Greetings to all from Southwest Missouri!
I have spent quite a bit of time interacting with exiting JWs and I have some "odds and ends" I am going to start posting. If you find them boring, please, tell me and I will just lie in the corner in a fetal position, suck my thumb, and moan softly till I "re-centerer."
Here is the first:
***** and******,
*******, when we last talked, I mentioned I was the "simplest minded
Christian" you will, probably, ever meet. I had stripped my
Christianity to three bare essentials:
I believe the Story.
I trust the Promise.
I believe we should move toward and do those things that nourish us
to the Will of God.
I figure those three are enough to fill my Life, short as it will be
in this present state, and, I will leave all the other theological
"stuff" to those brighter, more informed, and with a lot more time than
this over-worked, under-educated, hillbilly, chicken plant worker.
So, let us start with the first.
The best explanation I have come across I call "Tom Cabeen's Short
History of Christianity." (I have included Tom so he can edit it if I
deviated from his History) OK, here goes....
About two thousand years ago, in the Roman province of Judea,
there appeared a young traveling rabbi. His name was Jesus.
Now, both the occupation and the name were not uncommon. Often, a rabbi, a
teacher, would gather about him a group of disciples, taught ones, and
they would live and interact as a group. To mark this particular
"Jesus" those around him called him "Jesus the son of Joseph the
Carpenter" or "Jesus of Nazareth."
As time went on, this Jesus began not only a program of teaching,
but, he started doing some really spectacular acts. He could heal anyone
of any disease or ailment. He could cause dead people (really, really
dead people) to come back to life. He could read other's minds and
emotions. And, he was a nice guy. His words and actions comforted
others. He was totally unique. People would come from near and far
to benefit from his words and actions.
This did not set well with everyone. Unfortunately, when one is
outstanding in being good and honest and open and wonderful, it is
compared to those that are not. This "are not" group included a lot
of very prominent people: religious, economic, and social leaders. They
became opponents of Jesus and resisted him.
A little group, twelve in all, came to be very close to Jesus. A
larger group, seventy in all, were an extended arm of Jesus ministry.
These folks worked hard and shared the message and actions of Jesus
over a large area.
A few years go by and a lot happens. One of Jesus disciples that
wrote a book about him said that if everything Jesus did and said was
written down "the world could not hold the scrolls." Jesus and His
were busy.
It was determined by the followers of Jesus that He was the "messiah"
of Jewish prophesy: a wonderfully special man. Jesus went further.
He claimed his was, also, the Son of the Living God. They put faith in
Jesus as such.
On the way to a Jewish celebration in the capital city of the region, Jerusalem , Jesus told them this:
"Look, as a further, final proof of who and what I am the following
will take place: those jerks in Jerusalem that hate me so much will
overcome me and treat me badly and kill me. Although I have the power
to destroy them, it will happen. This is all for your sake. Three
days later, however, I will rise from the dead."
And, it happened just a Jesus foretold. This includes, of course,
his rising from the dead. We Christians call this "The Resurrection of
Christ". This event is the center of our hope...the one I am sharing
with you.
Well, as you can imagine, all this trauma and turmoil and, in the
end, joy and confirmation, had quite an effect on the minds and the
hearts of those that, personally, knew Jesus. He was someone unlike
anyone that had, did, or would ever live on earth. The followers of
Jesus, those that became "Christians," were so moved by all this that
they started telling this Story. Funny thing, the Story had the same
effect on others, those that never knew Jesus, as it had on the ones
that did. They developed a Faith and a Hope based on the person of
Jesus of Nazareth. You, too, can put Faith in this Story and benefit
as millions have since it was first told.
So, there you have it, +++++ and *******, The Story. It is the one
I tell when I minister to a non-Christian.
Next, The Promise.
In this Journey,
V