not ready to go over to the "dark side"

nowwhat?

after spending a lifetime in it, no one is as fed up with the wt as i am. [my golf game would have been a hell of alot better if i was'nt banging my head against the wall on saturdays! lol ] this forum has taught me alot more than i thought to confirm my suspicions. however on the other side of coin, what we have here is an association that runs the full sprectrum of beliefs or non beliefs. there is an awful lot of talk about "light" what i need is the "light of pure bible truth". if you believe in t he bible you can't deny these basic bible truths:

there is no Hell or enternal torment

Jesus is God's only begotten son-not part of a trinity

one day God's kingdom will come upon the earth. when and to what extent remains to be seen.

Jehovah and Jesus expect his followers to live by righteous standards according to their best imperfect abilitites, [sorry gay guys]

so for those of you that are sincere where else is there to go? that's why most of us stay in the borg that's right i said borg.

as someone with a bible trained concience you wind up being caught in the middle. how many feel this way?

lisaBObeesa

You may be surprised to learn that you can be a member of a 'normal' (one that is not cult-ish) Christian church and disagree with some of the teachings.

It is ok. People are not robots. You can't have a huge group of humans and have them all agree on EVERYTHING. (if you do find a large group where everyone agrees on everything a) it is a cult and b) people are not being honest about what they believe.)

think of it this way: RIGHT NOW you are going to a church that you don't 100% agree with.

It only seems wrong to go to another church that you don't 100% agree with because the JWs have told you for years and years that other churches are evil and bad.

Roberta804

Nowwhat,

I was a born in and for a long time I too kept the central tennets of the borg. However after one experiences the acceptance of Jesus Christ as God everything changes. I doubt anyone here on this board would deny that the borg uses divide and conquor as their power play. Well they also do this with Jehovah and Jesus. Jehovah is the BIG Cheese and Jesus is nothing more than Jehovah's side kick. Sort of like Batman and Robin. Once it is realized this is not the case, everything the borg teaches comes crumbing down.

SophieG

I grew up in the Borg and dedicated 20 years to it.

When leaving it and faced with the question? “Where is there else to go”, frankly the first response I got from my gut was: Why DO I have to go anywhere? I already had a life, it was just constrained by a set of beliefs. Now I just need to EXPAND IT!

Of all the “Basic Bible Truths” that you've listed, for me the jury is out on most of them, because I am allowing myself to be open to all sets of beliefs now. The first thing I wanted to immerse myself into was reading the Bible without JW slant and I feel like (no offense meant) that some of those you’ve listed have that.

I think as JWs our ‘bible trained conscience’ has a huge and biased slant. I certainly don’t feel caught in the middle. I live my life more so now according to choice and consequences. I make good choices because they give good results. I am beginning to think I really don't need a "guide book" or a "religion to steer my life. I think we can be guides and our lives will reflect that. There IS something I think to go to and it’s a personal journey, where one ends up will be different for each person.

lisaBObeesa

Also...There is no 'perfect' church where everyone in the church believes what you believe or what I believe.

But there are churches that are close to your beliefs and where they accept and love you even when you don't believe all of their teachings and they don't believe all of your beliefs.

Outside of the unnatural high control of the Borg there is freedom to believe exactly as YOU believe and there is acceptance, and there is real LOVE.

What what is most important? That the dogma is exactly right or that there is LOVE? Jesus didn't say you would know his followers by their dogma...

label licker

I always thought you had to belong to the self appointed org but not so. The question shouldn't be to where should I go but it's to whom shall I go to. It's not untill the end when Jesus comes back that he will give us that knowledge along with the two witnesses whom by the way is not the witnesses or their conventions or whatever they claim it is

Londo111

I will agree with there being no eternal torment. Of course, I also believe in the end, there will be a universal reconciliation for all.

From my studies of the Scriptures, I will say:

(1) Jesus is God’s only-begotten Son, a distinct person from his Heavenly Father. The Father has a greater position than the Son. However, Jesus is by nature Divine, or God. There is a profound unity between God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, and an interworking between these three and all Creation. Trinity simply means tri-unity—and it does not teach that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one person. Last year this time I would have fought myself tooth and nail about this.

(2) God’s Kingdom is primarily spiritual and heavenly. One can derive the spiritual blessings now through the King or Lord, Jesus: forgiveness, grace, sonship. But there is only one hope held out in Scripture for Christians, not two.

(3) In regard living by “righteous standards”, this does not save anyone. By nature, we are unrighteous. If a man is not righteous by nature, then his works are not righteous. That is where Grace (ie undeserved kindness) comes in, and living by Faith. We are declared righteous and that makes our works righteous. God is not a performance based taskmaster. Also, we are not to judge others—God CAN make them stand. We are to keep our finger pointed at ourselves at all times.

(4) Where else to go? That is the wrong question. Peter asked, “To WHOM will we go away to? You (Jesus) have the sayings of everlasting life.” We go to Jesus our Mediator and have a relationship with him and his Father. If we still feel a need for Christian fellowship, there are lots of choices.

I don’t have too much time today, so I didn’t post Scriptures to all this. But feel free to PM me and I will respond when I have time. I really urge you to start digging, studying, researching if you haven’t already. Even if you think you know something, look into it again.

jgnat

I think you would benefit from some unabridged bible study. There's a lot of stuff the WT glosses over.

How about reading all of the promises in the New Testament in context? Who were they meant for?
How about a word study, again sticking to the New Testament, like grace or love? The new e-bibles make this super-easy.
Study the beatitudes in-depth.
Study all the parables.

No need to go over to a "dark side". How about concentrating on finding your side?

applehippie

Londo, I agree with your assesment of thie situation. If we could be righteous- we wouldn't need Jesus. We wouldn't need Grace. I go to a reformed church with my husband, but I don't agree with absolutley everything- but I am happy to leave that in Gad's hands for now.

soontobe

not ready to go over to the "dark side"

Hi nowwhat, I think that, as you grow over time, the very concept of "truth" that you hold dear will look increasingly like a flawed premise.

Luke, you're going to find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.

not ready to go over to the "dark side"

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