What Caused Your First Doubt ?

by Big Jim 46 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Big Jim

  For me it was when I was about twelve years old and my best friends Dad was disfellowshipped from the congregation.

  I could not understand how a God of love would treat someone so coldly.

  I used to think what if that was the way my parents would treat me if i had done something wrong, that would be so hard and cruel.

  As I got older another thing that bothered me was the beard issue. It may sound pretty trivial however the Society has always refused to make a good arguement as to why they would give you the old cold shoulder if you were to grow one.

  Two more items; First I could not understand why all the congregations and all the assemblys would give income reports
  and the Society never did.
  Last but not least, why dosen't the Society help with widows,orphans and homeless people.

  What were yours?
• 

  joelbear

  There were several that kept building.

  1. The thought that kindhearted loving people were doomed because they didn't belong to a group.

  2. Studying with a woman using her Bible and seeing the different words used in the NWT. Researching this endlessly.

  3. Trying to explain to a fairly intelligent Bible study the 1914 doctrine and not believing it myself.

  4. No logic to Jehovah's judgement. For example, living wild debauched life in the 1800s and having a chance for paradise while now having to live according to strict behavioral rules. I never bought the oh, but they will have more trouble reaching perfection. Huh? In a paradise earth where they get to see dead people come to life, I think it would be easier then.

  5. Double standards aplenty. Talks by materially rich educated elders about giving up your life to pioneer.

  ugh hugs

  Joel
• 

  Mulan

  I was a dub for 45 years, never doubting, but having little nagging thoughts, that I would "put on the shelf". The thing that made the shelf start to fall down, was the book study in the Greatest Man Book. My husband was the conductor. In the prodigal son story, it became clear to me that the father who accepted his wayward son, was in the right, and the other son, who didn't approve of his father's acceptance, was wrong. To me, the JW's were like the brother, not the father. Then the study about sin and how a sinner was to be treated like a man of the nations or as a tax collector. I asked my husband and myself "do we treat a disfellowshipped person as the Pharisees did, or as Jesus did?" It all started to fall apart after that. My husband was way ahead of me, though, as regular readers here, know.
• 

  Big Jim

  Hello Mulan
  That story also made me really think about the way the JW'S treat people who have sinned. As well as the way my own father who was the PO treated me when I ran away from home and came back.

  He did not slaughter the youngest calf, are get me a nice robe.
  He asked me where was my home, and why I came back to his.
• 

  MacHislopp

  Hello Big Jim,

  a very good question!
  My first answer is: when I started to make very elaborate
  researches, having been questioned in a very nice way by
  others JW and non-JW. I'll come back with specific points.

  Agape, J.C.MacHislopp
• 

  Gianluca

  November 1995: The day they changed the "1914 generation" doctrine.......Thats when i started to an intensive research into WTS doctrine.

  Ciao
  Gianluca
• 

  Copernicus

  Good question, and in my case, an easy answer:

  When they took the mention of creator’s promise of a new system before the generation of 1914 (blah, blah) out of the Awake masthead.

  I still remember it clearly. I was out in service and noticed the change in the way they worded it. No warning, no explanation, nothing. I guess the creator doesn’t honor his promises – or more to the point, the creator never had anything to do with the establishment of this rag in the first place. I felt I had been treated so shabbily. Would Jesus handle his followers in such a cold, indifferent way? I think not.

  Anyhow, it took a few more years to before I pulled the plug. But that moment was definitely the start of the dominoes falling.
• 

  larc

  I was a true believer until I was about 17 years old. Reading the old books of Russell and Rutherford did it for me. The failures of others did not bother me. In other words, people didn't stumble me, changes in doctrine did. I my day, the issue of rich versus poor members was not an issue. Almost everyone was of modest means back then.
• 

  Francois

  It started for me with reading "Jehovah's Witnesses in the Divine Purpose." It's a sort of JW Apologia. I thought it was absurd how the JWs applied to themselves all sorts of prophecies and how they made the most incredible connections. Like claiming their little pamphlets they handed out prior to an assembly in Pittsburg, I think it was, were like "tongues of fire falling from heaven on the heads of non-believers" spoken of in the scriptures.

  And applying to the guys who went to jail for refusing to serve in the military in WWII the prophecy about the "two witnesses" who were dead, then not dead, then dead again, only to be resurrected and I disremember what else.

  They also had explanations for certain selected, but not all, of the nutty things that went on with Rutherford and some young chick, and Beth Sarim, and miracle wheat, and on and on and on and on. I thought, "this is the weakest argumentation I've ever heard in my life. And some of the things that happened in the past. My God, what a buncha bozos. And this represents GOD?"

  Strange as it may seem, it was the beard issue that was the proverbial straw. And the three guys they sent over to "adjust my thinking" on that matter. One stole electricity with a power meter when he cleaned apartments, one was a noted boozer who was shit-faced when he got to my house, and the last was also a petty thief. Essentially, I kicked them out.

  So it was their own book, coupled with the beard issue that did it for me.

  Francois
• 

  zev

  for me, looking back, it was the day i turned in my resignation as a m.s. to the c.o. i "saw" alot going on that wasn't right, though, couldn't put my finger on why i felt the way i did. within the last year, i stumbled on information concerning molesting of children within the "org". that started me into an earnest effort to review my beliefs and why i believed the way i did.

  it didn't take long to discover the answers to the questions and feeling i've had for so many years.

  beware of the internet. the information so easily accessable here can be disasterous to the "org"...

  i'm glad i finally "saw the light"

  the beard stand has always been a tough point for me.

  if only they had come clean and admitted their mistakes.
  they are proud and haughty.

  __
  zev
  Now feeling the pain of sitting on the pickets class.