How are we to understand the GB/Slave interpreting scripture, as the sole chanel, and at the same time accept that they can err?

[TrueTomHarley]

54 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

I woke up this morning and was pleased to see a red 17 on the notifications bell at the top of this page. I thought that perhaps someone had made some thoughtful posts to read.

Alas and alack! All 17 were just down-votes from @Foreigner (Allen Smith's [BTK's] long-running spamming account).

This brings to mind when Anna started complaining that I never upvoted anyone, so I searched through her comments and upvoted if she so much as sneezed. 

In no time at all, I had crashed her computer system.

[TrueTomHarley]

On 7/2/2019 at 7:05 AM, TrueTomHarley said:

As it turns out, I have been assigned the #4 talk this week on how Paul described certain fellows few have heard of as “a strengthening aid” to him, as one taking the lead in the work at the time.

Whether I can use you as a modern-day example is dubious.

Talk: (5 min. or less) w04 5/1 19-20 ¶3-7—Theme: How Were Certain Christians “a Strengthening Aid” to Paul? (Col 4:11, ftn.) (th study 7)

“I know several people who rose in their employment far beyond what their qualifications and education would have seemed to permit. When I investigated, I found that it was because they had deliberately made themselves indispensable. 

“Aw, man, I can’t believe I left my parchments at my apartment,” someone would say. He (or she) would volunteer to get it. “Rats, I left my cloak in the car,” another would say. “I’ll get it,” was his reply.

Of course, those are Bible examples from 2 Tim 4:13, the gist of such will be revisited presently. What they would actually volunteer for is some pain-in-the-neck spreadsheet that had to be done but nobody wanted to do it.

So it is that five obscure characters rose in the ranks in the apostle Paul’s eyes. “Only these are my fellow workers,” he says of Tychicus, Onesimus, Aristarchus, Mark, and Justus, almost as though they formed a cabal. He describes them as a “strengthening aid” (“source of great comfort” - 2013 NWT) and the Greek root word is peregoria, used only once in scripture, which generally has medicinal connotations, hence the two acceptable renderings. Going back several decades, there was the English ‘peregoric,’ an over-the-counter medicine. It had opium in it. It was good for whatever ailed you.

Paul comes across as almost superhuman in his endurance—recall Mark Sanderson at the Gilead gradation referring to the list at 2 Corinthians 11:23 and observing that just one of those experiences would have floored most of us—yet he surely could have used “strengthening” from time to time. Like when enemies try to pin the charge of ‘sedition’ on him—as they did with Jesus—as they have done with Jehovah’s people today—and, far from according him respect as a driving force of an important religion, dismiss him as a “pest” promoting a “sect.” (Acts 24:5)

If someone is described that way—especially if they are under (house) arrest, as was Paul—there is a tendency to keep one’s distance, lest the unsavory accusations rub off. If someone is charged with sedition, you think twice before you say, “That’s my buddy!” If someone is written off as a “pest,” you show whose esteem you are trying to court by whether you identify with that person or not.

Similarly, “they will say every sort of [wicked] thing about you,” Jesus says of his disciples. And ‘if you see how they treat me, then you know how they will treat you.’ (Matthew 5:11, John 15:20) There is a tendency to back away from anyone of whom “every sort of wicked thing” is said, and these five cabal Christians would not do it. It is hard not to think of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Russia right now. As some are being led off to courts and imprisonment, after having personal property confiscated, their brothers, far from laying low, are publicly identifying with them. There is even a scene somewhere of the friends clapping in the aftermath of a trial, as the “guilty” member is being led away. It plays a little odd from a distance, but the idea is to recognize and support those keeping integrity under trial. It is hardly just Russia, however. Everywhere “every sort of wicked thing” is said about Christians, affording ones opportunity to gather round or distance themselves.

Qualifications were not unreachable for those whom Paul would later recognize as a “strengthening aid,” or “source of great comfort”—just stick with him under censure and don’t run like a chicken. One of them even DID run like a chicken at one time (arguably) —Mark, but he later got his act together and identified with Paul in hard times—so if we are chickens, there is yet hope.

The others: “Tychicus, my beloved brother and faithful minister and fellow slave in the Lord, will tell you all the news about me. I am sending him to you so that you will know how we are and that he may comfort your hearts. He is coming along with Onesimus, my faithful and beloved brother, who is from among you; they will tell you all the things happening here.Aristarchus, my fellow captive, sends you his greetings, and so does Mark, the cousin of Barʹna·bas (concerning whom you received instructions to welcome him if he comes to you), and Jesus who is called Justus, who are of those circumcised. Only these are my fellow workers for the Kingdom of God, and they have become a source of great comfort to me.” (Colossians 4:7-11)

Tychicus made himself a conduit and a go-for. Onesimus is the former slave that the educated Paul hung out with—probably freed at his request, since his owner had also become a Christian. Aristarchus—all that is known about him is that he was a jailbird with Paul, and incurred the same slander. Mark, as mentioned, is the reformed chicken. Justus—virtually nothing is known about him. These are not high-profile people and their high praise as Christians is not unreachable for anyone.”

That is how I ended the talk, by observing that anyone could attain that status and that I hoped to be described that way myself someday.

[JW Insider]

14 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

That is how I ended the talk, by observing that anyone could attain that status and that I hoped to be described that way myself someday.

Good talk. I would have changed only . . . . oh, never mind. 😀

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

30 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Going back several decades, there was the English ‘peregoric,’ an over-the-counter medicine.

I thought "paregoric" was something you gave someone if they had food poisoning, to make them deliberately vomit out the contaminated food.  My Mom used to keep a bottle in the kitchen cabinet, but I never read the label, but I THINK I remember the word. (?).

 

[TrueTomHarley]

14 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

Good talk. I would have changed only . . . . oh, never mind. 😀

You would have taken out the smiley?

10 minutes ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

I thought "paregoric" was something you gave someone if they had food poisoning, to make them deliberately vomit out the contaminated food.  My Mom used to keep a bottle in the kitchen cabinet, but I never read the label, but I THINK I remember the word. (?).

Maybe so. It was a quick Wikipedia search I did to come up with that bit, and you know how authoritative Wikipedia is.

Why don’t you hop on there and put in your recollection?

I’ve never entirely gotten my head round just how that is supposed to work. Apparently if one ignoramus writes something wrong, others jump on board to instantly set him straight.

 

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

I thought it was a good talk, TTH ... and you mentioned chickens , I think, FOUR times.

Since my wife bought 18 chickens, I am sensitive about such things .... they are as much fun to watch as parrots ($ 900 to $3,000 ) and the big plus is that chickens ( $1.00 to $1.50 ) do NOT talk.

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

2 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Maybe so. It was a quick Wikipedia search I did to come up with that bit, and you know how authoritative Wikipedia is.

Why don’t you hop on there and put in your recollection?

I’ve never entirely gotten my head round just how that is supposed to work. Apparently if one ignoramus writes something wrong, others jump on board to instantly set him straight.

I once told my children when they were young enough to believe it, that I knew EVERYTHING ... except four things.

They caught me with three of them.

This may be number 4.

[TrueTomHarley]

Just now, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

I once told my children when they were young enough to believe it, that I knew EVERYTHING ... except four things.

I could have given them hundreds.  

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

4 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

I could have given them hundreds.  

I tried to keep them short on pocket money .....

... but even my daughter is more than 6 feet tall.

[TrueTomHarley]

21 minutes ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

I tried to keep them short on pocket money .....

... but even my daughter is more than 6 feet tall.

When I worked for the inventory company for a time, described by a former manager as ‘the most selfish company in the world,” there were three female student workers from the nearby SUNY college. All were that tall, and were colloquially known as ‘the Amazons.’

[JW Insider]

2 hours ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

Since my wife bought 18 chickens, I am sensitive about such things .... they are as much fun to watch as parrots ($ 900 to $3,000 ) and the big plus is that chickens ( $1.00 to $1.50 ) do NOT talk.

We did this once in Missouri.

My mother actually bought about 48 eggs for incubation, and we mostly kept them on top of our "Warm Morning"^TM wood stove when it was too cold, which we tried to keep adjusted to the right temperature. About half of the eggs were "duds," but the other half hatched into "furry" little yellow chicks and we gave them about half an acre for free-ranging. They grew up fending against a local fox we named Herod, and several snakes of various stripes that could always find a way into the chicken shed, mostly for eggs. The surviving hens often slept outside the shed, hopping their way up into a tall cedar tree, and would clumsily "fly" down in the morning (and would sometimes roll when they hit the ground). The roosters must have fought each other to the death because we ended up with only two surviving roosters who wouldn't go near each other. (Our dog would constantly get into fights with the roosters, who would always win by running around to the backside of the dog and pecking on sensitive exposed skin under his tail.)

Ultimately, after some of them had chicks of their own (somewhere outside the shed), we managed to maintain about 40 at all times, from about 1969 to 1975, with lots of eggs, and lots of noise. They were still there when we sold the house and property. For the last 7 years, we've had a green conure parrot.

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

I am building my chicken coop and run as a fortress ... custom designed and built by me ... 100% enclosed, even the wire roof over the entire run, with six strand electric wire around the bottom, and I have already installed the brackets for the weathered wood sign which will read in black stenciled letters "STALAG 17".

If you have not seen the movie "Chicken Run", with the voice of Mel Gibson as the flying cartoon rooster trying to teach all the hens to fly and escape,, it is worth seeing.

That's where I got the idea about naming my Chicken Concentration Camp "Stalag 17".

A "multi-nested" inside joke.