by Sirona 11 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
"One thing I know I do is I don't always keep in touch with people.
It is almost due to a fear of close friendships.
In the past I've really opened up, but was hurt in the process.
Just recently I found out that a friend who I've confided in regularly
has lied to me and I don't know why."
Sirona
I've had similar problems.
Very close friends show you they're NOT close at all!
I didn't give up and remained 'open' to new friendships...they eventualy came.
Greetings everyone,
I'm Rick and have been "around" JWDF for just about a year. However, due to a crashing of a hard drive, a new ISP, and username (my nic); I now appear as a "newbie."
I was originally referred to JWDF by an ex-JW I met at Beliefnet. com (where I have approximately 12,500 posts). This person and I "met" on a thread that was discussing "apocalyptic literature" (such as the book of Revelation). He knew that this "topic" was often posted about here, so I came.
Thank you, Sirona, for the article and for being so "open" about your struggles... I can relate.
I have never been a Jehovah's Witness. I, too, have a background by way of my upbringing, in a "cult-like" group. To wit, I was raised in a family of hyper-dispensationalist (and exceedingly strict/separatist) Pentecostals. I had a teenage rebellion phase, but returned to my childhood faith (or religion), at age 19. Two years later, I had joined the Assemblies of God church (leaving the "separatist" church of my upbringing behind) and was enrolled at the A/G's main Bible College in their headquarter city of Springfield, Missouri.
During around my junior year, I had a crisis of faith. I had taken courses in hermeneuitcs & exegesis ("how to interpret the Bible") and found, in my devotional readings, that the A/G were teaching false doctrines. Namely, both premillennialism (which is shared by JW's) and the "pre-tribulational rapture of the church." The Tim LaHaye "Left Behind" book series are the current out-cropping of this strange and non-biblical teaching.
I left the college 11 hours short of a Bachelor's degree due to this. I reasoned (as a young person), "If they are wrong about these things, what else are they wrong about?" In fact, I wound up leaving any kind of faith in Jesus Christ behind (outside of his being an important religious figure)... and eventually became an atheist, in 1999.
1999, however, proved to be something "else" to me. After around 6 months of being an atheist (it's all myths & bullshit) -- I had a "revelation of Jesus Christ," as Paul once said it. I can't adequately explain this in words (even to people I know well) but I can say I have been a "christian"... ever since.
Yet since 1999, I haven't been able to find a church that I feel really "at home" in. I'm, more or less these days, a "conservative" (evangelical) christian but almost all protestant-evangelical churches "teach" the heresies of (both) premillennialism and the "pre-trib rapture" (premillennial dispensationalism).
I thank God that I exited the branch of Christianity that promotes these false doctrines and atrocities.
I'm still trying to find "my place" among believers....
Thanks again,
rick
\o/
