Posts by leaving

23

Ok called writing dept yesterday.

by poopie in

jw
friends

ask them a question can i give return to jehovah brochure to a df person.?

dead silence on other end, then he said uh hold on brother long pause music then ok bro have you discussed this with your local elders answer no.

bro what cong do you attend?

leaving_quietly

What an odd response. It was a simple question that only needed a simple answer:

Q: Can I give a df'd person the Return to Jehovah brochure?

A: Yes, and we expect you to. After all, disfellowshipping is a LOVING provision. We WANT the person to repent and ultimately return to Jehovah. There's no need for a lengthy discussion. Just hand the person the brochure and leave it at that.

Why the odd questions? It's so strange. Even Jesus didn't ask who a person was or where they were from or when their last sacrifice was before he healed them. I can't recall him ever even asking for their name before rendering assistance. Maybe he did on occasion, but that wasn't the norm.

12

My yoke is easy and my burden is light, unless you're a JW than you will have many strange complicated rules

by adjusted knowledge in

jw
friends

there is this jw husband and wife i knew from the 80's when i was a child.

they got a divorce a few years ago and never remarried.

they are older now and unable to afford to live on their own.

leaving_quietly

Sadly, before I woke up, I was a chairman on a judicial case where the woman admitted to fornication with multiple partners and smoking. Those weren't the big issues, though. The committee would have simply done private reproof because she was repentant and came forward on her own. But, because she was renting a room to her ex-husband, being that they were living under the same roof and she wasn't willing to kick him out, she was DF'd.

That was me, before waking up.

Now, however, I can see how insensitive and stupid that was. In fact, (and I've been waiting for the opportune moment to share this), there is Biblical precedence for a man and a woman, unmarried, to stay together under the same roof without any problems. In fact, there's at least two accounts of this happening:

Boaz and Ruth (Ruth 3:5-13) and Elijah and a widow from Zarephath (1 Kings 17:13-22). Ruth slept at Boaz's feet. Elijah, at God's direction, met the widow at the city gate, but since he was not a resident of Zarephath, and because the account says "she together with him and her household ate for many days" and because he was clearly inside her home when he resurrected her son, it stands to reason that he was staying with her in her home for those days.

4

What percent are getting baptized only at 'Regional' Conventions?

by Gayle in

jw
friends

what 'percent' at circuit assemblies or special day assemblies?

are ones inclined to wait for the regionals (more exciting) or not necessarily?

these regional conventions reporting quite low numbers, averaging approx.

leaving_quietly

Any comments you get here will be purely anecdotal and would be based on what each individual observes at the RC they attend. At the one I attended, if I recall, it was at .39%. 26 or 27 (somewhere around there) out of ~7000 attendees.

29

Jesus is not Michael the Archangel here is why

by paradisebeauty in

one of the biggest missunderstanding and unbiblical teaching of the jw's is that jesus is michael the archangel.

here is what proffessor anthony buzzard has to say about this:.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puqzffyxno0.

leaving_quietly

At 1 Thessalonians 4:16, the command of Jesus Christ for the resurrection to begin is described as “the archangel’s call,” and Jude 9 identifies the archangel with Michael. Michael was the archangel, since no other archangel is mentioned in the Bible, nor does the Bible use “archangel” in the plural. “Archangel” means “Chief of the angels.” Among God’s spirit servants, only two names are associated with authority over angels: Michael and Jesus Christ (Matt. 16:27; 25:31; 2 Thes. 1:7; Rev. 19:11-21). Either their roles overlap or it is the same person.

1 Thess 4:16 says "an archangel's voice", not "the archangel's voice", indicating more than one exists.

Daniel 10:13 calls Michael "one of the foremost princes", again, indicating more than one exists.

But, to me, the most compelling evidence that Michael is NOT Jesus is in Daniel's description of the one who talked to him in Daniel 10:4-6:

On the 24th day of the first month, while I was on the bank of the great river, the Tiʹgris, I looked up and saw a man clothed in linen, and around his waist was a belt of gold from Uʹphaz. His body was like chrysʹo·lite, his face had the appearance of lightning, his eyes were like fiery torches, his arms and his feet looked like burnished copper, and the sound of his words was like the sound of a multitude.

This one says, in verse 13, "But then Miʹcha·el, one of the foremost princes, came to help me." So, this one who was clothed in linen, had a face like lightning, eyes like fiery torches and so on, was speaking and was not himself Michael.

Notice this description in Revelation 1:12-16:

I turned to see who was speaking with me, and when I turned, I saw seven golden lampstands, and in the midst of the lampstands someone like a son of man, clothed in a garment that reached down to the feet and wearing a golden sash around his chest. Moreover, his head and his hair were white as white wool, as snow, and his eyes were like a fiery flame, and his feet were like fine copper when glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars, and out of his mouth a sharp, long, two-edged sword was protruding, and his countenance was like the sun when it shines at its brightest.

WTBTS says this is Jesus. Yet, the description is very, very similar to the one speaking with Daniel who was NOT Michael. My view is that the one speaking with Daniel was Jesus, and there referred to Michael as someone else.

Noting, too, the use of "God's trumpet" in 1 Thess 4:16. Rev 1:1 says that Jesus "sent his angel" to give John the vision. Rev 1:10 says that angel's voice was "like that of a trumpet" whereas the voice of "the son of man" in verse 14 was as "the sound of many waters." Could it be that Michael is Jesus' angel? I can't see why not. Thus, when Jesus comes with a commanding call, an archangel's voice and God's trumpet, why would he not come with his angel, Michael? After all, Matt 24:31 says, "he will send out his angels with a great trumpet sound" to gather his chosen ones.

Then, the strange use of Michael in Revelation 12:1 where the rest of the vision names Jesus all throughout. Why call him Michael here? Doesn't make a lot of sense.

I went back and forth on this issue for a long time, but I firmly believe now that Michael is NOT Jesus.

64

Geoffrey Jackson: "That would be presumptuous of us"...

by Calebs Airplane in

within the first few minutes, mr. stewart asked geoffrey jackson if the members of the governing body consider themselves to be god's spokesperson on earth.. his response: "that would be presumptuous of us" (implying that they don't consider themselves to be god's sole channel of communication).. to me, that was the worst lie of about 26 lies he's told during this hearing.

however, mr. stewart missed an opportunity to call out mr. jackson on this bold-faced lie.

he should have asked him to explain why the watchtower magazine teaches otherwise.

leaving_quietly

Christ was asked by Pilate: Are you the king of the Jews?

Jesus didn't say, "that would be presumptuous of me." No, he said, "You yourself say it." When the chief priests questioned him, he said nothing, but when Pilate the governor did, he answered. (Matt 27:11; Mark 15:2; Luke 23:3; John 18:33-38)

So much for imitating Christ.

84

The Kingdom Halls are empty

by punkofnice in

my jw spies tell me that the kingdom halls are empty compared to how they used to be, since i left 5 years ago.

not saying they're empty because of me though.. is that what you are hearing?.

leaving_quietly

The hall I attend (less frequently now) isn't empty. Fuller than ever. Of course, the congregation that shares the KH with our congregation is emptying. Something big happened over there and a bunch of people just left and started going to other halls. Our got an influx of wounded, pissed off people. Great. Just great.

49

GEOFFREY JACKSON THE PERSONABLE FACE OF JW.ORG...BUT IT AIN'T OVER YET BUDDY

by steve2 in

since geoffrey jackson's appearance before the australian royal commission on friday there has for some been an expressed feeling of anticlimax.

it is as though he was given too much latitude to preach, to claim ignorance and to skirt questions.

more to the point, as much as i myself thought i would never have expected to say this, gj actually came across as likeable and - don't throttle me please!

leaving_quietly

There's some very intelligent and respectful posts in this thread, so thanks all, for that.

I have only watched a portion of Mr. Jackson's testimony. Time is not on my side at the moment. What I've been able to glean is more of an inside look into the functioning of the governing body and it's role in relation to the rest of the organization. This, to me, is very key from a doctrinal perspective. The portion where I stopped watching is where they were just starting to get into the real issue at hand, but the first 40 minutes or so of the testimony is, in my opinion, quite damaging to the claim of being the "faithful and discreet slave". And it's out of the horse's mouth, so to speak.

Two phrases that jumped out were "Guardians of Doctrine" and calling the Bible our "constitution. "Guardians of Doctrine" never appears in any literature, so that's a new one. However, calling the Bible our "constitution" seemed to be somewhat popular in the 1970s and 1980s, the last reference to it that way in the March 15, 1984 Watchtower (p. 19 par. 18).

As for the phrase, "Guardians of Doctrine", that too is telling. They truly have placed themselves in a position, a self-appointed position, that even the Bible says is not necessary or required. Note Galatians 3:23-25: "However, before the faith arrived, we were being guarded under law, being handed over into custody, looking to the faith that was about to be revealed. So the Law became our guardian leading to Christ, so that we might be declared righteous through faith. But now that the faith has arrived, we are no longer under a guardian."

I do hope some good comes of all of this. At the very least, the light is shining into this critical area. It's on the world stage for all to see. It's on the internet, and it won't be going away any time soon.

5

Finally got a copy of the silver NWT

by wozza in

jw
friends

after not having a nwt translation for a few years i scored the latest edition still wrapped in plastic !

but guess where ?

at the local salvation army shop ...for free!.

leaving_quietly

Still wrapped in plastic? That's amazing to me. Probably a JW gave it to a non-JW relative who didn't want it to begin with and they donated it to a worldly religion. LOL! (Yes, Salvation Army is a religion. I've seen one of their churches.)

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