i am sure we were all shocked at the governing body update #2 with the unusual and impulsive changes set forth.. i am an insider at whq, and when i was on reddit and in communication with avoidjw i explained to the best of my ability that the approach on disfellowshipping was going to change based on the new light at the 2023 agm, that the jubilee rumor was false, and there were going to be changes on how jws approached disfellowshipping in response to the norway situation if it didn't turn out in watchtower's favor.
the decision came because of a legal blow to watchtower, not because "holy spirit" wad directing a faithful slave, who is going to become the "evil slave", more explanation on this soon.. everything i stated came true.
i left reddit exjw community due to the immature and mentally unstable nature there, and yet as has been the case my words came true.
There is no need to put hate on anyone here.
Maybe some posters just make things up, others could be the real deal. Either way, as time will tell, let's just wait and see. However, it is more likely that 2024 will be an interesting year, and probably a better show than anything on TV.
you heard me correct, this is not a joke, and it is not april fools day!
the asl portion of the governing body updated #2 (march 2024) has been released a bit early and someone caught it.
summary: .
If this is true, I'm genuinely surprised, as I didn't expect more changes until the next AGM.
However, as I mentioned in one of my previous posts, the rate at which communications are issued (even if they are encrypted), is an important indicator of the events that surround them.
This being the case, I imagine that the Wednesday Governing Body meetings, would be highly animated. And the 10 year plan, has well and truly started.
i remember the story going around the traps (here, perhaps?
) a couple of decades ago, about a country formerly behind the iron curtain.
when the soviet union crumbled, the jws were able to re-establish contact with the underground jw movement.
Hi NotFormer,
While this story may apply to other countries to some degree, I believe that that the one your are thinking about is Romania.
Cut off from main stream Jehovah's Witnesses just after WW2 and forced to refer to older WT material, the divergence between Western Witnesses and Romanian Witnesses theocratically, grew. Many Romanian Witnesses were sent to prison in the communist period and a feeling of abandonment developed. Ultimately, two or three sub-Witness groups formed, each with their own Kingdom Halls, Elders and administrations. However in the late '90s, a push from the US to encouraged a reunification with the greater Church, was made
The Governing Body sent representatives and deals were made (primarily around some stumbling doctrinal differences and the issue of appointed congregational positions) and while much was made of this publicly, it seems that even today, Witnesses are not totally united in that country.
I expect that the core reason for Romanian dissatisfaction, lies in the fact that Romanians are generally a conservative people. Thus so it should not come as a surprise that these feeling have not completely dissipated. And realistically, if you got into your time machine and brought back any Witnesses from the 1970's and dumped them into a Kingdom Hall today, most would find the Disneyland song, the beards and the very flexible understanding of 'the service', quite hard to process.
(see the video "Gerrit Losch: Maintaining Unity Under Ban" in you are interest in the JW perspective of this story)
translated with google translate:.
the trial went before oslo district court in january, and now the district court has concluded that the state is acquitted.
jehovah's witnesses are also ordered to pay court costs of just over nok 1.1 million.. https://www-vg-no.translate.goog/nyheter/innenriks/i/2bljxg/staten-frikjennes-etter-aa-ha-blitt-saksoekt-av-jehovas-vitner-melder-dagen?_x_tr_sl=ka&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp.
Sorry Phizzy, court costs were only $103,960 USD ... pity though.
Yet it a good precedent, that will get the Governing Body's attention. I think that GB's master plan, better get a hurry on.
hi friends, i have not been on this board in awhile, and i would like to get some thoughts from some of you.
i have noticed a change within my 4 siblings in approximately the last year and a half to 2 years regarding their communication with my mother and i. they have either phoned us, texted, emailed, or written a letter or card to us.
the conversation has been good, and on any topic that comes to mind.
I have always thought that the Organization will implode one day, burdened by the weight of its infrastructure because of fewer and fewer people being around to service its running costs. And up until recently, I never thought that the GB would try to reform the Church ... and yet now we are seeing signs of them trying.
But do they have the courage, to do a good job of it? Or will the reluctance for change, make them want to drag things out, too long? I just don't know.
But one thing I do know, is that the Governing Body has no idea of what problems the Brotherhood have to deal with, outside the walls of their gardened compound. For example, why haven't we had an article or assembly talk to warn girls about the drawing power OnlyFan sites, about the re-emergence of Cocaine as the housewife's a drug of choice or advice of what to do when your nationality is being genocidally attacked. No ... we instead just get articles about not following the 18th century custom of chaperones, and a never ending stream of happy relio-tainment.
Their understand of what practical help people really need, just seems beyond their comprehension. So it just doesn't give me hope, that they will get anything right. All we'll be getting instead I believe, is more and more confusing 'new light', to get distracted by.
hi friends, i have not been on this board in awhile, and i would like to get some thoughts from some of you.
i have noticed a change within my 4 siblings in approximately the last year and a half to 2 years regarding their communication with my mother and i. they have either phoned us, texted, emailed, or written a letter or card to us.
the conversation has been good, and on any topic that comes to mind.
I think that there is another factor, at play here.
When you think about the average active Witness over the last 50 years, the ratio of 'die-hard' believers to the more relaxed behaving Brother, it has clearly changed. I've been in one congregation or another a lot longer that 50 years, and I can tell you that in earlier days, everyone kept to rules, rigidly. However today, the pendulum has swung clearly the other way, with the far greater majority being highly flexible regarding the application of Governing Body law.
For example, it was normal in the past, that if a CO visit was shifted over your planned holiday, you changed or canceled your holidays. If an Elder was scheduled to give a Public Talk away in another congregation, he would still make it to his own meeting, to do his preassigned parts. Its just how it was.
Thus it should be no surprise to us, that disfellowshipping behavior, has become more relaxed amongst the brotherhood as they invent more and more excuses for contact. I actually think, that most now don't even try to find excuses, they just do want they want ... as they understand that there is no value in being a hard core Jehovah's Witness.
on february 22, 2023, anthony morris iii was officially removed from the governing body of jehovah's witnesses.
a few months later it was revealed that the watchtower bought him a house in lumberton, north carolina.. however, and correct me if i am wrong, since leaving the gb nobody has reported seeing tony attending jw meetings or participating in field service.
in fact nobody has reported seeing him anywhere, not even at a local liquor store.
As always ... in Jehovah's Organization, its not what you know, but who you know.
i’ve not been paying close attention to watchtower developments, but talking to a jw yesterday it occurred to me the society (yes, still use that term - old school) have been sending out mixed messages in recent years.
from what i gather, a few years ago the gb announced that during the great tribulation jws would be required to preach a “hailstone message of judgement” which involved telling people it was too late for them to repent and they were definitely going to be destroyed.
there were hints that this could be very soon, “any day now” preaching could stop and the hailstone message come in, kind of thing.
Hi Biahi,
It was meant from their perspective.
imagine if all the governing body resigned and a new set of brothers came in and said we are very very sorry for all those who have been disfellowshipped and disassociated over the years.
we know many mistakes have been made.
we are really genuinely sorry to all those who have been hurt and especially those who have died and been hurt by these mistakes.
To MikeJW,
I think that such a scenario, would work ... but not for the few on this site who comment regularly.
The people here, are thinking people. People who now highly value their own right to individual thought and paid a high price for it. However most people are not deep thinkers. They go with the flow and end up, and often in places where they don't want to be. That's how I see the majority of those disfellowshipped for fornication and adultery, in fact. So for those people ... yeh ... I think that it would work. As most of these ones, never wanted to leave the Truth in the first place.
Ultimately, people see what they want to see. And the case of of our Witness family and friends, they would just see such a change ... as Jehovah extending his loving hand.
i’ve not been paying close attention to watchtower developments, but talking to a jw yesterday it occurred to me the society (yes, still use that term - old school) have been sending out mixed messages in recent years.
from what i gather, a few years ago the gb announced that during the great tribulation jws would be required to preach a “hailstone message of judgement” which involved telling people it was too late for them to repent and they were definitely going to be destroyed.
there were hints that this could be very soon, “any day now” preaching could stop and the hailstone message come in, kind of thing.
The 'Hailstone message' is an interpretation of one or two verses at best. And I have always seen it as a warning not for worldly people, but just as another tool to scare Witnesses into not leaving the Organization.
Just as we were days away from Armageddon, then minutes and now seconds ... the Governing Body has fewer and fewer hyperboles left, to convince the Brotherhood as to the nearness of the end. Thus the appearance of this 'understanding' about a message of judgement.
But what good would it do, if it was real anyway. The telling billions of people that no matter what they do, they are soon going to die by having the flesh melt from there faces or by having their bodies crushed by oversized hail ... that is a thing that Satan would gleefully say.
No ... we are not going to hear anymore about the 'Hailstone message' if the Governing Body wants to portray their Faith as a kinder, more humanistic religion to attract the masses. Its just not compatible, with the new direction they feel the spirit is leading them.
