Someone recently included the phrase from a talk, “cherished errors”, which made me think about something I wanted to get off my chest. The societies use of manipulative language has been discussed on this site many time and I hope this adds to the ammunition to fight back against them.
Periodically , i’ll Run into someone and they’ll say “Hendrixgrip, why don’t you come to the meetings anymore.” I’ll give them some not too specific reason like, “I’m struggling with the overlapping doctrine”. Inevitably, they’ll say something like, “you haven’t let that impact your faith in the organization/bible/GB have you?”
My response is to say, “no, faith is not the problem, it never has been. I’ve never had faith in the GB. Then I paraphrase Hebrews 11:1 and say, “Faith isn’t the problem. Faith is the assured expectations of things hoped for, the evident demonstration of realities that are not yet seen. I don’t hope there’s a GB, I know there’s one. I’ve seen them, I don’t hope to see them. If you mean my confidence in the GB, then yeah, I guess I’m struggling with that.”
Faith is something that should be reserved for things we can’t see, like God or Jesus or according to them, gravity and wind. By asking JW’s to have faith in them, they’ve subliminally elevated themselves to the position of God. At best, JW’s should have confidence in the GB, like they might a politician.