I used to wonder about the "apointment by Jehovah" position a lot--especially after one of my fellow elders was discovered to be a pedophile. Since I was the chairman of the Judicial Committee that handled it, I came to discover certain facts about his history.
More than 20 years previous a young man had approached some elders to tell them about this elder's behavior. Apparently it was not clear that outright pedophilia was being charged, but the boy was very adamant that the elder was trying things with him in this vein. Nothing happened. He remained an elder.
About 5 years previous another young man explicitly charged this elder with fondling him. There were no witnesses, of course. Interestingly, the elder body even did something they weren't supposed to do--according to the organization. They actually proceeded with an investigation, questioning other families with children in our congregation and others as to whether or not their young ones had been abused by this man. It turned up nothing. He stepped aside briefly, but returned as an elder.
Then finally another accuser surfaced, unwillingly at first. He was now an adult. Another elder and I actually met with him privately to encourage him to come forward. He did. So we had two accusers, proceeded with the committee and, there being no confession made, he was disfellowshiped. After this came to light, even more accusers came forward.
I was very much the sheep. I was willing to believe the best about the WTS and looked for every reason to continue believing this event did not mean anything ultimately indictable to its not being God's Organization. I had concluded that, although God's spirit was with the WTS, that didn't mean He was in full control of every move made. "What doesn't come out in the wash will come out in the rinse." That was a popular expression among elders where I served. The thinking was that, just as Jehovah doesn't perform miracles today, he also doesn't have angels come down to point out guilty people for us. It took years for evil Biblical characters to receive their just desserts--and so too sometimes today. Jehovah's spirit would eventually see to it that people like this were removed.
But I'll admit to having difficulty with this--even at that time. Were we talking about the Almighty God of the Universe here? Or some silly little garden gnome? If the Most High God were really using this organization, setting it apart as His own, viciously sensitive to the little sheep within being mistreated...would it really take His spirit 20 or 30 years to fix something so heinous? Would He really allow a repeat pedophile to step aside as an elder a few times--and then return, as if by the operation of His spirit, to shepherd the flock again? Wouldn't preventing something like this from happening--say compared to creating the universe--be a pretty simple thing for Him?
