Did you ever “serve” as an attendant at conventions? What about working the parking lot at assemblies or memorial? Did you or your dad routinely travel to other halls to give a Sunday talks? Did you ever work safety at quickbuilds? Did you ever have a part on the stage at an assembly or convention? Were you ever in a drama? Did you ever get to pass the emblems (or even partake)? If you got baptized, do you remember sitting in the special section that morning? Did you ever get announced as an MS, elder or pioneer?
If you can answer yes to any of the above questions, you may recall the sense of pride you felt. Even if you’re a lowly teenager running mics or controlling the sound, any position of responsibility comes with a small (but noteworthy) power trip. Imagine, for a brief moment, an elder, the COBE, the circuit overseer or even a visiting bethelite pulls into the parking lot at memorial or circuit assembly and for one small moment, it is you who has all the power and control. You have the orange vest, the orange cone, the straw hat and the honorable Attendant badge. They must drive and park where you tell them to. They will obey your command. For a small snapshot in time, even they must follow your leadership and direction—even tho they represent god on earth. But for that moment, they heed your direction when parking a car. They need your microphone to share their wisdom. The anointed cannot partake unless you hand them the emblems. They cannot speak while you’re on the platform, even if you’re simply reading the WT. YOU have all the power and control. YOU command everyone’s attention. The day you got baptized, it was YOU everyone looked at in the special section. It was you they sang and applauded for. When you (or your dad) visited another hall to deliver a Sunday talk, you already felt special. They lined up to meet you. You met new friends. You were automatically trusted as “exemplary” and even given “hospitality.”
And even tho you may have only been a teenager at the time, or if you were an adult MS or elder, you were likely nothing special outside of the empowering moments those titles brought with them—but for those brief moments, even YOU, an uneducated window washer, enjoyed the taste of control and power. The highest ranking JW had to park where you told them. They couldn’t enter a quickbuild without safety gear and you had the power to stop them. They couldn’t interrupt your talk or take your spotlight the moment your appointment was announced. Yet, outside those windowless walls, you were nobody.
IMAGINE the sense of power and control the GB feels all the time, everywhere they go. They brag about their humble lifestyles (and it’s true, their lodgings at HQ are ok at best—nothing spectacular, in fact most of our homes are probably nicer than their rooms are), but they never lose that feeling of ultimate authority. Everywhere they go, they’re met with reverence. Everything they say is spoken as god’s mouthpiece. Every visit they make, every broadcast they host, they are revered.
What’s their motivation, you ask? Just try to remember those brief moments when you had title, rank and authority over others and ask yourself what you’d do if that was the way you lived 24/7.
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