Rivergang

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Posts by Rivergang

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  53

  What`s the reason some of you think JW`s are in decline ?

  by smiddy3 in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  from what i can see no such thing is happening.i became a jw in 1960 and remained for about 30 years and the numbers of active jw`s today in the world are far greater than they were back then.. and here in australia the numbers are much higher than they were back then .. so i don`t see that their in decline or have any worries about losing support .. don`t the numbers speak for themselves ?.

  is it just wishful thinking on your part ?.

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  Rivergang

  By Crikey, the sky is falling!
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  15

  How many new converts do you remember as a JW?

  by SydBarrett in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  inspired by the "whats the reason you think jw's are in decline" thread.

  my belief is that almost all the growth, at least in the western world is due to jw's having kids.

  i was a 4th generation jw from birth till about age 20, so the timeframe i can comment on would be my teen years.

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  Rivergang

  During those heady days leading up to 1975, I can recall many “converts” to the JW religion. In the congregation I was with, entire families came in as converts. During the 1980s, too, there still seemed to be more than a few converts to the religion. (Although much of the increase in numbers during that decade was the result of a concerted campaign to reactivate those who had become “inactive”).
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  19

  The Judge on Trial: Uncovering the Real J F Rutherford [Part 1]

  by pomo6780 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  enough rhetoric for now, here is my promised first part to my series.. for the benefit of lurkers, i'm using mainly wt publications as my research to show this information isn't 'apostate'.

  part 1: association with russell and the bible students.

  i want to ask an honest question.

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  Rivergang

  Shades there of Schnell’s 30 Years a Watchtower Slave. That is, a lot of extraordinary allegations - but precious little in the way of evidence.

  I believe that there is a word which describes that type of writing, and it starts with the letter “P”!
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  25

  All UK telephone landlines being phased out.....

  by BoogerMan in

  1. social
  2. current

  .....and replaced with voip by 2025. https://www.pmctelecom.co.uk/blog/are-landline-phones-being-phased-out-in-2025/.

  just heard this on a radio station's advert..

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  Rivergang

  Certainly a totally different planet to the one I grew up in - where the telephone exchange was operated by the local post office staff. Telephone service was only available between 09:00 am and 5:00 pm Monday to Friday, and between 09:00 am and midday on Saturdays. This was a manual exchange of the “Magneto” type, with barely a dozen subscribers in total - and no such thing as being able to have a confidential telephone conversation.

  Some things, at least, have changed for the better!
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  30

  Jehovah's Witnesses and Mental Health

  by Vanderhoven7 in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  this psychiatrist makes sense to me.. https://youtu.be/l5wcqc6m-gi.

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  Rivergang

  There is some considerable debate about whether or not chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) is a psychosomatic disease.

  Certainly - in my time at least - it was prevalent amongst the JWs. For example, back in 1990, it was estimated that 5% of the publishers in our circuit were affected by this condition. It was noteworthy, too, that it seemed to affect mainly the most "zealous" of the JWs - the "pioneers", missionaries and similar.

  Significantly, since breaking with that lot 28 years ago, I have only ever known of one person who suffers from this illness.

  CFS used to be called the "Yuppie Disease". It might as well also be named the "Dubbie Disease"!
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  17

  Charles the Third and the Two-Headed Beast

  by Anony Mous in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was reading an article about the pomp and circumstance around the first coronation in nearly a century.. made me think of the revelation book (the red one, not the bible) and the picture of the two headed beast with a sword and if i have some time today i will see if i can’t find it and age it a bit, it seems the sword is a bit dull and the two heads are now both octogenarians with severe dementia, kind of funny to see that instead of “swift judgment” we’ve come to internal decay.. what do you canadians, english, scots, irish and australians think about your new leadership?.

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  Rivergang

  In this part of the world at least, the coronation is unlikely to attract the same attention as in earlier times.

  For example, 85 years ago, my grandmother invested what for her would have been a year’s wages in a radio set. She did that solely because she wanted to “listen to the coronation” (ie. of King George VI).

  Cannot imagine this coronation generating anywhere near that level of interest!

  There are a number of reasons for that - not just the unpopularity of Charles III. At the forefront would be declining British influence in this part of the world, paralleling Britain’s post-WWII decline as a world power. The clinchers would have been two events which happened almost at the same time - Britain’s withdrawal “East of Suez” and its entry into the Common Market. Upon entry into the EEC, Britain thereby abandoned trade with the Commonwealth.

  Ever since, the term “Commonwealth” has meant very little, apart from that biannual Talk Fest called the “Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting”. Commonly referred to by its acronym CHOGM, it would more accurately be described as “NATO” - ie. “No Action, Talk Only”
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  9

  Were 1st century converts told to knock on doors?

  by BoogerMan in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  acts chapter 2 clearly shows (in jw minds) that door-door preaching was a must for all converts.

  (acts 2:37, 38, 41, 42) “now when they heard this, they were stabbed to the heart, and they said to peter and the rest of the apostles: “men, brothers, what should we do?” peter said to them: “repent, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of jesus christ for forgiveness of your sins, but also, preach to others by knocking on their doors.

  ...and on that day about 3,000 people were added.

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  Rivergang

  In countries like Papua New Guinea the JWs do also target public venues such as the markets (certainly during my time there, this was the case). Further, it always seemed to me that they met with more success doing that than futilely knocking on people's doors.

  Not to mention, too, that for many of the population, "home" is a hovel in some crime-ridden squatter settlement. Not sure how you would go about knocking on somebody's door when there isn't one!

  The JWs did "witness" within the squatter settlements, but even there they approached people only in the public places of those areas (such as the markets). To have approached somebody's dwelling within those settlements would have been an almost certain way of receiving physical attack - usually by some wild character wielding a bush knife!
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  17

  Charles the Third and the Two-Headed Beast

  by Anony Mous in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  i was reading an article about the pomp and circumstance around the first coronation in nearly a century.. made me think of the revelation book (the red one, not the bible) and the picture of the two headed beast with a sword and if i have some time today i will see if i can’t find it and age it a bit, it seems the sword is a bit dull and the two heads are now both octogenarians with severe dementia, kind of funny to see that instead of “swift judgment” we’ve come to internal decay.. what do you canadians, english, scots, irish and australians think about your new leadership?.

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  Rivergang

  Ireland formally left the Commonwealth and declared itself a republic in 1949. In response, Britain’s Ireland Act 1949 acknowledged that Ireland, to quote, “ceased to be one of His Majesties dominions”.

  Before that event, the Statute of Westminster 1931 effectively granted full autonomy to those countries which held dominion status within the British Empire. Ireland took that one step further in 1949 by removing any even token constitutional links with Britain. (Canada, Australia and New Zealand did similar during the 1980s -although all remained members of the Commonwealth).

  Not that Commonwealth membership has any great significance. Not all former British territories are Commonwealth members - Ireland and Myanmar (Burma) two name two. Conversely, some of its members (eg. Cameroon and Mozambique) never ever were part of the British Empire.
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  9

  Were 1st century converts told to knock on doors?

  by BoogerMan in

  1. watchtower
  2. beliefs

  acts chapter 2 clearly shows (in jw minds) that door-door preaching was a must for all converts.

  (acts 2:37, 38, 41, 42) “now when they heard this, they were stabbed to the heart, and they said to peter and the rest of the apostles: “men, brothers, what should we do?” peter said to them: “repent, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of jesus christ for forgiveness of your sins, but also, preach to others by knocking on their doors.

  ...and on that day about 3,000 people were added.

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  Rivergang

  Back then - and still in certain parts of the world to this day - people congregated in the market places. They went there pretty much because, for many, there was little else for them to do (I have seen this firsthand while living in Papua New Guinea). Not surprisingly then, Jesus and his followers focused their attentions on such venues as the market places.

  It requires a considerable stretch of the imagination to conclude from the bible record that early Christians went on a door knocking campaign!
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  33

  July 2023 Study Watchtower - Great Tribulation is coming soooooooooooooon!

  by BoogerMan in

  1. watchtower
  2. bible

  is this the "great tribulation" which jesus warned he would bring upon the corrupt christian congregations worldwide, (revelation 2:22; 7:14) or is it the same 1st century g.t.

  which he said would never occur again?

  (matthew 24:21).

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  Rivergang

  “The end is so close”.

  So what is bloody new?