I don't think I would have left if I believed it was the truth. I was miserable for many years before I finally left. Most all of my family are still in. But I just could'nt take it any more. I spent more time in the bathroom when I'd be at the meetings wondering how much longer I could keep it up. I don't think I could stand it if I had to go back.
Has anyone left still believing it was the truth?
by FollowedMyHeart 57 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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mrquik
No one gets a copyright on truth. The WBTS slick ad campaign entitled "The Truth" has polarized individuals either for or against them. The actuality is that some things taught by them are believed by many (including myself) to be true. The trick is to decide what is true & what is crap. I think starting with principles clearly defined in the Bible is a good starting point. I have personally found that to be very satisfying. Gives one a base to build on. Where the GB went wildly astray was their own version of running ahead. On things not clearly defined, they would have been better off to let the rank & file decide for themselves.
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thetrueone
Just on my own experience together reading peoples comments here, I would roughly say 30 to 40 % people who
leave the JWs were still thinking at the time that it is the truth. Over time though the WTS indoctrination gets drained from peoples minds as they start
to pose their own questions on religious matters and finding answers to those very questions, revealing things in a different perspective.
The inter-net is helping out in this regard and is responsible for fast tracking people to new previously unknown information.
Astonishing is it not that " The Truth " would be such a viral apparent threat against the WTS organization, after all these years.
A real irony with a twist no-less
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Highlander
It seems like the break-point is the term “cult”.
I can't speak for others, but for me, my mind didn't become totally free until I recognized that the JWs are a cult. I had been inactive for quite some time, yet still had the same fears and indoctrination keeping an iron grip on me.
An old time poster here coined the term "walkaway believer". That's exactly what I was despite being inactive. I still believed. I just didn't want any part of it.
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Black Sheep
I did. Suicide with an unloaded gun. I decided I was going to have my life now and let Jehovah kill me at Armageddon.
It happens a lot. We get a lot of newbies here who's partners/spouses have have gone back to their Dub side. All it takes is a new child to protect from WT killer god and they run back to the cult.
Until we fully understand that the WT was never selected, we are damaged goods.
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Kensho
The "truth" is JW's are like everyone else on the this Godforsaken planet, they want the same things as most rational humans. I have been on all sides of the this org. over 37 yrs. ( Df, divorced,pioneer-elder etc.) and I am still "active" at this point because of family and friends I dearly love and respect and really do not want to be without them in my life. I have worked hard at being at peace with myself, this is still a work in progress.
I went through all the mental turmoil and pain you see on this forum and have come to the conclusion that no one has all the answers. The positives are what I focus on, like the basic Bible principles that are a good code to live by (which can also be found in other beliefs) and they give people some kind of hope for better things to come even if they never do. Its not who is wright or wrong or us against them or what church you belong to its what kind of person you can strive to be and how you should "do unto others". Many on these forums are angry and bitter and that is their choice and it may be justified, they forgot the good they saw within the type of people trying to serve God, sadly under rules, teachings, and prophecies of men with the authority to control over 7 million peoples self worth. We shouldn't complain we gave them that power not Jehovah.
The truth is almost every JW I know is a selfsacrificing, loving and caring God seeking human just like billions in other religions who have been abandoned by the Creator of the universe to try to fiquire out on their own what he wants and then surrendering their lives to people who claim to speak for God out of pure frustration hoping God is using them to deliver the answers they seek.
So my issues are not with the GB (although I can find many without much effort) and not with my fellow lost witness friends and family but with Jehovah himself for allowing this whole screwed up mess to exist in the first place. This puts me in the worst of situations because I'm not angry at an organization but as a recent WT stated I have "become enraged at Jehovah" and expect that if it were not for the blood of Jesus I would not have the small amount of hope I do have. This is my truth.
Kensho
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AudeSapere
I did.
I thought it was the 'truth', 'God's Chosen People'. But also really thought that the organization was heading down a wrong path as several things just seemed so wrong and I was getting creepy vibes from one or two elders. Tried to switch halls a few times but still didn't feel right.
One day - I think it was a Sunday - I got up in the middle of a talk, said a quick little prayer to myself ("Jehovah - you know better than I do why I cannot stay here. But it just feels very wrong to sit quietly in my seat with these people.") and walked out of the hall for the last time. I felt I was being complicit by my presence in the hall and believed that at some point in our lives we are called upon to stand on our own and answer not just for our actions, but also for our in-action. It's one thing to follow theocratic order. But isn't is something else if that 'order' is leading people further away from Jehovah?
When the Israelites started serving the golden calf (??), was it just the leaders that were punished? Just because the leaders said it was OK, did that make it so? Could the individuals be excused for their sins simply by saying "The leaders that you gave us said it was OK"? I felt by sitting in my seat that I was saying that I agreed with everything that the elders were saying and allowing. In fact, I did not. I had my own crisis of conscience by staying in my seat.
After I walked out of the hall that day, for the next 13+ years, I worked, took a couple of classes, and kept to myself. I had no real friends. Did not date. Did not do drugs or drink heavily. I did not smoke. I thought by keeping to myself I was showing respect for Jehovah. Witness friends didn't hang around me because I was now inactive. I didn't call them because they would ask why I wasn't attending and I didn't want to 'stumble' them with my own questions. I didn't want to hang around non-witnesses because I thought they would be bad association. I also thought that at some point I would return to the cong and become active again - when they cleaned up their own act.
Before that happened, I learned the truth about 'The Truth'. Wasted 20 years in the org and another 13 years in self-imposed social isolation. Oh! What a fool I was.
So, yes. I left while still believing. Sort of. I think the term is: Walk-Away Believer.
-Aude Sapere (meaning: Dare to Know; Dare to Have Wisdom/Understanding; Dare to Think for Yourself)
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tec
I did also. (I never got baptized; but I had just agreed to get baptized after a two year study)
I didn't think they had everything right... I did think they were wrong about some things... BUT... I did believe in New Light, and I did believe that they were God's organization, and so had God's approval.
I left because I had thought that everyone got a resurrection, and once I realized that everyone who died at armageddon (which could come at any day) would not get a resurrection, well, I couldn't be a part of that.
That was the main reason. There were worldly things I wanted too, but I had accepted and come to terms with giving them up. But the desire was still there. In all, I felt like the rich man who rejected Jesus. It was especially awful since the lady who studied with me always held that man in such reproof. EVEN though the gospels say that Jesus loved him.
Tammy
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Lady Lee
When I lefdt in 85 I still believed. But I was married tp an abusive elder, was trying to deal with my childhood sexual abuse, was depressed and very suicidal. I finally orchestrated my DFing so I could leave the husband and at the time thought I could sit in the hall and pay my dues. It didn't work that way. I went back to school and it wasn't until 95 that I got on the internet and discover "The Lie"
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Alfred
I left mainly because of 1914... for many years I would be able to prove to anyone that the WT had the "truth" because they predicted 1914. I knew all the related proof texts backwards and forwards and there was no one who could go toe-to-toe with me on chronology... but then the "overlapping generations" mentioned in the April 15, 2010 Watchtower raised a BIG RED FLAG... several weeks later, I started browsing books on Amazon and Crisis of Conscience caught my attention so I ordered it... After finishing COC, I quickly jumped into Gentile Times Reconsidered and halfway through the book I started to feel like a complete fool... that definitely did it for me...