Why do the elders have to announce when a publisher decides to spend 70 hours a month in service?

[JOHN BUTLER]

9 hours ago, Outta Here said:

Oh they do you know. You did!

Only because I'm an ex witness and I know the game.

I stood and watched, waiting for someone to go up and talk to them or even just take a magazine, but no one went near them. 

[JOHN BUTLER]

But your people need all those monthly reports so as to count your membership. 

Stand by a trolly / cart for one hour a month and you are a member to be counted. Do half an hour on the doors a month and you are a member to be counted, as long as you don't forget to put in your monthly report  . 

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

3 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Buy your people need all those monthly reports so as to count your membership. 

Stand by a trolly / cart for one hour a month and you are a member to be counted. Do half an hour on the doors a month and you are a member to be counted, as long as you don't forget to put in your monthly report  . 

Sometime I fantasize about being a multi-millionaire, and being able to arrange my time to Pioneer ... but not only that ... but to put a full HUNDRED hours a month in the Field Service.

I would hire a pilot and aircraft to fly up and down Miami Beach, Florida , about 1/4 mile from the beach, towing behind a "JW.ORG" banner, with the Scripture "John 9:41", and watch it through my sunglasses.

..... the rough equivalent of a Brother standing beside his literature cart all day

I am reasonably sure that if I contributed  $30,000 a month to the local Kingdom Hall, as "Prince" did, not only could I "count my time" .... I would be a "Pillar" in the Organization.  AND, at the same time, get a nice tan!

 

....er ... "Pillar" .... NOT "Pillow".

 

[TrueTomHarley]

3 hours ago, James Thomas Rook Jr. said:

I am reasonably sure that if I contributed  $30,000 a month to the local Kingdom Hall, as "Prince" did, not only could I "count my time" .... I would be a "Pillar" in the Organization.  AND, at the same time, get a nice tan!

Over the weekend, I was in a circuit way out there in the back hills, and I came to know some of the strange ways of the local elders out there.

I learned that when they really got riled at one another, they would spit out out the most spiteful words that they could think of: “May you be assigned to preside in JTR’s congregation!”

[TrueTomHarley]

18 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

But your people need all those monthly reports so as to count your membership. 

They actually shortchange themselves that way. Often there are people who attend meetings who don’t engage in the public ministry. They are not counted. If you asked them, however, what was their religious leaning, most would say that they are Jehovah’s Witnesses.

[TrueTomHarley]

On 6/21/2019 at 4:47 AM, JOHN BUTLER said:

I stood and watched, waiting for someone to go up and talk to them or even just take a magazine, but no one went near them. 

So. Now you think that advertising the kingdom is a waste of time. Do you even think anymore that there is a kingdom? Or is the kingdom simply in our hearts?

Should we instead begin praying for the world leaders fo be blessed so as to succeed in bringing better conditions?

In fact, do you retain anything at all of your former worship other than an odd insistence that God produce a true anointed one that does not “lie?” 

With your characterization of every error or change as a “lie,” you may have to take what you can get. If you tell God that your insistence is on purity, he will likely say that you are no great shakes yourself—you will just have to learn to work with and trust [did you actually say that you trust no one at all?] other imperfect people.

Beyond question, God gives “gifts in men.” 

“And he gave some as apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelizers, some as shepherds and teachers,” for our “readjustment.”

What happens if we forsake that?

”So we should no longer be children, tossed about as by waves and carried here and there by every wind of teaching by means of the trickery of men, by means of cunning in deceptive schemes.” (Ephesians 4:11,14)

Hasn’t that happened to you?

If the evangelizers, shepherds, and teachers of Jehovah’s Witnesses are not good enough for you, tell me where they are to be found. What! God is incompetent, is he, unable to fulfill his above statement? Tell me where they are.

It will be nice if they know that there is a kingdom, that God and Jesus are not the same, that all good people do not go to heaven, and that the name of God is not The LORD.

 

 

 

[JOHN BUTLER]

11 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

They actually shortchange themselves that way. Often there are people who attend meetings who don’t engage in the public ministry. They are not counted. If you asked them, however, what was their religious leaning, most would say that they are Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I was once told that I could not be a JW if I did not witness to others.  I would be a Jehovah's bystander . 

[JOHN BUTLER]

10 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

So. Now you think that advertising the kingdom is a waste of time. Do you even think anymore that there is a kingdom? Or is the kingdom simply in our hearts?

Should we instead begin praying for the world leaders fo be blessed so as to succeed in bringing better conditions?

In fact, do you retain anything at all of your former worship other than an odd insistence that God produce a true anointed one that does not “lie?” 

With your characterization of every error or change as a “lie,” you may have to take what you can get. If you tell God that your insistence is on purity, he will likely say that you are no great shakes yourself—you will just have to learn to work with and trust [did you actually say that you trust no one at all?] other imperfect people.

Beyond question, God gives “gifts in men.” 

“And he gave some as apostles, some as prophets, some as evangelizers, some as shepherds and teachers,” for our “readjustment.”

What happens if we forsake that?

”So we should no longer be children, tossed about as by waves and carried here and there by every wind of teaching by means of the trickery of men, by means of cunning in deceptive schemes.” (Ephesians 4:11,14)

Hasn’t that happened to you?

If the evangelizers, shepherds, and teachers of Jehovah’s Witnesses are not good enough for you, tell me where they are to be found. What! God is incompetent, is he, unable to fulfill his above statement? Tell me where they are.

It will be nice if they know that there is a kingdom, that God and Jesus are not the same, that all good people do not go to heaven, and that the name of God is not The LORD.

 

 

 

@TrueTomHarley  Tom you put so much in a comment it is hard to know which bit to answer first.

I'll start at the top I suppose. 

So. Now you think that advertising the kingdom is a waste of time. Do you even think anymore that there is a kingdom? Or is the kingdom simply in our hearts?

You've created a trinity  3 questions in one.  1. I don't think advertising the Kingdom is a waste of time, but if no one comes near the stall / stand then no one hears about the Kingdom do they ?  2. Yes I believe in the Heavenly Kingdom which of course will have control of the Earthly paradise at some time.  3. No I don't think the kingdom is an imaginary thing in people's hearts. 

Should we instead begin praying for the world leaders fo be blessed so as to succeed in bringing better conditions?

No, in fact i gave a witness on FB about this, this morning.  A topic about saying christian prayers at Council / local government meetings. I mentioned that Jesus said he was no part of this world and that true Christians should be no part of this world either. 

In fact, do you retain anything at all of your former worship other than an odd insistence that God produce a true anointed one that does not “lie?”

This is maybe a trick question Tom.  I retain Bible knowledge, well as much as I can. And I use scriptures to prove points to myself and others. But yes I expect an Anointed that do not deliberately tell lies, or do not JUMP AHEAD of what God /Jesus wants those Anointed to know. The Anointed SHOULD NOT GUESS. That is going beyond the things written I would think. 

he will likely say that you are no great shakes yourself. But I'm not Anointed nor do i want to be a leader of people. 

 [did you actually say that you trust no one at all )  

I trust no human at all. However if i was sure that the Anointed were truly serving God then I would follow instructions, because the instructions would be from God or Christ, only using the human Anointed as a mouthpiece.  Whereas in comparison the GB make it up as they go along and most times get it wrong. 

So we should no longer be children, tossed about as by waves and carried here and there by every wind of teaching by means of the trickery of men, by means of cunning in deceptive schemes.” (Ephesians 4:11,14)

But that is what JW's do. Do you not understand that ? Can you not see how from the Bible Students onward there has been lies after lies / mistakes after mistakes. I need not repeat it all for you actually do know, you just chose to close your eyes to it all. 

 What! God is incompetent, is he, unable to fulfill his above statement?

God will make all things clear in HIS time and through Christ. Hence I feel that the Judgement is a long way off yet. 

The GB / W/t /JW Org is just frightening people by saying Armageddon is sooooo close now.  It brings the people and the money in. 

Of course it will happen, but not yet, not yet. 

 

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

1 hour ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

The GB / W/t /JW Org is just frightening people by saying Armageddon is sooooo close now.  It brings the people and the money in. 

Of course it will happen, but not yet, not yet. 

Sir Isaac Newton's FIRST love was theology ... and his minor obsessions were with physics, and math, etc.

Arguably the smartest natural man who has ever lived.

He hand wrote MILLIONS of words on theological subjects, and his collected religious works are now stored in the Hebrew National Museum, in Jerusalem.  OF COURSE I have not read them, but from three large biographies about his life, it seems safe to say this about him.

He never published ANYTHING without rigorous proofs, as he EXPECTED to be challenged on EVERYTHING.

To the best of my knowledge he was NEVER wrong ... even though he experimented with Alchemy extensively, as the science of Chemistry did not really exist back then ... and he did what he could with what was known at the time.

Even the WTB&TS alluded to the theory that he may have been one of the Anointed, and there is nothing I have ever read about him that would disprove that theory.

Without getting into a 20 page thesis, it seems his considered opinion was that Armageddon would occur in the year 2060, but perhaps as early as 2032.

Of course, it may occur in the next five minutes, as no one knows, or has ever known when the Great Day of Jehovah will start .... however ... I get that same feeling, looking at world events .... and Sir Isaac Newton was NEVER wrong (?), and about such things the Society (along with everybody else on Earth, for two millennia) ... have never been right.

If the Society had a "theology credibility credit rating" about ANY prophetic prediction they have ever made, with the big three predominate credit rating companies here in the United States: TransUnion, Experian, and Equifax ... what would their "theology credibility credit rating" be?

ZERO.

 

"In God We Trust"

... all others pay cash!

 

[James Thomas Rook Jr.]

========================================================

...as an aside ....  Sir Isaac Newton knew that the core beliefs (not the 85% drivel) of Jehovah's Witnesses were correct, and could PROVE IT, just as we can ... hundreds of years before there was a Watchtower Bible and Tract Society.

HE WAS ONE OF JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES IN HIS CORE THEOLOGY!

========================================================

 

[TrueTomHarley]

2 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Hence I feel that the Judgement is a long way off yet. 

How will you know when Judgement is just a short way off yet? 

[TrueTomHarley]

2 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

I don't think advertising the Kingdom is a waste of time, but if no one comes near the stall / stand then no one hears about the Kingdom do they ? 

“For as they were in those days before the Flood, eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and they took no note—they even ignored the literature carts!—until the Flood came and swept them all away, so the presence of the Son of man will be.”