by Nickolas 59 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Greetings,
Now I've lost my faith in God and the Bible, I do feel slightly envious about all those years when my life was allegedly sorted, I now find myself totally overawed at the information out there and what to believe in, probably time for another beer, or is it only a true madman would think!!!!!!!!!
Best Regards,
Star Tiger
1/Would your life implode if you lost your faith? 2/Should atheists just back off and not try to mess up your good thing, if only to keep them from wasting their time?
1/ I don't think so, it would just be different, I suppose it would change my view of many things and would take a while to get my head around (maybe it would implode for a while). But it wouldn't be the end of the world.
2/ Atheists don't bother me, sometimes I think they make good points and it makes me think...which is ALWAYS a good thing. However, I don't enjoy being told by someone that does not have a belief in God that I am wrong to have a belief in god. If they are disputing a particular belief that they believe to be flawed...ie trinity...doctrines...man made rules...even the bible itself....I appreciate this becuase my primary goal is to learn about god, not made made rules and it is sometimes difficult to discern which are which. But I am getting there.
If your faith is strong it should hold up to anything that anyone throws at you. If it isn't....well maybe you didn't really have much faith in the first place.
I thought it was interesting when I was studying with the witnessess that my study lady came out and told me one day that if she hadn't been raised a JW she probably wouldn't have become one??? She went on to tell me that she probably wouldn't go searching for god if she hadn't been raised in the truth. Then she went on to say that she didn't feel that she was particularly spiritual. Now thats where we differ...I have been searching for God my whole life. Sometimes in my life I have felt close to god and other times that I am lost and don't know where he is. I know he exists, but I am wanting to understand and know him better. I have to say that she left me speachless for a moment because I assumed that ALL JW's had a strong faith in God. I am still a bit baffled as to what she actually is trying to achieve with her life as a witness based on what she told me. Seems like she accepts it as right.....even though she doesn't believe it...To me this is a contradiction, but hey, she is 70 years old and has had plenty of time to decide what she believes or not.
I don't understand why you seem to think by helping your wife you have to remove God and faith...I don't see this as being the same as helping her to wake up to JW doctrine and control. I don't know how strong her personal faith is. But I would say that if it is, nothing you say about the WTS will affect her faith in god, just her faith in manmade religion....or maybe she might be a bit like my study lady...I dunno.
Hope some of this makes sense
I don't understand why you seem to think by helping your wife you have to remove God and faith...I don't see this as being the same as helping her to wake up to JW doctrine and control. I don't know how strong her personal faith is. But I would say that if it is, nothing you say about the WTS will affect her faith in god, just her faith in manmade religion....or maybe she might be a bit like my study lady...I dunno.
That has to be one of your best posts.
I would be happy to steer my wife into a more conventional Biblical belief system but I don't know that that is possible. The Watchtower does a very good job of proving that all other religions, in particular those of Christendom, are false. That is one of their most effective carrots. If someone comes to believe that only the Watchtower represents true Christianity and then three decades later discovers that the Watchtower is false, it doesn't leave a whole lot to fall back on. I wonder sometimes how many XJWs retained their faith in Jehovah and how many lost it entirely. 50/50, maybe?
I am not a Christian, so they are not important in the least.
I am not a Christian, so they are not important in the least.
Before I came to my present line of thought that there is no God, or at least one that is active in human affairs, I used to wonder how people who did not believe got through each day. Now I realize that it is quite ok and my life has not imploded in the least. I now live each day to the full and I have no regrets for the path I have chosen since leaving the org.
Regarding atheists wasting their time. They did not waste their time with me. One of the things that kickstarted my doubts was listening to something I think was called "the atheist tapes." Maybe I was a more open-minded born-againer. I actually dated an atheist girl while I was still a believer. She let me borrow the tape. I listened to it, and it put a bug in my ear.
My life didn't implode when I started rejecting my former beliefs. You hit on a significant factor in your question: how important were God and Jesus to me? During my time (15 years) believing in God and Jesus, I think somewhere deep down I knew all along that they were just ideas that I was supposed to believe in, but as ideas they were not really all that important. The ideas went with the territory of the cult I was getting caught up in. The people in the cult got excited when I showed interest in their ideas, and I allowed their excitement to transfer to myself. Deep down, I don't think the real me was all that excited about the ideas even though I experienced the various "heartwarming" and fuzzy feelings that I attributed to the "Holy Spirit." I think I was a typical victim of a group mixing emotion, faulty thinking, and social pressure to bring an "interested one" into their clique.
Related to one's life imploding, here is something interesting I am experiencing. Now that I no longer believe in God and Jesus, I think my sense of morality is underdeveloped by about 15 years (the amount of time I spent as a believer). As I have heard atheists point out, if you spend your life behaving morally out of fear of God, you may not be truly becoming a moral person. I need to check myself. However, I would not have it any other way. I am actually -excited- to develop a true moral personality. I think it is part of growing up. Unfortunately, I think my religious beliefs stunted my moral development because here I am at 38 years old talking about "growing up."
Regarding what would happen to your wife if she started rejecting her beliefs, I wonder if you can find out how important the ideas of God and Jesus, etc. are to her. Maybe deep down it's the same with her as it was with me. I don't know how you would acquire that information though.
In hindsight I think that the Jehovahs witnesses did me one of the biggest favours in my life....they finally closed the door to organised religion. I have searched and tried many things...but this was the lesson I needed to learn. Saying that Christendom is all false religion IS one of their most effective carrots...it is also one of the most truthful things that they say...but what they don't tell you, is that they should be included in that.
Yes it threw me spinning for a while, but now I am free to explore on my own, come up with my own conclusions and not be constrained by any particular religion. I find the very name Jehovah now repulses me. And don't associate it with God at all.
I was not born and raised a JW, so I cannot possibly answer how they would feel about God if you take away the belief in the WTS from them. But from reading many posts on here, some retain a belief of sorts, some go onto other organised religion, and some have no belief.
In the end it comes down to the individual doesn't it? You have no way of knowing where her journey would take her if she stopped believing in WTS. But then, that really isn't your responsibility. Just as my partner takes no responsibility for what I beleive or don't believe and the consequenses of my belief or not. It is mine to own and do with what I want.
Who?
Only marginally less important than santa claus, the easter bunny, prince William, the tooth fairy, or Paris Hilton.
Cheeses - establishing his priorities.
