I have two chapters left to read of the CoC book. I hardly thought the book would make me cry, but the treatment of the people disfellowshipped was deeply sad. Rene's appeal letter was awesome. The decisions making process the GB goes through is nothing different than decisions to axe people in corporation that don't agree 100% or to keep making the big bucks. It is very selfish and greedy.
The 8 points Franz brings out looking for scriptual backing should be read by every witness (page 330-331)
his response on page 326 to a Q from GB........."I believed that God had an organization on earth in the sense that He had a congregation on earth, the Christian congregation, a brotherhood." was moving for me.
Rene's comment to Ray 2 years afterwards, what a loving humble man on page 322 par 2
"If I had all to do over again I would be facing the same dilemma. I feel that so much good came from what I learned from the Scriptures, that it proved such a blessing to have things cleared up and brought me closer to God"
This statement, for me, makes all the crap worthwhile.
This guy Bonelli ratted people out. Read this. page 319
Albert Schroeder then expressed gratitude to Bonelli for his cooperation in testifying and counseled him to "keep himself spiritually srtong by attending the meetings regularly,"and added that if Bonellis heard any other information to come to them with it.
Ray's comment on truth......page 286
"I did not believe that truth had anything to fear from open discussion, any reason to hide from careful scrunity. Any teaching that had to be shielded from such investigation did not deserve to be upheld."
and page 274 last paragraph
Similarly, I did not object to "organization" in the sense of an orderly arrangement, for I understood the Christian congregation itself to involve such an orderly arrangement. But I believed that, whateever the arrangement, its purpose and function, its very existance was only as an aid for the brothers; it was there to service interests, not the other way around. Whatever the arrangement, it was to build men and women up so that they would not be spiritual babes, dependent on men or on an institutionalized system , but able to act as full-grown, mature Christians. I was not to train them to be simply conformists to a set of organizational rules and regulations, but to thlep the to become persons "having their perceptive powers trained to distinguish right and wrong."
Had to take a break, One emotionally can only digest so much.
I just finished reading CoC. It will forever change my life.
The last two paragraphs of this book are worth writing down now. "Life is a journey, ans we cannot make progress in it if out focus is mainly on where we have been; that could lead to emotional inertia or even spirtiual decline. What is done is done. Teh past is beyond our changing, but the present and future ar ething we can work with, focus on. The journey inevitably contains challenge, but we can find encouragement in knowing that we are moving on, making at least some progress, and can feel confident that what lies ahead can be fulfilling.
Whatever our individual circumstances may have been, we can each put confidence in the truth of these words of the apostle, "We know that by turning everything to thier good God cooperates with all those who love him." (Romans 8:28, JB) By holding to conscience and staying true to our Head, God's Son, we suffer to lasting loss, but do gain that which is of immense and enduring value. Assured of that, we can feel as did the apostle:
Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ.....one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of upward call of God in Christ Jesus.---Phillipians 3:7, 13, 14.
