Did any of you ever feel so sad a depressed in field service (page 3)

Georgiegirl

I remember feeling so much better when I got home from FS. I remember thinking it must be because I did the right thing. Now I recognize the feeling for what is was - complete and utter RELIEF to be home and not in service.

donny

My experience in the Society was that JW's would often help when it would be visible to others. In other words they wanted to be seen doing the good deed so it would be discussed later on. I used to hear brothers and sisters at the meetings exchanging stories on how they helped brother or sister so-and-so. When I lost my job back in 1986 during my JW tenure, we received some food bundles from a nearby Catholic Church where a co-worker of mine attended. You would be hard pressed to find examples of JW's helping anyone outside their own.

Donny

chickpea

whilst i was never the "excluded one",
i did call "foul" when i saw it happening...
reminded me of jr high where there was
always the "target" for injustices

the rank and file are no different than
"the world" they attempt to distance
themselves from.....
there are saints and sinners,
@ssholes and the truly compassionate....

best and sincere wishes for
a successful emergence
into your genuine life

thomas15

I’m sorry to hear this sad story. It reminds me though of the old hymn “and they will know we are Christians by our love”. If the “Brothers or Sisters” are not loving each other….. then you draw your own conclusions.

Back in the days of my teenage years, at a time when I was thinking about God and the meaning of life, It happened that my Grandmother was in the hospital with terminal cancer. Since her time was short and I was heading off to college, I determined to make the most of the time and visit her in her hospital room often. At that time, she had a roommate who was a member of an Evangelical Church. The pastor of her church would visit grandmom’s roomie everyday and I would often see and speak to him.

One day, the roomie was sent home. The pastor was still making the call though, to visit my grandmom. He would take time to talk to me, comforting words, not preaching words. There was nothing in it for this man, grandmom was dying and I was a kid headed off to college.

So, once off to my studies, I determined to find out about this God that the pastor served. I bought a Bible and started reading it. I made friends at school who knew the Lord and encouraged me to place my faith and trust in the risen Savior. Today, 35 years later I serve the Lord Jesus, not because I have to and not because my salvation depends on it, but rather because He loves me so much that he went to the cross to pay the penalty for my sins. And all I can do in response is simply trust him to save me by faith.

Far better than knocking on doors and handing out publications is the simple act of loving your friends and neighbors. The Bible does in fact teach this. Of course the Bible teaches many other things not covered by the watchtower reporters.

Tom

PSacramento

Thomas,

That was so well said...truly.

I thank you for such amazing words of faith and love.

" I serve the lord not because I have to, not because of salvation, but because he loves me so much".

Worthy of place in a Gospel.

kriptonian7

i did because i traded in what little free time i persoanlly had as a teenager for ties, jackets, rain, hot sun, cold, early mornings, dogs, being chased away by people with blunt intsrumets(literally happened 3 times) early mornings ( very annoying durning the summer vacations)

I hated it and hated talking to people that did not care to talk to me.

donuthole

I didn't care for the actual door to door part of it - that was a drudgery. I did enjoy being out with my friends, talking, getting SEB's from Hardee's, etc.

life is to short

Thanks Thomas15

What you said makes a lot of sense. I have seen it too in the non WT world where members of church's truly help and care for each other. A older lady I work for lost her husband last year and I went to the funeral. The elders in my hall have told the friends even from the platform that even though the faithful slave says we can go to worldly funerals that they the elders would not go and the PO made the point very clear telling the whole hall that he did not even attend his own mom's funeral. Ticked off his bothers and sisters but he stayed faithful to Jehovah. So for me to go to a person I just work for funeral was really going against orders. I went door to door in the morning and then I then I went to the funeral in the afternoon I felt like I was cheating on Jehovah. The church where the funeral was held was so friendly and kind. The paster came up to me, he did not know me but he thanked me for coming introduced to me to other members of the church. It was very different than I had been told it would be. There was coffee and cookies provided by the church and served by some of the members.

It was so different then the memorials we have. Here I have been a born in JW 46 years old. My husband is 17 years older than I am and has been a JW for going on 40 years plus he was raised around the religion. He was an elder for 32 years. My husband's mom just died and the hall where she lived did nothing. We live 10 hours away my other brother and sister in-law all live away and the friends if you can call them that did nothing. No coffee or cookies nothing. They did try to get one of my nieces to study though that was it.

There truly was not love there it was so sad. My worldly family was upset at the lack of love shown my JW family wondered why the worldly was upset. It is just amazing to me how they cannot see it. My husband just could not see it. He said well the friends were busy. BUSY his mom died and no one could make a pot of coffee for the family. How sad.

Oh how I wish my husband could wake up.

Thanks everyone for you posts. LITS

Awen

I suffered from depression for many years while a JW and even attempted suicide a few times. Just couldn't seem to get it right. LOL

I recall I worked for some JW's as a driver for an Electrical Business they had and even outed my worldly boss for stealing from the company ( I had the receipts to prove it), also that he was a closet homosexual who had men over to the trailer we shared when we worked out of town and coerced me into driving his "friends" home on my day off. These revelations shocked my JW employers and I was allowed to transfer back home and given oversight over a warehouse and ran errands for the boss. Unfortunately I was terminated 3 months later because my depression was so bad, I often walked around looking sad. Rather than help me, I was let go and told it was because "they couldn't stand to see me looking so down all the time". Eventually the PO told me to seek medical help thru a local hospital that dealt with depression (even though this went against WT doctrine). Others told me to go out in FS, that by doing that, I would be helping others and I would "forget" about what was ailing me.

There were those in the congregation who would sometimes check on me, but for the most part I felt unloved. I noticed that when I first started studying I was "love-bombed" by the Friends and was always being asked out to dinner or to play basketball, etc. But after my Baptism, everyone was suddenly busy doing something else. I spoke with a fellow JW who was also recently baptized and he said 2 things that struck me as very odd:

1) that they were counting their time with me as FS time and since I was now Baptized, they could no longer do it.

2) that perhaps we werte both being tested by the congregation as to fitness.

My response was that the first one was kinda mean and that the second reason was outright stupid. If either of us weren't fit to be JW's, YHWH would have seen to it that we were never baptized. So if we had God's approval, why would we then need the congregations?

That for me has been a personal rule for my life since then. If I have God's approval, what do men's approval mean?

only me

I anm in much the same position.

Lack of love is the outstanding feature of the Witnesses I know.

Did any of you ever feel so sad a depressed in field service

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