by freewilly01 27 Replies latest jw friends
I have come to realize that this religion is based almost solely on Performance and that is the most dangerous.
I always felt that as a person or JW (while an active witness)that I was always just as good as my last assignment, comment at the Watchtower meeting, feild service report.
This left me with a huge identity crisis in the BorgOrg......... I really didn't know who the hell I was?
Did any of you feel similair?
Isn't it really SCAREY when the lightbulb goes off and you suddenly SEE things as they are: MS's/Pioneers/Elders are NOT chosen based on 'holy spirit' but are considered qualified solely off how much TIME they spend in service and how spiritual they APPEAR to be in front of the congregation. If you show up at all the mtgs, you comment, you have your books underlined - then you are 'appointed'.
Soooooooooo superficial! After reading Crisis of Conscience, i see WHY and HOW it's all about performance, like you said.
Oh yeah...when everyone is so pleased with your performance, then you stop performing, a huge void results. Suddenly you go from a superstar to a nobody. Of course it doesn't take long to realize you were actually a nobody when you were a religious performer!
More accurately, it is based on the appearance of performance.
It doesn't matter how much effort you really put into field service, what's more important are the numbers that show up on your publisher card.
It doesn't matter how deeply you study this week's Watchtower, what's more important is that others see the multi-colored highlighter marks in your magazine.
It doesn't matter whether an elder is kind or sympathetic or generous or intelligent or merciful...what's really important is, how "visible" is he in supporting congregation activities?
What's really scary is that it appears to have morphed into a religion run by lawyers. I can't imagine much more frightening than that!
It is based on the appeareance of performance of the RANK AND FILE Jw, not the elders or CO and certainly not the GB.
Fact is, most JW's no less about the whole bible than they care to admit, oh they know about their lessons and such, but they are so caught up in the selected verses they use to justify (erroneously) thier beliefs that when you show them the WHOLE context, it freaks them out !
To them it truly is get out and get the "truth" out, regardless of what you are "selling".
They are the obsolete vacum door-to-door sales people of the 21st century.
It's especially dangerous when dubs get old and sick. Because it's their "deeds" that define their faith, when they're forced to slow down, they are made to feel guilty.
I've known dubs with chronic breathing problems who routinely expose themselves to the prevailing viral stew at meetings becase they feel compelled to attend. And stupid dubs with contagious illnesses also feel compelled to attend even though they knowingly spread their viruses around to their cherished brothers and sisters.
"Gotta be at that meeting, cough-cough. Gotta get out in service, achoo! If "householders" and my fellow dubs get sick, too, that's tough. I've got to get my hours in. Jehovah's keeping tabs."
Idiocy.
:I have come to realize that this religion is based almost solely on Performance and that is the most dangerous.
In my Handy JW Apostate Glossary I defined "Field Service" as "salvation by quota." In fact, that is what it is in dubland.
Farkel
Very much so. I knew a few JWs who were absolutely burn out (R&F, MS and pioneers, very sincere). Because of the constant need to perform. I think I personally felt that for years even after I left the org (I was a born-in JW). And contributing to the misery: As JWs we were never satisfied, nothing we did was really enough, had to reach out for more, and the reward (that was uncertain at the personal level) was to become much later. Satisfaction postponed.
As a new member here I havent had the chance to share ALL of my story, but part of the reason I eventually left for good was exactly this idea that it was ALL about what "privilidges" you had, and if you didnt have them, were you "reaching out" for them?
several years before I eventually left, the elders approached me and informed me that my "privilidges" of such things as running the microphones, reading from the platform, and representing the congregation in prayer were to be REMOVED because they felt that my job, being a mobile DJ who played music at parties such as birthdays and holiday parties besides the obvious weddings, was "innapropriate" and that my performing at such parties made me guilty of participating by association.
Even a soundly quoted biblical example that I provided them of a prophet who served a pagan King and was not punished for it couldnt sway them.
I refused to quit my job and "rely on Jehovah" as they implied I should in finding another career...and that was the time that I finally realized just what a JOKE it all was.
I immediatly stopped going in field service, I was told it didnt matter how many hours I put in now anyway, as long as I still held my job I would not be allowed to progress any further in their little organization...like I wanted to at that point anyway LOL.
I wasnt celebrating Christmas. I wasnt celebrating birthdays. But because my job brought me into direct contact with those who WERE, and I could STUMBLE someone who saw me at one of these events, I was JUDGED and found GUILTY by appearance.
Great post!
Hours in field service, regular meeting attendance, answering at those meetings...it's all about being seen doing the "right thing". You can go home a beat your wife but if you show up for service the next day you are considerd "spiritual". :)
