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proplog2
JoinedPosts by proplog2
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5
What is your favorite bible translation?
by Stealth inbeing raised as a jw all of my life, the only bible that i have ever used was the nwt.
i would like to start reading some from another bible other than this translation.. for those who have compared several bible translations, i would like to know what translation you liked or prefer the most and why.. regards, stealth
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Questions for JWs
by larc indear jw,.
i have some questions.
as i understand it, if armageddon came tomorrow, those that never heard the truth, in such places as india or china would either live through armageddon or die and be resurrected.
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proplog2
The purpose of the "witness" work is specifically to generate a "new" nation for god to work with. This new nation, made out of people of all nations, is used to illustrate the benefits of separteness from the world. God's chosen ones survive. There is nothing in prophecy that indicates the "great tribulation" destroys everyone on earth except JW's.
The chosen one's discern the meaning of "the disgusting thing that causes desolation" and determine the opportune time to flee "Jerusalem".
Daniel indicates that quite a bit of the Earth's governments surive the clash of the King of the North (Beast) and it's rival the King of the South. Daniel 7:11,12 "I kept beholding until the beast was killed and its body was destroyed...as for the rest of the beasts, their rulerships were taken away and there was a lengthening in life given to them for a time and a season."
The fact that others besides the "separated ones" (whether JW's really are these or some other group???) survive are indicated in Daniel 7:14 "And to him there were given rulership and dignity and kingdom, that the PEOPLES, NATIONAL GROUPS AND LANGUAGES SHOULD ALL SERVE EVEN HIM." ALSO Daniel 7:27 "And the kingdom and the rulership and the grandeur of the kingdoms under all the heavens were given to the people who are the holy ones of the Supreme One. Their kingdom is an indefinitely lasting kingdom and ALL THE RULERSHIPS WILL SERVE AND OBEY EVEN THEM".
Governments and people will have to survive the catastrophe of the Great Tribulation, otherwise this verse couldn't be fullfilled.
The only entities that are thrown into the Lake of Fire during armageddon are the Wild Beast and False Prophet. Revelation 19:21 says "the rest were killed off with the long sword." The long sword doesn't picture eternal destruction as the Watchtower has claimed. Notice in Revelation 6:8 that Death and Hades (common grave) kill with a long sword. Those killed with a long sword get brought back to life. The birds, according to Rev 19:18 eat those slain with the "long sword". Among those slain are the "small ones and great"
These ones are seen again at Rev 20:12 "And I saw the dead, THE GREAT AND THE SMALL, standing before the throne and scrolls were opened...and death and Hades gave up those dead in them and they were judged INDIVIDUALLY according to their deeds." Justice is finally carried out based on the behavior of each individual... but during the judgement day AFTER armageddon.If you believe in the Bible then you ought to be looking for a community of people who are separate from the world who might fullfill the role of "holy ones". Or you can ignore it all and get your day in court at some future time.
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To wait or not to wait?
by Frenchy inokay, this need not necessarily be controversial but i would like some honest opinions on the matter.
from time to time (in last sundays wt lesson for example) i read in the magazines or hear brothers say this in their talks.
(with some variation) arent we grateful that jehovah has waited this long before loosing armageddon on mankind?
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proplog2
There are more people in China than there were on the whole earth when Russell started his preaching.
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10 Nutty Beliefs!
by Tina indr albert ellis has identified 10 irrational beliefs that can influence us and contribute to over reacting in specific situations.. knowing them is the first step in taking back your personal power and not becoming a casuality of such irrational thought.these screwy beliefs tend to make us 'awfulize,think in terms of 'they should,i should' and dysfunctional rationalizations.. 1. worrying too much about what other people think of you.
excessive worrying creates a strong fear of rejection.. these folks will ignore the self to please others or will display this insecurity by attacking others in order to stay distant and detached.. 2. i must not fail at important tasks,and if i do it's terrible and i can't stand it.. 3.people and things should always turn out the way i want them to-and if they don't it's awful,terrible and horrible,and i can't stand it.. 4.if any of the first 3 bad events happens(if im not liked or respected,if i fail,or if things don't turn out as i'd like-then i'll always blame someone for it!
they acted wrongly,as they should not have done,and they are rotten people for acting in that terrible way!.
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proplog2
Larc:
Ellis makes a big deal out of not using the word "terrible" and prefers words like "unfortunate" that aren't as catastrophic.
My comment was a reaction to "victimology". I don't mean to minimize this particular kind of bad luck. Ellis would even say that molestation doesn't "ruin" your youth. All of us have to get on with the rest of our life every single day.
There is way too much hysteria over this issue. Many here are pinning their hopes of getting even with the Watchtower through this issue. That's pretty sick.
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10 Nutty Beliefs!
by Tina indr albert ellis has identified 10 irrational beliefs that can influence us and contribute to over reacting in specific situations.. knowing them is the first step in taking back your personal power and not becoming a casuality of such irrational thought.these screwy beliefs tend to make us 'awfulize,think in terms of 'they should,i should' and dysfunctional rationalizations.. 1. worrying too much about what other people think of you.
excessive worrying creates a strong fear of rejection.. these folks will ignore the self to please others or will display this insecurity by attacking others in order to stay distant and detached.. 2. i must not fail at important tasks,and if i do it's terrible and i can't stand it.. 3.people and things should always turn out the way i want them to-and if they don't it's awful,terrible and horrible,and i can't stand it.. 4.if any of the first 3 bad events happens(if im not liked or respected,if i fail,or if things don't turn out as i'd like-then i'll always blame someone for it!
they acted wrongly,as they should not have done,and they are rotten people for acting in that terrible way!.
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proplog2
"Stop catastrophizing about the Watchtower and Child Molestation."
That's what Albert Ellis would probably say.
Albert Ellis is considered to be a tough almost cruel therapist.
In therapy he would say:
Patient: I was molested over and over when I was a child. Isn't that terrible?
Ellis: No it wasn't terrible. It was unfortunate. But it wasn't terrible.
Patient: But thoughts about being molested make it impossible for me to have sex with my husband.
Ellis: Of course YOUR thoughts are causing you trouble because you are no longer actually being molested. Since it's just your thoughts that are causing trouble you had better change your irrational thoughts about your experience into rational thoughts. Instead of thinking about how "terrible" it was maybe you should think of it as one of the many unfortunate things that can happen to a person when they are young.
Just an example of what you could expect from Albert Ellis. His advice to everyone's "inner child" GROW-UP ALREADY!!!!
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Confessing to elders..Scriptural??
by nytelecom1 inis it?...regarding the verse in james i think..where it speaks about.
going to the older men of the congergation for "healing".
just wondering what opinions are out there regarding this.
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proplog2
The scriptures also tell us to confess our sins freely to one another. Going to the Elders is not mandatory. In fact sisters would be better off confessing to another sister (who would keep the confession confidential) especially on matters of sex.
Confession is good because it reconnects a person to their community. Sin wants to have a person all to himself.
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San Francisco Anyone?
by Tina inpardon this off topic please.. i thought i could get some good input here.. i'm sending my son on a mini-break (vacation) for his birthday.. he's always wanted to see san francisco.
(yes,im still a mother hen too :>) he has just a few days so what would you recommend as a 'must see'?
what will really give the 'flavor' of sf?
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proplog2
Before you go watch Hitchcocks best film "Vertigo". Then visit some of the scenes.
Go to Fort Point where Kim Novak jumped into the bay. Truly, one of the spookiest views of the Golden Gate Bridge.
Jimmy Stewarts apartment still sits at the bottom of Lombard St. Your son might like to walk past the SF real world location (MTV?)
Visit the sea lions at Fisherman's Wharf and pretend you're at the Kingdom Hall.
Walk down Baker Beach - Another great view of the Golden Gate Bridge.
Go to Muir Woods. It's the closest thing to "God" I know of.
View the San Francisco Skyline at night from Sausalito.
By some Chinese herbals in Chinatown.
There are some places on the internet that will give exact locations for Vertigo.
San Francisco is a no-brainer for sight-seeing. You just got to be there.
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Infinitism
by dunsscot inskeptics of the world, unite!.
as i slowly and deliberately nursed a nonalcoholic cup of coca-cola tonight, something motivated me to pull out my notes on infinitism and share them with you good folks here.
infinitism is a philosophical school of thought that advocates the epistemological "suspension of judgment.
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proplog2
Infinitism sounds good. Mature and creative minds are comfortable with ambiguity. Too many sell out cheap just to be able to close the books on a subject. I prefer to tie knots in the end of some subjects until I can give it some serious consideration.
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Should Christians Fear Evidentialism?
by dunsscot inarguments from natural theology are at times needed when christians defend the faith against atheological attacks.
yet, for the christian, such apologetic maneuvers are not required in and of themselves, for christians know that they are not in a relationship with a force or an abstract superlative entity devised by human adroitness.
no, christians heed the sensus divinitatis and the confirmatory evidence that god provides to those who love him.
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proplog2
My only experience with communication is with "human"
persons. They write letters, phone, e-mail, fax, wire, leave
voice-mail, send agents who can speak for their sponsors. In all of
these cases there is opportunity for a response that can in turn be
acknowledged. If I have doubts about the identity of the real
sender I can receive certification of some sort. If the
communication is of a serious business nature that involves a
monetary transaction I can get certification from objective third
parties. I have prayed frequently every day for 45 years and can
honestly say that I have never received an answer that I could say
is attributable to a "person". I have had favorable things happen
after praying on certain occasions. I have had bad outcomes also
following prayer. I haven't kept a tally so I can't make any
judgment about correlations between prayer and the possibility that
the prayer had an effect on the outcome of important events in my
life.DUNS: "How do you know? Maybe he has not communicated with or shown
himself to you. Evidently you have never heard divine locution. But
some of us have. What is more, every human seems to possess the
sensus divinitatis. I know that I think I sure possess the SD."What precisely is "SD"? It is either similar to ordinary
sense experience or it is not. Let us conclude that it is similar
to ordinary sense experience. This would be your strongest position
because people generally trust their senses. Let us suppose that
there is an isolated group of people who occasionally experience a
headache as "a demon hitting the inside of my head". Would this
experience tend to prove that there were in fact demons inside
their heads? Or does the phrase "a demon hitting the inside of my
head" simply describe a feeling that could just as easily have been
described by the word "headache"? There are problems we encounter
when we ascribe unverifiable causes to experiences which are
private to each individual.To know that "SD" is reliable we would have to test it to see if it
could be used to tell the difference between God and other types of
"communication" the person is sensing instead. How do we test this
supposed "SD"? . We would have to already know that God exists and
is communicating before we could find out whether "SD"
was reliable in detecting such communication. This is because a
test would consist of discovering whether in fact God was
communicating when the theist using his "SD" makes
that assertion. To do that we would have to have some independent
means of knowing that God is communicating. It is hard to believe
a loving, God would expect humans to grope in this manner. If
there is a God the loving thing for him to do would be to make
himself known in an obvious manner.There is just as much evidence for belief in UFO's as there is for
GOD. Billions of Galaxies show scientifically the likelihood of
intelligent life existing somewhere. Thousands of eyewitness
reports, of abductions, sightings etc. But, it would be foolish to
believe in UFO's before one actually lands and ET steps out and
starts talking and explains where he is from and how his
contraption for getting here works. Oh I get it. Some of us are
just too skeptical to know when aliens are really communicating
with us. We aren't "tuned" in. -
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Should Christians Fear Evidentialism?
by dunsscot inarguments from natural theology are at times needed when christians defend the faith against atheological attacks.
yet, for the christian, such apologetic maneuvers are not required in and of themselves, for christians know that they are not in a relationship with a force or an abstract superlative entity devised by human adroitness.
no, christians heed the sensus divinitatis and the confirmatory evidence that god provides to those who love him.
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proplog2
Your rebuttal is special pleading at its worst.
Unaided reason is "imagination". There is a difference between imagining a possible God and the actual existence of a real God.
If God can't do any better than that..."The facts of Christianity" are not evidence for the existence of an actual GOD. They only express the wishful thinking of a community of believers.
Part of our experience is our scientific knowledge of inertia. Since we don't see anything in space that is likely to interfere with the momentum of the earth and sun therefore it is a very reliable belief that the sun will rise tomorrow. Of course to be completely accurate the sun will be revolved into view because it doesn't actually rise.
You have nothing to justify belief in GOD.Pascal said "blah blah the heart has its reasons". Who cares what Pascal says? He was just a man. We're talking about the existence of God in the actual world. To which you will say "yeah but God isn't in the world." And again you are describing your theoretical God which has never been shown by anyone to be an actual God.
You state an interesting IF... If God communicates with us... then the fairie comparison is misleading." The reason the fairie comparison ISN'T misleading is because God DOESN'T communicate with us.
Your dismissal of the reliability of gravity is special pleading. The "other minds" problem is not a problem to people with common-sense. We at least know that there are other "brains". And we know what human brains do.
As far as Berkeley goes - again like Pascal who cares. So what if Berkeley is incoherent.
You conclude (or continue but I think you are concluding) IF God is timeless... That is a far cry from SINCE God is timeless... Anything you have said about God is imagined. One mans "imagined" God is no better than another man's "imgained" God.
I agree that imagining there is a God is no different from imagining that 2+2 = 4. So what. Some of us don't believe math has a necessary relationship with reality. We can live without mathematics, logic, and all the other imaginary stuff.
I believe in the spirit of philosophy - "seeing". Thinking is not the same as sensing. Duns, your problem is that you are a "thinker" not a "seer". A little bit of ordinary vision would organize a lot of the data you've transplanted from other peoples imaginations.