Field Service Reports Count More than Showing Love - Ray Franz CF Book

by flipper 56 Replies latest jw friends

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  flipper

  DATA-DOG- Very well put by you ! I enjoyed reading your well expressed experience. I have experienced exactly the same treatment you received from elders before I left 9 years ago. They are legalistic in their views. If you are sitting at the receiving end at a JC meeting the demeanor on their faces suddenly turns digustingly inhumane, and suddenly you feel they are battling you , not helping you- they are aggressively battling AGAINST you on behalf of the WT society & corporation - almost like WT attorneys. It's as if YOU YOURSELF have to become an attorney on your OWN behalf to stand up against these bastards. It's a very disgusting and challenging feeling. These me who had promised to look after your interests - turn on you and become your enemies. It's one of the big things that opened my eyes to leaving the Witnesses too. In fact, I left that very nght they met with me unjustly accusing me. I went to my seat, picked up my books and walked out the door of the kingdom hall- never returning !

  KONCEPTUAL 99- I agree. It's so weird to me now that the WT society determined if a person was " spiritual " by the field service hours. A JW could beat the $hit out of their wife at home without anybody knowing , yet if they regular pioneered they'd be appointed an elder. It shows how God's alleged " holy spirit " had NOTHING to do with who gets appointed as an elder. Ridiculous.

  NEW YORK 44M- Well, JWs could always lie about the number of hours or number of placements of magazines they do in order to just get appointed into a position in the congregation, so it's not necessarily an accurate assesment for the WT society to " budget " on how many magazines they produce. In essence the WT society treats a field service report as a pulse, or an estimation of how " spiritual " a person is. A person could be a dickhead and turn in 60 or 75 hours a month and they are treated lke royalty ! THAT is where the fallacy is. It's not a true estimation of their REAL character or if they show the fruitages of the spirit love, joy, peace, mildness, etc . in their personal lives ! It's just stupid on the WT leaders part and shows they are more concerned about WHAT JWs do for the WT society - than actually having quality, loving people in their cult.

  MC RUBBER MALLET- Exactly, you see the point. If numbers are so important why didn't God have men write that down in his alleged word " The Bible " ? Very well put
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  BluesBrother

  Excellent thread Flipper and , for once, well worth btt-ing...

  Every long term Witness knows that this is true. The WT may say that "Of course we know that everything that makes a Christian does not go on his report" but we all see that in fact it is your Service Record that counts in the congregation. The C/O sits and reviews the cards as his first job in his visit and basis his week on them.

  This is why elders do so little shepherding. Even if he wants to, he knows that he is stealing time from his Service Record and that is where he will be judged. Actually, it is a ridiculous system. Have you ever worked for a firm where the manager had the same workload as the workers as his number one priority? No, The manager manages the others, is supposed to motivate and carries out appraisals of the workers and theoretically helps them achieve their work targets. If he had the same workload, nothing would get done.

  In a successful system, the elders would have proven their effectiveness in The Ministry, and now spend their time directing the flock to do it. He would report detailed Shepherding records to the COBE and the BOE would liase if a specific problem occurred.

  At least that is how I would organize it, and the elders would then know the problems of the flock far better and be looking out for them. As you say, loving attention is far more important - and scriptural.

  I have known, as we all have, Bros with large families that were a credit to them, but they only got criticized for not "leading the congregation" in the ministry...
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  flipper

  BLUES BROTHER- Exactly. WT society's priorities are pretty messed up in my opinion
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  Iown Mylife

  Hello you all, i haven't read any other threads that might be more recent, on this subject so wanted to comment here.

  The numbers. It's a numbers game, it's a business and the way a business reads on paper is by the numbers.

  The elders have to show the numbers to their boss, who has more pressure to show numbers to HIS boss. What drags down their averages is inactive ones who are not df. I believe from what i observed the last few years i was attending, that if one is inactive but keeps attending meetings, they are dragging down the averages and they need to prune those people off completely. Correct that - i mean to say, whether they are attending or not, if they are not turning in hours they want to erase your name so they can clear off that pesky list of non-producers.

  This is stuff you pick up when those young, inexperienced elders are fumbling around trying to communicate with each other without anyone else hearing. And from their facial expressions and body language, when they are talking to someone who is not producing. They are impatient, jerky, pulling back and avoid meeting your eye.

  So just my opinion, when someone says they have not been going to meetings and all of a sudden the elders are trying to create a reason to df them, and they wonder why - that's why.
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  Crazyguy

  The person that posted about an elder beating his wife at home in private then getting a lot of hours in service and hes considered a fine guy, reminds me of someone similar. A man at my last hall had his first child and didn't want it, so his wife had to take on extra work to pay for raising the child because he would not do so. Obviously he a poor loser that could barely take care of himself, but hey he get the needed hours in service and bamb, hes appointed an elder. This guy is a dumb as they come and can not give a talk to save his life but hey he's probably doing JC meetings too.
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  Sammy Jenkis

  Great post Flipper, thanks for sharing- that always rubbed me the wrong way

  70 hours = I love God and the brothers.

  50 = I love god this month and some bros.

  30 plus= I'll love god soon, good bye bros.

  less than 20= Me and God are taking a break but we'll be back soon.

  0= I've seen what this is all really about.... Saturday morning cartoons here I come!
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  Iown Mylife

  Sammy! Love the definitions but let me add one: Two hours or less per month = God please continue to enable me to pretend that I believe this is your "visible organization."
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  Sammy Jenkis

  Awesome IownMylife! That one's great too..
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  flipper

  Didn't realize this had been bumped up 26 days ago ! Thanks for the replies.

  I OWNMYLIFE- Very good points you bring out that I definitely agree with. If a JW doesn't produce hours in field service the elders do want to get rid of them. If it drags the congregations hour average down- the elders will get jumped on by the Circuit Overseer when he visits- so it is a numbers game you're right. It's a business nothing ; more except a mind control cult using cult practices in the business.

  CRAZYGUY- Exactly. In the point you make about the jerk-off JW husband who makes his wife work harder because he doesn't want to pay for their new baby- yet because he gets lots of field service time he is appointed as elder- it drives the point home perfectly that spirituality and being a good, decent person does NOT get you appointed as an elder- fulfilling the field service time averages does get you appointed though. A person could be an axe murderer or child molester in secret - yet still get appointed as an elder in the JW organization. It's disgusting.

  SAMMY JENKIS- Good points you make. The turning of time is only serves the WT Society's functions, and peoples egos basically
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  Iown Mylife

  Hi Mr. Flipper,

  I very much appreciate you talking about this - it is one of the big topics that come up when i'm thinking about the WT years of my life so i enjoy dragging it out and chewing on it a little bit once in awhile.

  The whole numbers and reports thing was bugging me for a long time when i was still attending. One day I asked an elder who was personal close friends of my family, How is it really looked at, the hours that people put in, - is that what the elders really care about the most???

  Like, i was sincere, i was not being flip or sarcastic. He said (of course) OH NO, that is NOT true! But there were so many little clues and hints to pick up on, in the way I was greeted and treated, at the bookstudy especially. The briskness was just short of disrespect.

  I had a serious injury, which i won't describe because i don't want to be outed and that would tell the story by itself. But anyway, i didn't go around telling people and talking about it - i figured the elders knew and that was enough. I had a hard time getting to meetings after this injury, for months. But gradually people began to treat me a little colder, and a little colder, - none of them ever came up and asked me anything about what was going on, even people i had known over 25 years. So I never explained myself and apparently the elders didn't let anyone know my situation either.

  So it became obvious that I was thought of as a bad associate who was irregular in service and meetings, with no justification, and was dragging down the hour averages. They kept trying to get me to attend a different bookstudy! LOL!

  Bottom line, you know when you are not wanted, there's no way to mistake it.