Posts by nowisee

11

What are your favorite song lyrics?

by berylblue in

mine are a toss between:.

"and had i but known last summer, what i now understand.

i'd have never set my foot inside this bleak and bitter land".

nowisee

amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. i once was lost but now im found, was blind but now i see.

46

Did I turn my back on Jehovah's True Organization?

by sandy in

i was wondering as i have been lately; did i turn my back on god and am i wrong for turning my back on the organization?.

are there any of you out there that feel like you have a real personal relationship with god with or without religion in your life?

do you still call god jehovah?

i feel for you so much. i totally understand your doubts and confusion, questions and fears. i wish we could just sit down together and talk. after 9ll i was so much also in the place you describe. i wondered if i had made a mistake and turned my back on god so many years before. i wondered if i started to look again for the truth, whether i would have to go back to the kh, sit in silence with no one talking to me, be ashamed, and grovel to get back in their good graces. the doubts were so nagging and troubling.

then one night i told god i was looking for him, and if he were really there, why not come and find me. literally within minutes, and totally out of the blue, someone gave me the book, "mere christianity" by c.s.lewis. reading this was just the start, but it definitely was a start and it made a compelling case for the existence of God and of the ransom sacrifice of Jesus Christ. it was only much later when i looked back on it that i realized my prayer had been answered (i can be a bit dense at times).

in the beginning of my search i had really forgotten how to pray. my prayers seemed forced and not quite sincere to me, as though i was praying what i thought sounded right (sort of like the prayers heard at kh). so what i did was i just kept praying the Lord's prayer over and over - sometimes dozens of times in a row. as i started to study on my own i always prayed for guidance, clarity and understanding of what i was reading, and always for direction.

i had really come to doubt the existence of god and had to go back to basics, but didn't really know where to go. one night as i was driving, radio surfing, i stumbled across hank hanigraff, the bible answer man. in tristate area he is on wmca, 570am, 6-7pm, also runs the christian research inst. he had on ralph muncaster who wrote "a skeptic's search for god". i got this book, read it, and when i was finished i knew that God does indeed exist. on the net www.equip.org.

i can only tell you my own story. i kept praying and asking, searching, seeking, knocking. there were many times when issues got muddy and i got confused, but i did not give up. some of the books that helped me were:

"answering jehovah's witnesses subject by subject" - david reed; "crisis of conscience" - raymond franz; "approaching jehovah's witnesses in love" - wilbur lingle; "the orwellian world of jehovah's witnesses" - heather and gary botting; "witnessing to the witnesses" - jerry and marion bodine

i also simultaneously began going around to various churches, dismissing all (lutheran, methodist, quakers, spiritualist, salvation army, catholic, etc etc until i found a small church loosely affiliated with presbyterian, but what attracted me to it and what kept me there was that they studied the bible. (i also found out then that jw propaganda that they are the only ones who read the bible is totally false). this church has probably a dozen bible studies throughout the week and you can attend any or all or none. but once i started i found that i was being fed by this, it was real food and i accepted it hungrily. many of my questions have been resolved at these studies as i discovered that jws had taken many of the scriptures they use to prove various points out of context. i dont consider myself to be presbyterian, i consider myself now to be "christian". the more time went on the more intimate i became with the Lord and his infinite and boundless love and mercy, through prayer, through study, through learning to trust Him (psalm ll8:8) and through, i am sure, the working of the Holy Spirit.

a couple of booklets that i recently received were, "does god work through an organization", and "where is the body of Christ", both by tom cabeen (a former bethelite elder). you can write to tom cabeen, l new haven ave., ste. l3, milford, ct 06460-3398. this can help to readjust the thinking that we must affiliate with a particular organization.

you did not turn your back on god or his organization when you left jws. trust me on this, but do more. do the work yourself, do the study, pray, put in the time. it doesn't happen by magic. you must do your part. but know that our Father truly is there to help and He WILL answer you.

"ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. for everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? if you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!"

sandy, He's not going to give you a stone or a snake. go to Him. trust Him.

my very best to you, nowisee

33

What's The Strangest Thing that ever happened to you OUT IN SERVICE??

by NaruNaruChan in

jw
friends

i once had a guy answer the door naked, and i laughed my butt off... you?

nowisee

how can anyone in the world follow that.

261

Welcome !

by Simon in

jw
friends

welcome to the newest jehovah's witness discussion forum on the net.. please register so that you can post to the forum and turn this into a welcoming place for other brothers and sisters online

nowisee

yes... i reaffirm all of the above. thank you.

6

JW Chaplains

by RR in

hello apostates and apostatees:

i thought you might find these interesting.. .

just to make a long story short, the local elders in my community are part of the county police chaplain association.

nowisee

i believe the answer may lie in the fact that jws are always recruiting new converts. so there may be some already serving on a police force/military who are in the process of conversion. they probably would want to make religious counsel available to those potential new members.

33

Goofy's Introduction, hello

by goofy in

jw
friends

i feel like i know some of you since i have been lurking here for almost two years, yikes!.

let me introduce myself.

i go by goofy here, you know the disney character, always liked him.

nowisee

hi goofy, im pretty new here too. read your story and we have a LOT in common. i totally related to your stories of childhood and not fitting in at school. and...i totally related to your stories of adulthood and finding acceptance at a place like cheers.

i wish you well. i wish you the joy of many new friendships. may you find your way.

nowisee

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