.
do other churches have "no trespassing" signs on the grounds?.
i don't recall ever seeing "private property - no trespassing" signs on other churches, especially ones that have a priest or minister available at all hours, or ones that offer space for community services or other kinds of events.. i wonder whether there is some kind of legal expectation of a charitable organization that pays no taxes to offer access for community services in order to maintain their tax free status.. anyone else ever see signs like this on kh property?.
This might be a way to keep Apostates from attending the Memorial or regular meetings. The J-dubs can cite private property laws and have them prosecuted. This might also affect KH's who might try to secede from the WTBTS (like Menlo Park). The WTBTS can cite private property law and have the dissedents expelled from the property, keeping them from obtaining important documents from the KH files.
Seems a likely scenario.
.....bringing someone into the organization of jehovah's witnesses?
personally, i had several bible studies, but thankfully, never got any of them all the way to baptism.
my conscience is clear..
I never had a Bible study. I would offer them and people would accept but I would always pass them along to the Pioneers. The non-Pioneers were actually encouraged to do this from the platform then later on sneered at by the Pioneers for not having Bible studies. O.o
there have been several threads in which the views of the universe provided by the hubble space telescope have been discussed.
i guess this will be another one.
there's a new series being broadcast here in canada on the oasis hd nature channel entitled hubble's canvas.
I think I will bow out of this topic. It's far beyond my limited education and some of the jargon I don't quite comprehend. I gave my point of view on what I think and that's all I can really do. Anything added to this thread by me would be pure speculation I think.
Awen
often i wake up in a cold sweat wondering if i'm wrong.
life is short.
i have only a brief time to make a decision.
No and Yes.
No, because I know they're 100% wrong on most everything. There would have to be an admittance of guilt on the part of the Governing Body for misleading millions of people and causing the deaths of thousands due to their erroneous teachings on blood, the destruction of marriages because of their teachings on marriage and immediately recognizing that protecting pedophiles shames God's name more than revealing them and throwing them out of the organization.
Yes. Only if Yeshua asked me to for reasons other than the ones cited above.
circuit overseers what do they do?
today i uploaded to my blog an article showing documents circuit overseers send to each congregation in preparation for their upcoming inspection.
quite a few have never seen these, and they go a long way toward understanding the place and operation of these watchtower appointees within the organizations structure.
Oh please let them come to my house for a shepherding call. Please, please, please. I always have such fun with CO's and elders.
circuit overseers what do they do?
today i uploaded to my blog an article showing documents circuit overseers send to each congregation in preparation for their upcoming inspection.
quite a few have never seen these, and they go a long way toward understanding the place and operation of these watchtower appointees within the organizations structure.
Oh please let them come to my house for a shepherding call. Please, please, please. I always have such fun with CO's and elders.
i was reading the letter of james before and i came across a verse which a brother on my judicial comittee shown me:.
14 is there anyone sickamong you?
let him call the older men of the congregation to [him], and let them pray over him, greasing [him] with oil in the name of jehovah.
Also the name Jehovah doesn't actually occur in the Greek text of the Letter of James. It's Jesus' name, but that would contradict WT teaching and so Freddy Franz replaced the name with Jehovah when he "translated" the NWT.
I give you the letter of James in Greek with the English translation next to it as evidence.
http://www.bookofjames.info/greek.html
Note that in James 1:1 Jesus is referred to as "The Lord". So it's safe to conclude that any further references to "the Lord" is in fact a reference to Jesus and not Jehovah.
Also I think you are correct when this scripture is speaking of physical ailments and not spiritual ones. The reason the WTS says otherwise is because their reasoning is flawed.
there have been several threads in which the views of the universe provided by the hubble space telescope have been discussed.
i guess this will be another one.
there's a new series being broadcast here in canada on the oasis hd nature channel entitled hubble's canvas.
Project against this context the image of Yahweh as depicted in the OT. Against the incomprehensible magnificence of what He is alleged to have created, He appears very, very, very, very tiny and insignificant. Against the reality of tens of billions of years and billions of trillions of planets, the context of the past 4-5,000 years and the central story presented in the Bible is almost immeasurably diminished. Add to that the context provided by other branches of science, genetics not the least of them, and any semblance of credibility in Yahweh and the Bible vaporises. All that is left is faith.
This is a sincere question posed to sincere people. How does one go on believing in Yahweh and the Bible when the evidence against the legitimacy of either is so astonishingly overwhelming and relentless? Is it just cognitive dissonance, or is there something more to it? How is it possible for you to go on believing what you believe?
@ Nickolas. Firstly I have nothing but the greatest of respect for you. You've always been kind to me (even when we've disagreed) and are always polite, which to me makes any discourse with you enjoyable.
Secondly I am somewhat perplexed as to why you see YHWH as being diminished. I can only speculate that you're speaking of the YHWH that is only revealed in the 66 books of the Bible, not the other 550 or so books that have been written, hidden, destroyed, covered up, etc. There is so much that was written and is now lost, forgotten or even not accepted because they're not part of the "official" canon.
The Gospel of St Thomas is one of my favorites.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gospel_of_Thomas
In the Thomas gospel, Jesus is presented as a spiritual guide whose words (when properly understood) bring eternal life (Saying 1). Readers of these sayings are advised to continue seeking until they find what will enable them to become rulers of their own lives (Saying 2) and thus to know themselves (Saying 3) and their legacy of being the children of "the living Father" (Saying 3). These goals are presented in the image of "entering the Kingdom" by the methodology of insight that goes beyond duality. (Saying 22). The Gospel of Thomas shows little or no concern for orthodox religious concepts and doctrines. Scholars have traditionally understood the Gospel of Thomas as a Gnostic text because it was found amongst other gnostic texts, it was understood as being prone to a Gnostic interpretation by the early Church, and the emphasis on knowledge as the key to salvation, particularly in Saying 1. However this view has recently come under some criticism by suggesting that while it is possible to interpret the text in a way that aligns with Gnosticism there is nothing inherently Gnostic about the text itself.
The Gospel of Thomas emphasizes direct and unmediated experience. In Thomas saying 108, Jesus says, "Whoever drinks from my mouth will become as I am; I myself shall become that person, and the hidden things will be revealed to him." Furthermore, salvation is personal and found through spiritual (psychological) introspection. In Thomas saying 70, Jesus says, "If you bring forth what is within you, what you have will save you. If you do not bring it forth, what you do not have within you will kill you." As such, this form of salvation is idiosyncratic and without literal explanation unless read from a psychological perspective related to Self vs. ego. In Thomas saying 3, Jesus says,
...the Kingdom of God is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living Father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty, and it is you who are that poverty.
It must be also recalled that many people on this forum discount the accuracy of the OT and is for the most part intermingled with older myths and legends. It's only as we progress further forward (speaking in measurements of time) do we gain a clearer picture of YHWH than what is depicted in Genesis. Psalm 139:16 seems to speak of the genetic code as David related how God was able to see his innermost being and establish his traits before he was even born.
On a side note I think the Deluge is a myth or at best a localized flood. One must also take into account who was writing the account and what their worldview was at the time. As far as most people were concerned, at the time the "world" constituted what they could see up to the next village or the limits of their travels. So when they said the entire world was flooded they were saying this from the point of view of what the viewed the "world" to actually be. Quite small actually as history has shown us. It took thousands of years for humans to discover the true size of the earth. It's only been a few centuries since Galileo first gazed through his telescope into the void. I mention the Deluge as a speaking point on the relevancy of Genesis as a whole. While there is valuable information in the text I do think it may have been tampered with, especially concerning the six creative days. I think there might have been an understanding (at the time it was written or even an annotation in the text, but there isn't one in modern translations) that it wasn't literally six 24 hour increments of time but rather a simple explanation of a very complex measurement of time. It had to be simple as higher mathematics hadn't been invented at this time. It was written with the primitive man in mind and we're conveniently forgetting that.
As far as I can tell genetics hasn't disproved the Bible, quite the opposite in fact. Genesis states that life was created according to it's kind or what we call a "Genus" Evolution shows us that life cannot evolve outside of it's Genus.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution
If you click the hyperlink for Hominids you'll see that Apes are in the same Genus as Humans (of course you know this already). I'm merely pointing out that we're related inside the same Genus and didn't evolve independently of them. Genesis says God created man directly, but as I've suggested before this could be a tampering with the text because evolution shows us something quite different. The point about not evolving outside of our "kinds" or Genus shows an undestanding of the genetic evolutionary process that was thousands of years beyond primitive man.
So how did they know?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam%27s_razor#Science_and_the_scientific_method
there have been several threads in which the views of the universe provided by the hubble space telescope have been discussed.
i guess this will be another one.
there's a new series being broadcast here in canada on the oasis hd nature channel entitled hubble's canvas.
Just a side note. The word "idjit" (also spelled idgit, though incorrect) is a word common used in the area of the Appalachian Mountains. It was brought to America by Scottish immigrants who settled in that area. Shelby having been born in that area (and myself being of Scottish descent) are quite familiar with the term.
Here's a quick definition for ones such as bohm who like to "correct" us dumb people.
http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Idjit
IDIOT, Persons. A person who has been without understanding from his nativity, and whom the law, therefore, presumes never likely to attain any. Shelf. on Lun. 2.
2. It is an imbecility or sterility of mind, and not a perversion of the understanding
That is all.
Now back to our regularly scheduled programming.
there have been several threads in which the views of the universe provided by the hubble space telescope have been discussed.
i guess this will be another one.
there's a new series being broadcast here in canada on the oasis hd nature channel entitled hubble's canvas.
@ Paulapollos
My use of the term Creationism is related to the failure of modern science to explain how life originated. Scientists can explain evolution within a species or mutation within a species but thus far no one has been able to explain or duplicate how life began in the first place. It's all conjecture. Occam's Razor states "eliminate all other possibilities and whatever remains, however unlikely must be the truth." I don't come to this conclusion lightly as I have done years of personal research and had to admit (to myself) the lack of evidence for a perfect creation. There are many genetic flaws and certain things do mutate. The Influenza Virus being a great example. However evolution only seems to occur within a species. That is to say monkeys don't evolve into birds or horses etc. Nor to my knowledge has any evidence ever come forth to prove otherwise (I could be wrong as I don't have a college education nor am particularly learned in biology, chemistry, or any other of the higher disciplines of science).
To address what you asked of Shelby (AGuest) I will quote a particular scripture.
John 14:26 "But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you."
Now we can only speculate what it was exactly what the Holy Spirit reminded the Apostles of. However the promise is given to all persons (if they ask for it) the gift of knowledge to understand the deeper things of God. One can reasonably surmise this might include the nature of the universe. Yes an outlandish claim but also limited and for good reason. If someone who had the Holy Spirit knew everything about...well everything they would become a subject of idolatry to others and stop following God. This isn't the purpose of the Holy Spirit. It's to teach the basic things about God and Christ but in a way that does not draw attention away from either of them. I myself, nor Shelby nor anyone else claim to know it all. We only know what we have been told (in strictly limited terms).
If that invites criticism, then so be it. If we're labeled "nutters" then that's okay too. Many of the prophets of the OT and NT (which I nor others equate ourselves to) were labeled as such too, Jesus included. So we're in good company I guess. I think I also speak for us all when I say none of us say these things in an effort to draw attention to ourselves or to make "followers" like the Governing Body does. We're simply mailmen (and women) who deliver the message. We don't write the letters, we just deliver them. But at the same time we're responsible for what is said to a degree since the messages can be influenced by our own state of mind, social outlook and the imperfect vessel that is the human mind. We make mistakes sometimes and God will hold us accountable for those mistakes or if we willfully try to draw worship away from God and onto ourselves (like the GB has done). It's a precarious position.
Above all I encourage you to pray, ask from a sincere heart for the Holy Spirit to come into your life and teach you about God and Christ. If you read something I or someone else writes that you do not agree with or you think goes against what God teaches, then by all means ignore what we say. The Apostles didn't always agree on everything even though they all had the same Holy Spirit. It simply speaks to different people in different ways. They didn't at first accept Paul even though they later did. Obviously they allowed their own humanity (and the imperfections that come along with it) to influence their state of mind rather than listening to the Spirit (which they eventually did).
Paul said at 1 Corinthians 13:12 "Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely."
This is where I find myself when trying to relate what I have been taught.
I hope that answers your question.
Awen aka One Cashew among many Nuts.
