by gaiagirl 10 Replies latest jw friends
The WTBTS teaches that "the whole world is lying in the power of Satan" and that "Satan controls all the governments". Also, even that sincere members of all other churches good works all are service "to demons".
So, when a JW, or other person who believes in demons, commits a wrong act, do you observe that they blame it on Satan or demons instead of accepting responsibility for their own actions?
I have never seen that. They seem to give demons credit for other horrible things...or morals decling...and in the R rated movies ....oh...and porn........oh and the breakup of what seem to be good JW marriages
my faith would go off the charts if i could just see any demonic happen!...give me an ashtray floatin across the room...ANYTHING!....it cracks me up how in the bible demons were EVERYWHERE!....and nobody seemed it was odd...."oh...he has a demon in him"...."ya know ja-hab...i was thinkin the same thing...he must have a demon in him the way his head is spinnin round and round and all"
and ya it was mentioned the other day here...(and i had never thought about it)...the dubs must have invented demons being in inanimate objects when there is not a single example of this in the scriptures!...my mom would hardly let me buy ANYTHING at a yard sale for fear of it being possesed.....wtf would demon want to reside in a bicycle?!?!?.....geeze what a minkfluck that was to lay on a kid.....sorry for my rant...but this demon thing pisseth (that word is in the king james) me off..................oompa
Stupid threads like this amke me so angry!...............sorry the demons made me do it
I know a sister who blames everything on the demons - if a dog barks too loudly when going to knock on the door - it is because it is demonized
The WTS did come out with this information in 1995 perhaps trying to stop some jws from wildly accusing Satan for everything.
*** w95 2/1 pp. 28-29 Whose Fault Is It? ***
The Ultimate Excuse
"It is God’s will." "Blame it on the Devil." Probably the ultimate excuse is to blame either God or the Devil for our own failures. It is true that God or Satan may influence some events in our lives. However, some believe that practically everything, good or bad, in their life is the result of intervention by God or by Satan. It is as if nothing that happened to them was a consequence of their own actions. "If God wants me to have that new car, he will see to it that I get it."
Such ones often live their lives recklessly, making financial and other decisions on the assumption that God will save them. If their imprudent actions result in some disaster, economic or otherwise, they blame the Devil. To do something rash without first ‘counting the cost’ and then to blame Satan for the failure, or worse yet, to expect Jehovah to intervene, would be not only presumptuous but also contrary to Scripture.—Luke 14:28, 29.
Satan attempted to get Jesus to think that way and not take responsibility for His actions. Regarding the second temptation, Matthew 4:5-7 reports: "The Devil took him along into the holy city, and he stationed him upon the battlement of the temple and said to him: ‘If you are a son of God, hurl yourself down; for it is written, "He will give his angels a charge concerning you, and they will carry you on their hands, that you may at no time strike your foot against a stone."’" Jesus realized that he could not expect Jehovah to intervene if he were to take a clearly foolhardy, even suicidal, course. Hence, he replied: "It is written, ‘You must not put Jehovah your God to the test.’"
Those with the propensity for blaming the Devil or God for their own questionable actions have much in common with followers of astrology, who merely substitute the stars for God or the Devil. Thoroughly convinced that almost everything that happens is beyond their control, they overlook the simple principle stated at Galatians 6:7: "Whatever a man is sowing, this he will also reap."
The Bible says that the Christian has three foes: the world, the flesh and the devil. I have a hard enough problem with the first two, that the third doesn't even bother me. However, that begs the question, and the answer is no. My belief in the supernatural does not alleviate my responsibility for my sin. I believe that you would be hard pressed to find a reputable Christian scholar that even teaches that.
Maybe not to excuse responsibility, but certainly to explain behavior -- such as C.J. Woodworth using it to explain why he became an apostate for a while:
My parents certainly do. They're the kind of people who should never have gotten married in the first place, but stayed together "for the kids" and because that's what Jehovah wanted from them. They are just completely different people. They fought like cats and dogs and generally could not stand each other.
While growing up, I noticed a cycle. They would start to get on each others nerves and things would begin to escalate. Over time, things would come to a head and they'd have a huge fight. After a few days passed and things began to cool down, they'd blame it all on the demons and begin to "purge" our house of any items that might have been somehow attached to spiritism. Out went any toys or books that my parents, at the spur of the moment, somehow felt were tainted by demonism. They'd usually start with anything purchased from garage sales or that had been given to us by "worldly" people. Then the cycle began anew.
It was a convenient out for them. They never had to face the fact that they were miserable and should have never gotten married. They simply shifted the responsibility for their behavior onto the mystical demons that are somehow responsible for everything. My dad was by far the most fervent believer in demons. He has blamed Satan for just about everything, from sending a police officer to give him a speeding ticket to kids passing by with their car stereos turned all the way up to annoy him.
If you were to talk to them and then talk to me afterwards, you would think we grew up in completely different homes. They have endless demon stories of strange things that happened around our house, but strangely enough, I never saw any of this. Demons only seemed to attack them when I wasn't around. For awhile, when I became a devout Dub, I actually began to believe their nonsense, but was never able to really come up with a good reason why I never witnessed any of this. Oh well. I guess each of us will believe in whatever it is we want to believe in and view the world through that prism. If the lights mysteriously go off, my parents will blame it on demons while I will choose to check the circuit breaker instead. That's just life, I suppose.
When I do everything just so, and still get pxxx poor results, it is God that is rightfully to blame. Since He never relents, it cannot possibly be the demons or Satan doing it. And, if I don't make a mistake, that leaves only that Almighty Lowlife Scumbag as the culprit.
Maybe they believe that they could have been duped so it makes them feel like they are not evil and it's not totally their fault they are just incline towards evil. This does bring other problems. If we are influence by a supernatural being ( I know we are not ) and we are somehow flawed, then we can not really be guilty of sin and the ransom belief falls apart. That's one of the reason why I don't believe in Christianity.
