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54 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

What a weird congregation you have.

It’s like when the Regional brother and his wife hit town and it isn’t yet clear just what congregation they will be attending. “Are we in that stage of trying to haul in the big fish?” I ask them, making gestures of reeling in the big one. They reply yes. “Well,” I tell them, “just between us, I’m not sure they even believe in God at those other congregations.”

It's just Dan. His parents were missionaries and he used to be a pioneer, then he got DF'ed and reinstated. I don't know what it was for, but he's really sharp. I remember when I got him the DVD "Legally Blonde" for a graduation gift from law school (he'd previously refused to see it)...but anyway, he's super legalistic about everything. He'd hassle me about how long I conducted the meetings for FS and complain about how he was pioneering that month and needed to get in more time. So...I called his whiney little complaint and since I was pioneering too, I dragged him out in the Texas summer sun and we worked this whole hilly street about a mile long until sweat was dripping off the end of his nose at the door. Since he and I were like oil and water personality-wise I figured I needed to spend as much time w/him as possible to get over how much he annoyed me. (you know like when people only do service enough to hate it?...you have to push on through).

Just out of curiosity (the lawyers thing made me think of this) ....How many people imagine the new world to be completely conflict free?

Speaking of hellfire. How many here wish that Jesus had never used the illustration of Lazarus and the rich man?

More on language. In Genesis, during the antediluvian times we see the blessed lineage, the line of Seth accomplishing nothing of note, whereas the lineage from Cain is engaging in all manner of building, engineering, music, etc. That implies something as well.

2 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Kant was stopped dead in his tracks on this dilemma when his church told him he kant ask that question.  (sorry)

Along these lines I decided to harass this one brother (who's really annoyed me, so fair play) ... he's an IRS Lawyer/CPA... anyway I asked him:

"Dan...Could Jehovah have created Adam and Even with faux free will such that these imagined they were free to perform a forbidden or evil action, but lacked the capacity to actually act on the imagined act?"

Dan says "Sure, Jehovah could have done that."

I continue..."So then, if he had done that, would Adam or Eve have eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and bad?"

Dan responds "Well, no, of course."

I ask..."So what do you suppose Adam and Eve have thought when presented with Satan's challenge"

Dan says "I suppose they might have considered the situation, well at least Eve might, since it says she was deceived, but she wouldn't have eaten, because of not having free will. She'd have been wired to continue doing good, even though she had the capacity to consider doing the wrong thing."

Then I say "In all this, though she would have felt free, though wouldn't she...both she and Adam?"

Dan responds "In this thought experiment, the answer would be 'Yes'."

Then I ask "So then, the fall of man, death and sin would never have taken place?"

Dan says "Correct."

And I continue "...and Adam and Eve would imagine in all this that they were still free moral agents."

Dan says "That's what faux free will looks like."

And I continue "So we'd all be in a paradise earth now, then wouldn't we, and none the wiser for lacking free will..."

Dan says "Sure...."

And I say "So why didn't Jehovah do it that way? We'd all be happy and be congratulating ourselves on how we we are so wise that we always obey Jehovah..."

Dan says "Well Jehovah would know..."

And I blurt out "So it's all about him is it?"

Dan says "What about the angels? They'd know we didn't have free will?"

I say "Would they? If Jehovah could make humans with faux free will, then couldn't he likewise do so with any sentient being giving some actual free will and some faux and not allowing the knowledge of who here or there actually possesses the same?"

Dan says "What about love? They couldn't actually love each other or Jehovah."

I say "With faux free will you could imagine you were doing so..."

Then I say "Don't worry Dan. I'm sure we have free will. Maybe."

24 minutes ago, Anna said:

Sorry, this is going to be completely off the topic of Russel, but as you know I'm watching "The family" and the guy used the example of David for quite a sinister cause. He asked his "recruits" why did they think that after all the bad stuff David did, (he especially mentioned the adultery and manslaughter surrounding Bathsheba) God still not only forgave him, but kept him in his role as king and as representative of the future Messiah. One of the students answered pretty much as we would; because David was repentant and tried hard to do the right thing (or something like that). This was apparently the wrong answer. The right answer was because he was chosen. Which according to the guy in a nutshell meant that if you are chosen by God, it doesn't matter what you do. He convinced candidates that God chooses people in government today, to essentially be representatives of his Kingdom on earth.

I had no idea that such an idea existed. I mean I know that politicians in the US tend to be religious (Christians), but I didn't know that they believe they are God appointed for that role. It was like a comparison to the anointed, except these were high ranking politicians. (So in a way this is kind of on topic). It was interesting because it was almost like a parallel to our (JW) Organization. It's almost like there is a false "God's organization' and a true "God's organization". In this respect it's easy to see the future conflict of these two "organizations" and some of the puzzle pieces are falling into place for me....from a different angle. @Araunawhere are you?

...Ok, I agree, this should be in a new thread....

 

Well it's very Calvinist.

https://babylonbee.com/news/calvinist-explains-wife-didnt-choose-beard-beard-chose

1 hour ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Kant was stopped dead in his tracks on this dilemma when his church told him he kant ask that question.  (sorry)

Kant was a pedant, who was wrong about his categorical imperative. He knew nothing about the scalability of actions or even the capability of any given actor performing a given action. I think of him as a pigeon walking in circles imagining he'd circumnavigated the globe.

34 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

What about those verses that say God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and God struck Nabal dead, and in both cases we bend over backwards to say he didn’t, that he allowed the lout’s own stubbornness to kill him? Sometimes I think the Bible writer meant it exactly as he wrote, in the vein of ‘the light gets brighter as the day dawns.’

Sometimes in Twitter you will read of a given tweet removed with the note that this user limits who can read his tweets (though other tweets of his will be visible). I know of no such setting to do that. That’s why I’m inclined to believe the explanation I read that they ‘limit’ their tweets by going against something Twitter doesnt want them to say and so has removed it.

I suspect that the interpretation of the locus of the action leading to the hardening of pharaoh's heart is interpreted variously due to social values and ideas current at any given time. Both can be true with qualification. Jehovah has created this universe and all the natural cause-effect relations which allow for a measure of free will so one could say he caused the heart-hardening, on the other hand we could also say he allowed it insofar as he allows us to have free will.

Of course we could ask how we pretend to know our will is free.

Gallipoli (the movie) - Just because your leaders tell you something, doesn't mean A. They are lying or B. They always correct

@JW Insider Where did the extra 2 years come from? 1943+100=2043. 2043-3960=1917 (adjusted no zero is 1916)

The same thing is involved when I hear people say "I encouraged that brother". I always say, no you didn't. If you'll look and see he still appears to be discouraged. What you should have said is "I attempted to encourage that brother, but I failed." 

30 minutes ago, TrueTomHarley said:

The topic itself is easy as pi. I did enjoy that movie, quirky though it was, or maybe I enjoyed it due to that reason.

I liked the garden = 144 thingy. 144 x 10 x 10 x 10 = 144,000

For example we've been recently admonished via scripture to "not hurry ourselves to become offended" and in the same admonishment hear the words "someone hurt our feelings".

Do you see how the former suggests the locus of control is internal, that becoming offended is an act of the will on our part, whereas the latter is an external locus of control and lacking in free will, but rather a reaction to an external act?

The latter, in my view is more along the lines of "I didn't like what you said" vs "you hurt my feelings" as if ones "feelings" was some naked worm crawling along the sidewalk defenseless against being stepped on.

36 minutes ago, Patiently waiting for Truth said:

'click bate' of course, but it does show that you want it to happen too. 

You wouldn't write it if you didn't think it, and you wouldn't think it if you didn't feel it inside. 

I think the 'heavens' are a totally different dimension. I think all spirit beings are from that different dimension too. 

The dimention that we live in didn't exist until YHWH and His son Yeshua created it all. 

 

It's click "bait".

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/19966-because-children-have-abounding-vitality-because-they-are-in-spirit

What does red taste like, what does it sound like, what does it smell like?

Is your perception of red the same as mine?

It's next to the third tesseract on the left.

42 minutes ago, Patiently waiting for Truth said:

It is not possible to improve the whole JW Org that is run by 8 'untouchable men'. 

It has been made clear on this forum that NO ONE can remove the GB, so therefore it's not possible to improve the Org. 

Those 8 men have complete control. They control the 'helpers' which in turn control others, which control the Elders of congregations. 

  Seems your faith is in that Org and in your congregation only.  A true Christian serves Almighty God through Yeshua. 

You can't do that if you aren't attached to some kind of congregation. The scriptures are absolutely clear on this. You can dispute WHICH congregation of people who consider themselves Christians you should be attached to, but you can't avoid the attachment. Not if you are a TRUE Christian. A person in regular attendance at a baptist church imagining Jesus is part of a trinity is closer to the truth than an EX-JW who imagines he can go it alone.

Imagine yourself living at the end of the 1st and the beginning of the second century and you were in one of the seven congregations. Imagine the letter was read to you how Jesus viewed your congregation. You also got to hear what he had to say about the other congregations. If you thought the others were getting a better report, would you abandon your congregation to move to the one with the better report, or would you have stayed and helped to improve it? Or would you have abandoned the project of being a Christian entirely imagining wrongly that you could go it alone. "It's just me, Jesus and Jehovah against the world of darkness out there!", you might imagine to yourself. (and you'd be wrong).

You simply cannot be a Christian by yourself. You need the perpetual annoyances of the congregation to live up to the requirements. Oh, you might say to yourself "What about the baptists, the seventh day adventists, the christadelphians, the way or any other non-denomnational group. What about the catholics, lutherans, episcopalians, methodists, etc?" Well, I'd say, if you feel that these are better at following the bible, then you need to hook up with them ASAP and be a REAL Christian (if that's what these are and I'm not the ultimate judge) otherwise you're not a Christian, because you absolutely need to be attached to a congregation to be one.

Like Tom pointed out earlier w/regard to the actual congregations of the 1st century - the congregations weren't free from strife. Why would anyone imagine it would be so today? To believe that you must not be reading your bible with any depth of understanding. In fact it seems sometimes that there's more there to give us all something to deal with - we get some great learning experiences.

1 hour ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Oh for crying out loud, Dimitar! Why would you downvote that one?

It's a reflex. Like <begin analogous shibboleth>Pudgy's dog.</end analogous shibboleth>

In Texas we have Aggie jokes. I worked in an office w/a few Texas A&M grads and was always ripping them. "You know what you call this?", I asked one while holding up a black felt marker. "No", he replied. "It's an Aggie highlighter!", I responded. (yes I made that joke up allll by myself)

17 hours ago, TrueTomHarley said:

Yes, I know, Pudg, but it appears that’s the way it is and always has been, even in the first century, and you should try to get your head around it. Pray to God for intervention and he says, “I’ve got people who handle that stuff.” Point out to him that some of those people are pieces of work, and he says, ‘Well—you’re no cream puff yourself. Do you have any idea how much you try me? You’ll just have to work it out.”

I say ‘always has been’ because the Bible does not celebrate the ‘free speech’ that is axiomatic in the West. Sometimes it celebrates shutting people up. Certain ones have to be muzzled because they are stumbling entire households. The tongue is even more damaging than actions since ‘see—how little a member can set the whole forest ablaze.’ Few actions you could do will have that effect. Even if you chased after the lithe and tantalizing young prostitutes of Thailand like Lloyd it would not have that effect.

So you do well to practice self-control, and chalk certain things up to discipline, even if they weren’t meant that way. Sort of like the kid Mark Twain wrote about who complained to his dad about getting punished for something he didn’t do. Well, the old man replied, in that case its for something you did do for which you should have got punished but didn’t.

Strictly speaking, the statement is not even true, though it certainly is true by Western standards where people argue their grievance to the nth degree and don’t give up until the other side is bludgeoned submission, and since that doesn’t happen, they don’t give up. You get to blow off steam but little more is accomplished. Come come. We must not be like the obstinate politician who just prior to hanging is asked if he has any last words. “Yes! This is unacceptable!” he cries, as the trap door swings open and the rope snaps taut.

I suspect there’s a small local consortium of those who know you personally who hold you in high regard as they should—upholder of justice, defender of the widow, the downtrodden, and so forth. But online it takes some time to realize you’re not a spiritual terrorist. You might be better striving to be one of those ‘watchtower brothers’ you once said your life would have turned out better had you been one of them. Strive to be ‘one of the boys’ and from that position influence them to be better. You piss away your talents making common cause with ones who are resolutely opposed to the 15% you cherish. I mean, the day one of these characters likes a post of mine, I will take it as time to do a swan dive off the Golden Gate Bridge.

 

I just rope-a-dope and ignore any counsel I don't think applies or is unscriptural and keep the aforementioned reaction  to myself. I had young brothers coming to me to confess that they'd seen a boob on the internet, I asked one "So what do you want me to do about it? Just stop doing that. Maybe meditate on where staring at boobs got King David and realize going down that path leads to nothing good."

You know I really love how some are so concerned about the contents of other people's heads.