Pudgy

Used cardboard boxes are bought and sold by weight ... we buy em dry, hose em down, and sell em.

As a two-dimensional cartoon dog, I am not saved, but thanks to "Pudgycoin", which has massive global investments in wet cardboard boxes, I am well invested.

This might often be true. But more often it brings a polite "no thank you" from those who don't want to listen. The proportion of countries where there is outright persecution and banning of our work has actually improved. In most countries of the world the reaction to our message is non-violent, even peaceful. And sometimes, it is obviously still quite enthusiastically positive. The 8.6 million plus publishers in 2019 conducted 9.6 million Bible Studies, and 300,000 new ones were baptized. That's nearly a third of a million new persons. And shows that on average there was more than one Bible Study conducted per publisher.
Of course, you picked the numbers from 2020 which dropped from 2019. @Witness already pointed out that they actually dropped .6% (which is based on the average monthly publishers, not just the "peak" which you quoted above). But the bigger drop from 2019 to 2020 was the number of Bible Studies which dropped 20%.
2019: Average Bible Studies * Each Month: 9,618,182 2020: Average Bible Studies * Each Month: 7,705,765 They dropped by nearly TWO MILLION in one year! (Partly because we were asked not to keep studying with persons if there was no apparent progress.) But notice that they weren't replaced by new studies, so that the average is now much less than one Bible Study per publisher.
Also note the number of new ones baptized also dropped by 20%:
2019: Total Number Baptized *: 303,866 2020: Total Number Baptized *: 241,994 And unfortunately, this also means that over 300,000 persons left the Witnesses between 2019 and 2020 for there to still be a decrease even though so many were baptized. Some leave by death or disfellowshipping, but the vast majority of these 300,000 must have decided to leave.
And the 2021 numbers are already in, and the Society was not able to report an increase in publishers this year, except in a few individual branches.
This also means that there is no need for additional congregations, so I'm guessing that the number will continue to remain about the same, or more likely decrease. I wouldn't look for a 20% increase in congregations to 144,000 even though you think that number of congregations is somehow significant. Anecdotally, I already heard about a couple special language congregations (New York and Los Angeles) that are being dropped and reverting to their original congregations.
You are telling people that this system will go on for another 20 years, which is very unfaithful and indiscreet in light of Jesus' warning that the end could come at any time, as if without warning, like a thief in the night.
The response appears to be diminishing, but wasn't your original point about how violent and hostile we can expect the response to be?
There is nothing about this in the Bible. Paul wasn't speaking of an outbreak resulting in a proclamation, he was just agreeing with 2 Peter 3:3 that there have been ridiculers since the first century saying they don't believe this parousia is coming because they can still talk about the relative peace and security that allows them to eat, drink, get married, etc. Adding to the Bible that we should wait for a proclamation by political kings shows a lack of discretion and a lack of discernment. Remember that Jesus, too, spoke of the time coming as a time of relative peace and security when he compared it to a time when you might be asleep in your house, or working in a field, or grinding at a mill, or doing any of the things that people were doing in Noah's day or in Sodom when the end came, essentially without warning.
Just like Jesus, both Paul and Peter added that it would come "as a thief in the night." This way, no one would get the impression that we should look for some "proclamation by political kings" of peace and security. (Nor wait for some specific proclamation by ridiculers that "things are going on [peacefully and securely] just as from creation's beginning.")
For the same reason, there can be no specific time when any of us (GB included) can declare in advance that it is now time for a "final message of divine destruction." That would only show a level of presumptuousness and indiscretion. It would make us wise in our own eyes, and completely unfaithful to Jesus' words that "no one knows the day or the hour" because "it will come as a thief in the night."
Ah! Something we can agree on! 😊

Let's get right down to the REAL nitty-gritty .... where the rubber meets the road.
SCENARIO NO. 1:
Someone with an I.Q. not much higher than a Cocker Spaniel with a headache, let's call him T'MOOG, lives in the outback of Australia, eating termites, and standing on one leg to sleep at night. He has no concept of the Biblical Reference of Gog, Magog, or even of a Cocker Spaniel dog, Los Angeles Smog, or Kermit the Frog.
SCENARIO NO. 2:
Someone with an I.Q. in excess of 200 has studied Biblical Prophesy his whole adult life, let's call him ABNER EASTWOOD, and is one of only 23 people on Earth that has, or has ever understood completely what Jehovah has in mind .... including contingencies, ramifications, and subtle nuances in great detail.
He knows absolutely  everything there is to know about everything there is to know about Gog of Magog.
The fact remains that neither T'MOOG, or ABNER EASTWOOD can do Anything about any of it.
Nothing whatsoever.
Zip, Zero, Nada, Goose Eggs.
Meanwhile, ABNER is an unsufferable bore who beats others over their head with what he knows, and they care not at all, and is a truly miserable person. He has no joy in what he knows, as he is well aware THERE IS NOTHING HE CAN DO WITH THAT INFORMATION.
... and T'MOOG, who leads a very hard life, wakes up one morning, holding on to his spear, and puts both feet in the dirt beneath his bare feet, and like the Cocker Spaniel, looks out at the new day and realizes he is completely happy.
 
 
 
 

That's the problem when you get your water from a neck O' the woods ... of course if you have jugs of living water, it should be tested to see what's living in it.   Could be parasites, amoebas, tapeworms, or even dead guppies or other small fish. Or worse ... pieces of dead guppies or other dead insects.
...Like Gilda Radner used to say, as Rosanne Rosanadana, "If f it's not one thing ... it's another. .... It's always something!".
 

Yeah ..... It's always somethin'.
 
 

I am truly impressed by the time it must take to compose these bible book length epistles.
I wish I had the time to reply, point by point .... but I do not.
.... and like Witness, his/her long tomes, and my long replies would not be any influence whatsoever on anyone .... and we have a decade of Archive commentary ... tens of thousands of comments ....  to abundantly confirm that point.
I suspect that each and every one here, addicted to such things, on our death beds ... perhaps surrounded by people we are about to forever leave behind, will look up, and with tears in their eyes, and tears in our eyes, with our last breath before the blackness closes in forever, and we can move no more, will raise our feeble fingers and attempt to check our e-mail.

At least you will get free dental care, after they knock out your teeth ....
 

At last, to my mind, you have scored a definitive hit, not a dubious one.
I’ll be carrying on about how I love big brother next.

Since we do live in a two dimensional forum on the site, I feel pretty confident in forwarding a two dimensional comment.
Looking at what ABLJ STATED, Above, it seems to have no back up or make any sense whatsoever.
 
Yeah I do this all the time, but it is clearly understood by those who have two neurons to rub together.
It’s like the old saying goes, I never repeat rumors…… So you better pay attention the first time.
TWICE she assumes things that are not in evidence, with no basis whatsoever for the premise upon which that opinion is offered.….. and who is this “we”, in “we assume…”?
 

…. in Dog, this is known as a “wooof!”.

…. I thought it significant, Dmitar, that you allude to the supposition that you are a lawyer at all, positively, but seem to take offense at being thought of as an EVIL lawyer.
…… in Poker, your starting each post with “Friend,” is what is known by humans as a “tell”.
 
 

..... how about $2,000?
If I lose, I will pay you in Pudgycoin!, the Digital Currency preferred by the two-dimensional.
If you lose, as you are three dimensional,  U.S. Dollars will be just fine!
I present as evidence.... my photo.

.... and I am sure, BR,  that EVERYBODY ..... without a single exception, will get what they deserve at Armageddon.
But Jehovah is not going to do it because your opinions were slighted on this forum.

As usual BroRando, you have COMPLETELY misunderstood what I said .... BECAUSE ... you never read anything in context, and it appears you are completely unfamiliar with the Society's publication "The Divine Name".  THAT was the context you ignored.
When that happens you draw conclusions that get MORE wrong as the conversation goes on, as the error is not just additive, but multiplied.
.... please go back and re-read what I, and Witness  actually said, instead of your current screwed up perception of what we actually did say.
That is why in the 7th grade they used to teach how to diagram sentences .... a highly valuable tool for determining what a statement is REALLY saying.
Because you got what Witness' statement completely wrong, I am a white Supremacist?
Gimme a break!
( an aside to the 4th wall: Of the 9 billion people on this Earth, not a single one is equal to anyone else ... and that's a fact!)
Whether someone accepts or denies the Holocaust is COMPLETELY irrelevant to accepting or denying the letter J, or other silly premises.
 

ZERO relevance!

You know, I am just a cartoon dog, two dimensional, but your comment BroRando, is a clear example of a one dimensional comment that has absolutely ZERO relevance to what Witness mentioned in the "Divine Name" brochure.
You may as well have stated "Entrails in the middle of the highway can't speak!".

Seven Shepherds, Eight Dukes—What They Mean for Us Today The Watchtower Announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom—2013   LESSONS FOR TODAY ....
16. Who today are represented by (a) Jerusalem’s citizens (b) “the Assyrian” (c) the seven shepherds and eight dukes?
16 .... (2) When “the Assyrian” attacks, the elders must be absolutely convinced that Jehovah will deliver us. (3) At that time, the life-saving direction that we receive from Jehovah’s organization may not appear practical from a human standpoint. All of us must be ready to obey any instructions we may receive, whether these appear sound from a strategic or human standpoint or not ....
 

Remember this, Jehovah God foretold and had a Prophet  declare the news that Nineveh the Great City  would be destroyed.
Then, for reasons of his own, he changed his mind.

Some ideas are so obviously fabricated out of desperation that although ridicule may or may not be effective, or insult the persons believing in them,  still need to be ridiculed.
Otherwise, like the old fable goes, the King may ride on horseback  through the cheering town completely naked, because not only does he believe he is wearing the finest magical clothing, but the crowd also believes he is wearing the finest magical clothing, and it takes a child calling out what is obvious to everyone, "THE KING HAS NO CLOTHES!".
I really think you feel insulted by my previous posts, because although they may be rough analogies, they are in fact true, but in your heart of hearts you have a conflict that cannot be allowed to resolve.
"Millions now living will never die." was a deliberate lie, a false flag, puffery, and a taking advantage of naive and scared people for monetary gain.
The way I resolve this, having Faith that somehow, Jehovah's Witnesses really are God's Name People, not based on derived fantasy, but on solid Biblical core doctrine, is not expect much from the leadership of ANY  religious based organization of more than somewhere around 50 to 200 people.
We ALL have our 15 minutes of fame and shame, deluding either ourselves, each other ... or both.
It's the nature of being human.
In an interview on the BBC show Horizon, in 1981 Richard Feynman said this:
"I can live with doubt, and uncertainty and not knowing.  I think it is much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong."
 
 
 

So, Of everything I wrote that’s the only thing you could find that you deem to be a illogical?
I would assume then, that you agree with all the other statements that were made in my posting.
……. be a sport, go through it line by line and tell me what points you object to, besides the one you just mentioned.
Could be worse, could be overlapping cows.

As that was fictional sage of the ages, Yoda once said, “There is no try, there is only do“.
……. guessing about this, and guessing about that and extrapolating fantasies galore is certainly trying, but it’s better to say “I do not know“ and leave it at that then to be continuously committed to an agenda of being 100% wrong, 100% of the time ……  which is what we have going on now by any rational determination.
People from one end of the Earth to the other end of the Earth, and at least for the last 6000 years or so I’ve had one opinion about how long a generation is. It’s about 100 years and they don’t overlap.
This is reflected in The actuarial tables of  every insurance company in existence, who will insure your life based on the idea that you will be dead in 100 years, with very very few exceptions.  Many will actually pay you the proceeds of your life insurance policy at age 100, because theoretically you are dead  
 That’s the standard definition of a generation and everybody on Earth that’s not of the Governing Body or their adherents knows this to be true, and has known it to be true for the past 6000 years, or so.
You add that to Jesus words to his disciples, and what was in his mind and what was in their mind and you get the same conclusion.
it is very clear that in a horse race, one of the horses is going to win, and although we don’t know which one, the best bet on the strongest or the fastest one.
The rest is up to pure dumb luck.
Were you absolutely refuse to do that you are stuck in a position of entering a cow in a horse race.
1.)  I  know everybody in your little tribe agrees the cow is a racehorse……… but It’s really not.
2.). I know everybody in your little tribe agrees that the  cow is a racehorse……… but It’s really not.
It is an agenda driven fantasy.
 

..... how about $2,000?
If I lose, I will pay you in Pudgycoin!, the Digital Currency preferred by the two-dimensional.
If you lose, as you are three dimensional,  U.S. Dollars will be just fine!
I present as evidence.... my photo.

.... and I am sure, BR,  that EVERYBODY ..... without a single exception, will get what they deserve at Armageddon.
But Jehovah is not going to do it because your opinions were slighted on this forum.

As usual BroRando, you have COMPLETELY misunderstood what I said .... BECAUSE ... you never read anything in context, and it appears you are completely unfamiliar with the Society's publication "The Divine Name".  THAT was the context you ignored.
When that happens you draw conclusions that get MORE wrong as the conversation goes on, as the error is not just additive, but multiplied.
.... please go back and re-read what I, and Witness  actually said, instead of your current screwed up perception of what we actually did say.
That is why in the 7th grade they used to teach how to diagram sentences .... a highly valuable tool for determining what a statement is REALLY saying.
Because you got what Witness' statement completely wrong, I am a white Supremacist?
Gimme a break!
( an aside to the 4th wall: Of the 9 billion people on this Earth, not a single one is equal to anyone else ... and that's a fact!)
Whether someone accepts or denies the Holocaust is COMPLETELY irrelevant to accepting or denying the letter J, or other silly premises.