank and file JW's in Russia getting arrested and criminalized as extremists.
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Something that really ticked me off about seeing the video of New Head Quarters of J.W.s (Warwick)
by StoneWall inwhen i was a jw it was always emphasized that we should trust in jehovah completely.
jah will protect his people do not trust in man, throw your burdens upon jehovah etc.ok now if that's true wouldn't it mean that if jehovah was going to protect anywhere it should be his world head quarters right?.
we were told to not trust in ourselves (such as guns,walls for defense and protection) but to leave it in jehovah's hands and he would provide a means for escape etc.so as i'm watching some pro-wt vid's about the facilities in warwick i noticed something they didn't show on them or focus on and only reason i know about it was because of the w5 newscast as well as the vids the protesters shared.they conveniently leave out the parts of them putting walls/fences and gates as well as a "guard shack" at entrance instead of relying on jehovah to protect them.the guard house even has a "no trespassing" sign in the window.
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Drearyweather
We were told to not trust in ourselves (such as guns,walls for defense and protection)
When and where in the JW world were you told that you or JW's should not have fences and boundary walls and gates for their houses/property?
Cite some references please. Don't tell that an uber so-and-so elder from your congregation told that JW houses or bethels should not have boundary walls and gates.
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Diminishing glory of JWs, confusions are at the root
by Ireneus inwhen the world shuns jws because of difference of opinion, it is described as the action of satan.. when jws shun others because of difference of opinion, it is described as theocratic action.. such confused mind is at the root of getting wrong teachings.
jws shun anything what anyone would rate as the best of the bible or christian traditions:.
1)cross (with a longer descending arm) is the symbol of controlling the less powerful (“acts of the flesh”) with the more powerful (“spirit” within)—galatians 5:17, 19, 25.
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Drearyweather
Yet Bible writer named John was so careless that he could produce a verse that is inherently contradicting itself: “No one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven, the Son of Man.”
Ireneus, With due respect, I feel you are again taking things out of context and are also isolating sentences from conversations.
You have missed an important word from John 3:13, and that is the verse begins with 'and'. The verse is a part of the conversation that Jesus was having with Nicodemus. (verses 10-31).
Why did Jesus tell this verse? To comprehend Jesus's words you need to understand the entire conversation. In the entire conversation from verse 10, Jesus was talking about his authority as being the only person who had been with God in his prehuman existence and had the knowledge to teach people about heavenly things. No other person was in that position because no one had been with God there.
Had any human in the Bible gone to heaven and then come down from heaven and taught people about the kingdom of God? No. Only Jesus. So when he told that only he had ascended to heaven, it meant that only he was the one who had been in Heaven earlier and thus can now teach people about the kingdom of the heavens. That's the way we humans use certain semantics.
"ascended to heaven" cannot always mean physically going to or raised to heaven. You cannot take it in a literal sense if the context does not warrant. Let me give you an example:
Take the following three sentences:
1. I went to a musical concert yesterday, and wow, I should say that her performance was out of this world!
2. I went to Jane's house for a party and Kim drank until he was out of this world.
3. After seeing the first rocket launch, my 99-year-old grandpa excitedly exclaimed, "O Man, no one could imagine we can send such a huge thing out of this world"
Will you take the phrase "out of this world" in its literal sense in all the sentences?
in the above three sentences, the phrase "out of this world" means three different things in each instance, first sentence. it denotes extraordinary performance, the second sentence refers to intoxication and third means sending out in space.
It's about semantics. An effort is needed to understand it rather than simply discrediting it as contradictory.
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Diminishing glory of JWs, confusions are at the root
by Ireneus inwhen the world shuns jws because of difference of opinion, it is described as the action of satan.. when jws shun others because of difference of opinion, it is described as theocratic action.. such confused mind is at the root of getting wrong teachings.
jws shun anything what anyone would rate as the best of the bible or christian traditions:.
1)cross (with a longer descending arm) is the symbol of controlling the less powerful (“acts of the flesh”) with the more powerful (“spirit” within)—galatians 5:17, 19, 25.
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Drearyweather
things referred to in Mathew 7:21-23 are absolute which can mean one and the same thing in any context
True. In fact, for a Christian what Jesus told in all the four Gospels are absolute and in harmony with each other. That's my point.
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If JWs are living "The Best Life Ever," then why preach?
by JW_Rogue inshouldn't the unhappy and unfulfilled worldly people see what jws have and be drawn to them?
shouldn't they be showing up at khs asking for bible studies?
at work shouldn't they be asking how jws families are so happy?
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Drearyweather
The "Best Life Ever" is the one defined by Jesus:“If anyone wants to come after me, let him disown himself and pick up his torture stake and keep following me.
Do you think anyone would want this life? That's what makes missionary activity a heck of a job.
I mean everyone wants true happiness, so why work so hard for new members?
There are different charities everywhere in the world. The volunteers working there say that it gives them true happiness and purpose in life. If they claim that they are truly happy, then why do you think they work hard to have all these fundraising programs to attract more volunteers and raise funds?
A cause that makes me happy may not necessarily ring with you. If you want a following for your cause then it takes insane levels of promotional activities, no matter how noble the cause is.
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Diminishing glory of JWs, confusions are at the root
by Ireneus inwhen the world shuns jws because of difference of opinion, it is described as the action of satan.. when jws shun others because of difference of opinion, it is described as theocratic action.. such confused mind is at the root of getting wrong teachings.
jws shun anything what anyone would rate as the best of the bible or christian traditions:.
1)cross (with a longer descending arm) is the symbol of controlling the less powerful (“acts of the flesh”) with the more powerful (“spirit” within)—galatians 5:17, 19, 25.
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Drearyweather
Drearyweather, Jesus himself says in Mathew 7:21-23 that he would not make such statements.
That's a bit absurd. The rock mentioned in Matt 16:18 is Jesus and not Peter. Eph 2:20 says that Jesus was the cornerstone of the true Christian faith. Peter and other apostles did take the lead but formed a part of the foundation, not the cornerstone itself. No way does it contradict with Matt 7:21-23.
Matt 7:21-23 says that those who do the will of God will be acknowledged by Jesus. The will of God was explained by Jesus and the other apostles who came after him and wrote the other books of the Bible.
If a scripture somewhere looks out of context then that means that it is necessary to dig deeper to understand the events when they were told. Matt 7 was a part of the Sermon on the mount told to a group of thousands of believers and unbelievers, whereas Matt 16:11-28 was a part of a private conversation between Jesus and his apostles. Jesus was preparing his apostles for his upcoming death and thus the conversation dealt with uncomfortable subjects leading to Peters admonition to Jesus and Jesus' resulting rebuke.
In the Sermon on the mount, Jesus told that blessed are the peacemakers. (Matt 5:9) But later, while sending his disciples for preaching, Jesus told that he has come not to make peace but with a sword. (Matt 10:34). Two different occasions, with different people addressed and in different contexts. Not contradictory.
Discrediting a scripture as not spoken by Jesus because we cannot reconcile it with the context is like me telling that Einstein did not invent the theory of relativity because I can't understand it.
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Diminishing glory of JWs, confusions are at the root
by Ireneus inwhen the world shuns jws because of difference of opinion, it is described as the action of satan.. when jws shun others because of difference of opinion, it is described as theocratic action.. such confused mind is at the root of getting wrong teachings.
jws shun anything what anyone would rate as the best of the bible or christian traditions:.
1)cross (with a longer descending arm) is the symbol of controlling the less powerful (“acts of the flesh”) with the more powerful (“spirit” within)—galatians 5:17, 19, 25.
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Drearyweather
Church required a verse that says it is appointed by God, hence they added such portion in Mathew 16:18.
Interesting. How do you know that the verse was added? Do you have evidence that the early manuscripts did not have this verse?
How do you come to a conclusion that one verse is inspired and one is not?
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Diminishing glory of JWs, confusions are at the root
by Ireneus inwhen the world shuns jws because of difference of opinion, it is described as the action of satan.. when jws shun others because of difference of opinion, it is described as theocratic action.. such confused mind is at the root of getting wrong teachings.
jws shun anything what anyone would rate as the best of the bible or christian traditions:.
1)cross (with a longer descending arm) is the symbol of controlling the less powerful (“acts of the flesh”) with the more powerful (“spirit” within)—galatians 5:17, 19, 25.
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Drearyweather
On an individual level, people can believe any story that they want whether historical or not. You can even make up stories to further your point. But a story cannot be attributed to Jesus because it is moral and fits the narrative.
However, if you are tasked to prepare an edition of the Holy Bible, then you are bound to include only stories that are accepted as historical and appeared in the earliest canons. If such unverified stories are included, then the book should be entitled: "Ethical stories of the past", and not the Holy Bible.
It's like preparing a corporate presentation for your client about your services. You can't include a case study of a project just because it looks good and is appealing. It needs to be verified, authentic, true and a project handled by you.