How Did You Deal With God Destroying Non-Witness Relatives that You Loved?

by DNCall 17 Replies latest jw friends

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  00DAD

  Interesting question. When I started studying with JWs one of the sticking points I had with OTHER religions was Hellfire.

  The fact that JWs did NOT believe in the Hellfire doctrine appealed to me. Of course at some point in my studies I I learned about Armageddon, but that was God destroying "the wicked" so it was OK with me (at the time).

  It took some time before it dawned on me the dilemma by that doctrine, which is of course the question posed above. But by then I was pretty well indoctrinated as a good little witness and knew (but not quite accepted) the answers repeated by DNCall.

  For many years I tried to set aside the cognitive dissonance in my mind between JW theology on this point and my own conception of a loving, just God. I actually never quite got over this contradiction. In the meantime, I would try to witness to my "un-believing" relatives and friends when I could because, hey, we love 'em and don't want them to die at Armageddon. How annoying I must have been to them.

  Note to self:Better apologize to all my "un-believing" relatives and friends for being an obnoxious ass!

  Also, JW indoctrination is really good at making us feel bad: Those nagging doubts we have are evidence of OUR lack of Faith, Understanding, Knowledge, Spirituality, etc. We are the one in error, we are the weak one. It couldn't possibly be the FDS or it's GB. They are after all God's Channel ... blah, blah, blah.

  It was only after the doubts kept piling up in my mind and the evidence of their hypocrisy and lack of divine backing became overwhelming that I could clearly see that the problem with this "dilemma" is not me, it's their error.
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  00DAD

  Oh, and BTW, I also realized that the WTBTS's "God will destroy the wicked at Armageddon ..." doctrine is really just another variation of the Hellfire teaching.

  After all, the whole point is to manipulate and control through fear: Death at Armageddon, Burning Forever in Hell ... just another variation on a theme. Hey, whatever works!!!
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  blondie

  My family never felt the non-jw relaltives had to be baptized, that God would judge their heart. Many jws today still feel that way. They avoid dealing with anything in the publications that suggests otherwise and the WTS dances around that doctrine and rarely mentions it in print, and if they do they couch in language that obscures it.
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  undercover

  How Did You Deal With God Destroying Non-Witness Relatives that You Loved?

  We didn't.

  We acknowledged that our "worldly" relatives existed and we associated with them when necessary, but rarely out of any feeling of "just wanting to" for "family sake". There were the obligatory funerals and an occasional family reunion. But aside from that, worldly family were kept an arm's length away.

  Having been brought up that way, it's hard to say that I loved any of them, since I didn't really know any of them. They were people we saw two or three times a year, and usually because of circumstances my parents couldn't control.

  Even now, as I have tried to be more accessible and socialable with them, especially the elderly ones, I realize too much time has passed. I'm pretty much a stranger to all these people. We don't have a history together. I still work at it though. Try to make up what little I can.
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  leavingwt

  We would talk about "what a shame" it was that so-and-so wasn't "in the truth", fully expecting them to die at Armageddon.
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  PSacramento

  It was one of the many sticking points that never allowed me to become a JW.

  I kept hearing that little voice, even then, saying, "why would God do that?"
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  rip van winkle

  When I started to "study", I overheard my mom say to her cousin, Neil: "she is trying to indoctrinate me." So, from that point forward, I would not "preach" to my mom. When she had a question, I would answer her; show her a scripture , an article, or open up the Insight book. But, I stopped preaching to her from the moment I overheard her use the word "indoctrinate".

  After years, I knew my mom was never going to become a witness. So, of course, I wished that she would die before Armaggedon, so that she could be resurrected and have an opportunity to know Jehovah and live in the "real world".

  This is a sick and twisted view, but one that I would never have considered if I hadn't been so afraid for her dying a permanent death at Armageddon. When I recognized that this was my "hope"( long before she actually became ill), I started to remember other things that I put out of my mind and slowly awakened.
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  blondie

  I had a non-jw father and other non-jw relatives I did like. I figured God was judging who lived and who died and did not need the help of the WTS/GB/FDS to determine who those would be. I also told the elders that having the title JW was no guarantee of an individual's survival, that they would neither catch all the bad jws nor would their df'ing someone mean that God would kill them on their say so/judgment. King Saul was God's anointed and his decision to kill David did not have God's backing per the Bible and Israelites protected him and died for going against Saul. I pointed out that they would not be executing anyone nor making a list and checking it twice to tell God who was worthy of destruction.

  (Job 38:1-4) . . .And Jehovah proceeded to answer Job out of the windstorm and say: 2 “Who is this that is obscuring counsel By words without knowledge? 3 Gird up your loins, please, like an able-bodied man, And let me question you, and you inform me. 4 Where did you happen to be when I founded the earth? Tell [me], if you do know understanding.

  Just like the WTS takes 7 unrelated scriptures to try and prove Jesus is Michael; they take a similar path to try and prove that the mark in Ezekiel 9 can be only baptism as a jw. Cornelius was accepted by God without being baptized...........and he was never baptized as a jw.

  I found the best thing to do to deal with jw unreasoning was to use the scriptures they said they followed....and the WTS that they said was so vital....and to show them the contraditions the WTS makes. I had not found a religion that was better, some that were worse. When I finally realized I needed no religion, did I leave.