The New System of Things - How much longer?

by Nosferatu 25 Replies latest jw friends

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  Nosferatu

  This post isn't about "how much longer until the New System of Things" arrives. I'm wondering how much longer people will buy this load of crap? The Society has been telling the R&F that Armageddon is right around the corner for 124 years now, and they're still using this method. I'd think that it would become less and less effective. It's as if a gambler says "I'm going to win the lottery! I feel lucky. Any day now, I'm going to be a millionaire". Truth may be that people have won the lottery, but many people put their false hope in actually winning it. They spend money on lottery tickets, in casinos, hoping to hit the jackpot. They put their own lives in jeopardy hoping to hit the big one so they can finally be happy. The truth is, they keep putting themselves in financial debt, and they spend even more to win the big one so they can get out of debt. Then they die. They have lived an unfulfilling life. They wasted their lives trying to fulfill a fantasy.

  JWs are very similar. They chase after "Paradise Earth" and wait for Armageddon. They spend their whole lives waiting for Jehovah to fix up their miserable lives, and they work even harder, preaching the "good news", hoping to enter armageddon with a good standing. They physically and emotionally wear themselves out, making their life more miserable, and they put even more faith in Jehovah bringing Armageddon to fix their own lives. The only difference between a gambler and a JW is noone has seen Armageddon or Paradise Earth.

  So my question is, how can someone continue to believe that Armageddon is right around the corner when it has been promised for 124 years? When are people going to start giving up on the promise of Armageddon? 124 years is a long time to be promising something, and it's always around the corner. It's the same bullshit tactic that has been used over and over again. It should have grown old and died by now.
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  suzi_creamcheez

  Good topic Nosferatu! When I used to entertain myself with "impure thoughts" at the KH, i realized how fantasy is so much better than reality.

  The JWs suspend their disbelief because they have everything invested in this Paradise on Earth fantasy. The more they give up "worldly things," the more deeply entrenched they become. Among the JWs the young people are leaving. I think this trend will continue among JWs in their 30s-40s who see the hypocrisy can't stand living the lie anymore.

  There will always be old, brainwashed die hards who will remain and do anything the Society tells them. I have a feeling a lot of the elderly will stay in the faith out of fear and unhealthy dependency.

  just my ramblings, i'm not usually up this early. -suz
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  Mary

  So my question is, how can someone continue to believe that Armageddon is right around the corner when it has been promised for 124 years? When are people going to start giving up on the promise of Armageddon? 124 years is a long time to be promising something, and it's always around the corner.

  I give it another 40 - 50 years before people stop believing it. The Society has been riding a camel's hump for the last 124 years. The largest hump was just before 1975 when they were riding on a huge increase in memebership, but it didn't last and it's been showing a general downward trend ever since. The November 1995 article which changed the "generation" issue, was, in my opinion, the beginning of the end for them, even more so than the pedophile problem. I've seen fanatical Witnesses who, before that article came out, had never saved a dime for retirement, bought a house, get an education, or anything else long term, suddenly do a 360 and have started "investing" in this wicked ol' system of tings..........

  Thanks in large to the Internet, where Witnesses can look up all kinds of information that they had no access to before, more and more Witnesses are committing the unforgivable sin of "independent thinking" and realize that we've been had..........

  Old habits die hard though; which is why I figure it'll take yet another "generation", before this doctrine "passes away."
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  Joker10

  Mary, you mention that 1975 was in your opinion, "the beggining of the end of them". Most of those people who left where new people who never really had an interest in serving Jehovah for a long time in this system. And I personally don't think that the "Generation" issue hit JW pretty hard, that I remember.
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  shotgun

  Joker where do you really stand? You surf a site condemned by the WT but you seem to support them in most of your posts, sometimes openly and other times its subtly. You make some interesting comments in your posts but I have not figured out where you are coming from...maybe I don't need to know or maybe your not sure yourself.

  shotgun
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  Joker10

  Shotgun, I simply think you guys are trashing them a lot n areas where they don't shouldn't have to. I've never had a ny bad JW expererience. And since most you offer negative views of them, I try once in a while not to. (I do recognize some faults)
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  RunningMan

  Joker, why are you pretending to be a non-JW who is favorable to them? You refer to JW's as "them". Yet, you claim to remember the generation change and it's impact on the JW community. You claim to know about the 1975 fiasco, and you spew the party line on the subject.

  Are you trying to make it look like you are an objective outsider? We are not that stupid. If you are looking for gullible people, go back to the meetings.
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  willyloman

  Uh, guys, don't chase Joker away, otherwise we're just talking to ourselves, you know? He's interesting counterpoint. Many of us were where he is, and not so long ago.
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  proplog2

  The End is Near. That is the divine deception.

  What is meant by all these references to Christ return?

  Matt 16:28 "Truly I say to you that there are some of those standing here that will not taste death at all until first they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom."

  Matt 26:64 "I say to you men, From henceforth you will see the Son of man sitting at the right hand of power and coming on the clouds of heaven."

  Heb 10:37 "For yet a very little while and he who is coming will arrive and will not delay."

  James 5:8 "make your hearts firm, because the presense of the Lord has drawn close"

  1John 2:18 "Young children, it is the last hour, and just as you have heard that antichrist is coming even now there have come to be many antichrists; from which fact we gain the knowledge that it is the last hour"

  Rev 3:11 "I am coming quickly. "

  Rev 22:7 "I am coming quickly"

  Rev 22:12 "I am coming quickly"

  Rev 22:20 "I am coming quickly"

  Jehovah's Witnesses are just being good Christians by keeping up the idea that the end is near.

  If they didn't believe that- they wouldn't have set aside their own lives to declare their message. It takes time to build an organization. So it makes sense that a lot of people would be "deceived" into thinking the end would come in their life time. That's what I mean by "divine deception".

  This only works for a limited amount of time. After Jesus didn't return in the first century the Church went through a radical change. They quit talking about the end being near - even though it was a Christian teaching. It took about 3 generations from the Death of Christ for the idea to sink in that Christ wasn't coming so soon.

  It was mentioned that JW's have been doing this for about 125 years. Again that's about 3 generations. (3 x 40 = 120). If nothing happens then JW's will fold up. The next few years are critical.

  I don't think it's mere coincidence that JW's can't sustain this work much longer and that the political fabric of the world is unraveling due to terrorism.

  Something IS going to happen. You WILL get your answer to the question "Where is this promised coming of the Lord?"
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  Shutterbug

  Most of those people who left where new people who never really had an interest in serving Jehovah for a long time in this system

  1975 did one thing for me, it made me start thinking, something I hadn't done up to that point. I believed the end was going to come because the WTS so strongly implied it would, but it didn't get me out completly, the oral sex fiasco accomplished that little chore. Today I see 1975 as a cynical program disigned to sell more magazines. It worked.

  Now, where are you getting your information as to the truthfullness of the above quoted statement? Bug