DID YOU HAVE PROBLEMS WITH ELDERS IN YOUR CONGREGATIONS?

by badboy 28 Replies latest jw friends

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  badboy

  ANY TAKERS?
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  stillajwexelder

  No - most of them are a good bunch of guys
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  fullofdoubtnow

  Not for most of my time as a jw, but in the last few months, yes, although I was having doubts by then anyway, and broke the "rules" by talking to a da'd person. I found them somewhat overbearing and judgemental then.
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  Wordly Andre

  
  ELDERS = PROBLEMS

  Have you flipped off an Elder today?

  I did last week, well didn't know if he was one or not, I was driving down Valencia St. its kind of a poor neighborhood near the DMV I saw a group of JW's in Field service, as I drove by slowly I honked my horn and waived at them then suddenly my hand with a mind of its own, told them that they were number one ,,|,,
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  Dismembered

  Greetings badboy,

  DID YOU HAVE PROBLEMS WITH ELDERS IN YOUR CONGREGATIONS?

  Yes! At the fact that they exist.

  Dismembered
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  parakeet

  None at all. When I stopped going to meetings in the late 1970s, not one called or visited to find out why. I guess they had no problem abdicating their shepherding responsibilities either.
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  Moomin

  Hi Badboy,

  The girl who conducted my study was the wife of an elder. He was a nightmare, they both were. He was the same age as me so was the youngest elder in the congregation but he was so pig-headed and thought himself superior as him and his wife were the only pioneers.

  I went out on fs with him and his wife a few times and all they ever did was return visits and none of them were ever in. They would just stand at the door for ages and ages and then eventually write a note and put it through the letterbox with the mags. The rest of the time while his wife was on a study, he would be sitting in his car eating junk food and listening to the radio.

  Once he gave a talk telling everyone that if you never seem to find anyone in then go to the nearest town and do some street witnessing. He would never do that himself though. I felt quite confused by all of this as him and his wife had been invited to talk about themselves at the convention. They said it was an enourmous blessing from Jehovah so they must be really pleasing him?!?!?!?!?

  He would ask me who's talks I thought his were better than. He had this really irritating way of pronouncing the word 'nothing' as 'nuffink' and 'something' as 'sumfink'. I remember reading a WT article about making sure you pronounce your words correctly when giving talks. Whenever this elder gave a talk as soon as he mispronounced a word it would completely distract me as I would sit there and wonder why no one has said anything (or should I say anyfink?).

  Once while his car was parked in the kh carpark during the Sunday meeting, someone had smashed his car windows and stolen his belongings. It was all very odd being as it was broad daylight and no attendant noticed. His wife told everyone that it was Satan influencing the local youths to try and stop them from pioneering as they were obviously doing such a great job ?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!? (see above)

  I'm glad their child wasn't in the car at the time as one of the worst things I heard them say is that when their son was ill with Chicken Pox they didn't want to let anything prevent them from attending the memorial so they left him in the car!!!
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  Seeker4

  I was an elder for many years and worked with quite a bunch of them. There were frequent problems with elders. I'll share a few.

  1. Ambition frequently created problems. I served with one elder who was appointed at 23 or so. He'd been at Bethel for a year and came to our congregation as a special pioneer. He wanted to become a CO and another elder in the congregation refused to agree with the recommendation, even under pressure from the CO at the time, who was trying to fast track this young elder. The last thing the congregations needed was another young, haughty, know-it-all CO hardliner with a bull head, an arrogant attitude, a short temper and a penchant for wanting to put people in their places.

  2. Incompetence is a common problem with the elders.

  3. Pride.

  4. Feeling that they have a right to get into everyone's business. They get that from the WTS itself.

  The list could go on and on.

  Dismembered, who did you have trouble with up there? Though he was a close friend, Claude Burkett from my old congregation did a huge amount of damage to people down here. He's been gone to NY state for many years now, so you may not remember him.

  S4
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  Balsam

  Well I can think of some instances that we're not right.

  Elders encourage me the innocent wife to remain married to my then JW husband who cheated on me repeated times with various women. They said he was a good man I needed to be forgiving like Jesus. Even when he was disfellowshipped for smoking and adultery they told me Jehovah hated divorce. I had no children then.

  The other thing was when my son's were young teens handling microphones at the hall. My oldest son then 16 was counceled for having his hair cut too short. He worked in construction and kept it shaved off to about 1/4" long like the brothers he worked with who were older. They told him he looked like skin head, but it was alright for the jw men he worked with to have the same hair cuts. That was very weird and they eventually stopped him from handling microphones. It caused him to turn away from the jw religion so that was good.

  I have to say that most of the time the majority of Elders were nice and helpful. I can only think of a handful that I considered bad over the 30 years I was in.

  Balsam
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  BrendaCloutier

  yes. The Gamble and Burns show from Vancouver, Washington, Central congregation. Assholes and terrorists. They and their familys and croanies are the primary reason I stopped attending and "fell away". NOT good christians, but gud JW's.