About stumbling

crownboy

How many of you were ever "stumbled" as a JW? I always thought that claiming you were "stumbled" was just an excuse to stop going to meetings etc. (should have thought of it myself ). I figured that if your faith in God was strong enough, then it shouldn't matter what Brother X or Sister Y did, you should only be focused on "the big picture": your relationship with God. However, I've realized that I've never really found out why people get "stumbled", so if someone here has a "stumbling" experience or care to comment on their feelings on the whole issue, please feel free to do so.

Go therefore and baptize the people in the name of the father and of the son... what the hell, we just need to bring up the yearbook numbers!

refiners fire

I would say that being "stumbled" was a very convenient excuse for having it out with people you didnt like in the church.A Biblical excuse employed by people who hated other people in their congregation.
No more than that.
I recall a member of my family being stumbled that a certain sister in the cong was impolite to a worldling while he was steam cleaning her carpet.Why would you be stumbled over such a thing? It was only because she hated her guts anyway.

patio34

Heavens to Betsy! I would never have been 'stumbled,' because that seemed to mean you were weak ('there is no stumbling the righteous one'--Psalms).

However, it does seem to be a convenient excuse, now.

Pat

LB

While I never felt stumbled, lots of others thought I was. At the time I left there was a horrible man appointed as a servant and they all thought that did if for me. While I'm sure it was a factor, it obviously wasn't the entire story. They just wanted to believe it was something simple I guess.

freeman

I guess it is possible to be stumbled but I often think it’s used as an excuse.

Here is my own story: An Elder and his wife that we knew very well found themselves in a bad way finically because they had to come up with some cash fast, and we thought we would help them out by temporarily lending them the sum of $1,000.00. At the time (1978) my wife and I were “in the truth” about one year, had no savings, and since I could not work as an Engineer or even a Tech. in the defense industry anymore, both of us were now resigned to low paying jobs. Oh the joys of being a self-employed janitor. :(

We obtained the money for them by getting a cash advance on a credit card. And like a trusting dumb ass, I the so-called head of this enterprise, never so much as even asked for an I-Owe-You. Why would we have to, after all, we were all “in the truth”, we baby-sat their kid, we went to shows and dinner together all the time etc. Trust your brother, right?

Well they paid the first two months OK but then we started to get late payment notices from the Credit Card company. The Elders wife apologized and said it was just a slip-up and that she would take care of it. Everything was back on track, or so we thought. But after a while, we could sense the relationship was starting to get cooler. Then the big wake-up call came when they moved hundreds of miles away with no forwarding address. Oh how nice! Making a long story short, I had to eat the $1,000.00 and it took me literally years and years to pay it off. God only knows how much I paid in interest; I don’t even want to think about it.

So there you have a true story, (Old Hippie will say I’m making it up, but I’m not). And no my wife and I were not stumbled, we just kept on going like good little WT drones. After all, Jehovah was still God, we were in the last days, the end of the world was so very near etc. I think if I were ever to be stumbled, this would have done it. Just my two cents.

Freeman

duped

I can't even count the number of times that I "should" have been stumbled. Of course I was programmed so well, I would NEVER be so "weak" as to allow a fellow servant of Jehovah to cause me not to return to the KH.

Let's see.........There was the MS who would come and have lunch with me at my work (I worked for his Father-in-law). I knew he was coming to see me because he would stay and eat with me even if his Father-in-law wasn't there. And when I decided to change jobs he called me and told me that I was making a bad decision. And then when my husband confronted him about it he quoted Proverbs 14:17 about him being foolish for being quick to anger.

Then there was the time after my husband wasn't going to meetings anymore and I was struggling with two kids by myself a MS came up to me during the halftime song and in front of everyone sitting around me asked me if I could keep my daughter more quiet during the meeting. She was probably 5 at the time and IMO she wasn't being noisy at all. But because there were no kids in the hall at the time any noise my kids made seemed loud.

One time I was having a home interiors party and i was handing out invitations at the KH. I was young and naive. And an elders wife told me I wasn't supposed to be doing that. How silly.....I could go on and on.

Basically I always felt like there were all these rules and regulations that I couldn't keep track of and every time I turned around I was breaking a rule and getting in trouble. I can't tell you how free I feel now that I don't have to worry about all of their silly rules. But I know most of you already know how I feel. :)

Duped

"Sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug." Mary Chapin-Carpentar

Seeker4

Never stumbled, though I saw a million stupid things over the decades I was a Witness. I never expected too much from the org or the brothers, and that expectation was always met!

When I left it had nothing to do with stumbling, and everything to do with realizing this was simply not THE TRUTH.

S4

crownboy

Ditto Seeker4.

I always felt that if a brother made an error, it was a reflection of his failure (or stupidity) and not the organization. I never was stumbled ever (a little irritated at times, but not stumbled).

The apostle Paul said that if eating meat stumbled someone, he would stop eating it. I always thought "good for you Paul, but that ain't me. I like steak too much . I wonder if anyone actually did something unusual to stop someone from stumbling?

Go therefore and baptize the people in the name of the father and of the son... what the hell, we just need to bring up the yearbook numbers!

About stumbling

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