TrueTomHarley

Alright, alright, already—it was Srecko I was speaking of. It does play into another bit of speechmaking for me. I don’t think it is proper to entreat ones who have so firmly put himself into the opposite camp after having weighed all the evidence. I don’t do it. When I address any of these characters, it is not to sway them—I don’t think that I have seen a single person here alter their position since I came across this site long ago, so what sort of a self-pugilist would pour their time into that futile effort? When I address these characters it is to speak to whoever might lie beyond—and that may be nobody. It is also the case that whatever is hammered out eventually appears in some other form where it may do some good. The fat lady has not yet sung, so who can say where anyone will be when she does? Still, I don’t entreat them to come back on the side of the angels. They have decisively shown where they want to be. Perhaps some day they will no longer want to be there, but if so, it will not be because of my invitation. They have rejected that invitation decisively after having once accepted it and I think it is wrong therefore to keep extending it. Essentially, they have tasted and pronounced Jehovah bad. Beyond saying ‘check your tastebuds,’ there is little response to be made. These are persons—many of them—who conducted themselves so outrageously and unremorsefully in word or deed that they were put out of the congregation, and as such, I keep my distance spiritually. And now they will come online and engage me in earnest spiritual conversation? It’s not happening on my watch. it is sort of a fine line—the distinctions between engaging, responding, conversing, answering, and fraternizing. Billy (the bad cop) sees no distinction at all between them and simply practices roasting and toasting. I am not so sure that he is wrong—though I am sure enough about it not to do it myself. It’s mostly the horrible PR that he leaves in his wake that is objectionable. To the extent people think he is a Witness, he paints them as the most intolerant, rigid, and anger-prone people on the planet.

How do you know that ‘Judgement day’ is still a long way off yet? Didn’t you just base that on your previous assessment that God has not yet produced a true Anointed? It does not sound like much to hang one’s hat on. It wasn’t you. I don’t. You, too, have read it wrong. I guess John has a point. it is well to identify who you are talking about and not just leave that identification to the thread. Even those who you think are paying rapt attention are just waiting for the other blowhard to stop talking so that they can make their own speech.

Well, I think he already has picked, long before he came here, and from our point of view, it is not wise. It is one thing that I appreciate about Billy Flamethrower, even if I think he is doing nearly everything else all wrong—he does appreciate when choices have been made and he no longer entreats those who have made them.

I don’t think you read this correctly. It had nothing to do with you, nor were you on my mind.

Some bromance

To be fair to you, John, I did a partial cut and paste and forgot to take out what was irrelevant. Sorry. That doubtless confused you even more than usual. My bad. I changed it. Again, maybe my bad. JTR will howl that I have thwarted factfinding by the dozens if not hundreds of honest tried and true citizens that he is convinced have nothing better to do with their time but hang out here.

What! Have you gone back to the devil as a nasty red fellow with horns and a pitchfork who otherwise has no influence? It is Satan whose ‘spirit’ pervades the air. Do you think that foul air has been sealed out of the university? Or does it emanate from it? Granted, it is not so everywhere. I recall reading somewhere (not in a WT publication) that business majors and engineering majors seldom study at the expense of their faith. It is more to be found in today’s ‘liberal arts’ that is intertwined in everything. When it is not the food that is bad, it is the restaurant in which it is served, with it’s maitre d’s, chefs, and waiters. A la carte is the way to take your education wherever possible—cherry picking the best of it—rather than simply unlatching the top of your head and let today’s atheistic and/or politically minded professors (usually leftist) fill it with whatever they want.

Hmm. It looks to me like you may need a visit from the ‘bad cop.’

It may be so, but that is not how anyone understands the word ‘lawyer.’ Even few of us would understand it that way, and it is too trivial a point to be so glaringly out of sync with common understanding of the word. We are trying to communicate, after all, not make people think we are weird. “If the trumpet call is indistinct, who will get ready for battle?” Some words are not so trivial. They are essential and so we hold to and spread them, even in the face of a world that thinks otherwise. Such as the definition of the individual Witness as a minister. We hold to it, even though the world does not think of ‘minister’ that way. To most of them, a minister is someone who ‘has a church’ and ‘gets paid.’ I almost think that we flirted with that definition briefly in the late 70’s to align more with how the word is understood by most people, but then changed it back because it is so core. Blabbermouth probably knows about that. But there is no sense in harping on a different understanding of ‘lawyer’ and I am glad that it is no longer done. (It isn’t, is it?)

If people do not have moral underpinnings, you are almost better off not educating them. They can do less harm that way. If janitors and car-wash attendants had run the financial world back in 2007, they might have found a way to beat the taxpayer out of a day’s wage. As it was, highly educated MBA’s and lawyers, without the morals to balance their education, ran it and they discovered a way to bury future generations, even nations, in inescapable debt.

Each time there is a slam on the GB for their unenthusiasm over higher education, I think that proponents of that education should be required to take ownership of the world that it has collectively created. Unlike the GB, the movers and shakers of this world are, with few exceptions, highly educated. Let them point proudly to the world that their brand of education has made. See how many have the chutzpah to do it.

Didn’t it turn out in the movie that when he finally pulled his helmet off, he was your father?

[from JTR, actually] I will admit that I am glad they have stopped referring to Paul as a lawyer, which they did a few times & that brother is on permanent potato peeling duty in the Bethel kitchen. I mean, technically he was, as a Pharisee, but that is not how anyone understands the term today.

Duh. Good JWs will not be here. They will have more regard for the preference of the organization not to get into cat fights with those who oppose. Come on, Billy, let’s retire to the secret closed JW forum where this character can’t come so we can continue to plot our good cop/bad cop strategy. If you like, I’ll even reverse roles, be the bad cop, and let you be the good cop for awhile.

hee hee hee (so are you)

John, you are such a two-year-old. You know very well that I rebuked him harshly not long ago, and that he took offense to it. Nonetheless, I know your style, and I now know that you will be taunting me over this forever. So...is Billy my friend or not? Yes, assuming that he is the brother that he claims to be, he absolutely is. He is loyal to God. He is loyal to Christ. He is loyal to the human organization that does its level best to follow their lead. He is my friend. He may sometimes display himself a marauding and unhinged pit bull, but he is my friend. In the Kingdom Hall, we would get along just fine. Maybe, since you have paired us, we will roll with the illustration of ‘Good Cop/Bad Cop.’ (Guess which one he is) The good cop really and truly does not want you to fall into the hands of the bad cop, for he knows how bad that bad cop can be. He thinks the bad cop is doing it all wrong and indeed wonders sometimes whether the bad cop can truly be a cop. However, the bad cop thinks the good cop is a namby-pamby, fraternizing with the crooks way too much, and wonders ‘where is his loyalty?’ The metaphor works well enough. I like it. Let me direct you, therefore, to the L.A. Confidential movie in with the corrupt official taunts the good cop: “Oh, give me a break! You are not going to pull the good cop/bad cop routine on me, are you? I wrote the book on that routine!” Whereupon the bad cop grabs him by the scruff of the neck, nearly drowns him in the toilet, and then dangles him by a single foot over the 20th floor window that he had kicked out. Placing the jellyfied mess that is left of the corrupt official back on the couch, as the two leave, he says, “Was that in your book?” Your witness, Billy. Go as easy on him as you are capable of.

You know, sometimes I think that Billy and I are going to get along just fine.

If I “hide away” at your comment—which I have since addressed—then I notice that you run like a scared rabbit at mine. When you say you will be satisfied only with a “true” anointed and I say you won’t, I notice you do not answer that. Why not? Because you know that what I pointed out is true—if the “true” anointed is anything like the true anointed of the first century, they will make adjustments to changing times and circumstances. They will make some mistakes. They will give evidence of human imperfection. As soon as they do, you will rail against them as LIARS, because that is your pattern. There is no reason to think that it would change. Why did you “hide away” at that remark, John?

Oh, for crying out loud! You think you have found a ‘gotcha’ do you? If ones leave Jehovah’s earthly organization and still wishes to call themselves Jehovah’s Witnesses because they say they are still witnessing for Jehovah, be my guest—they are perfectly welcome to do so. In no time at all, however, they will be witnessing for Yahweh, because the name Jehovah is associated with those they don’t like. Soon thereafter, they will be witnessing for The LORD, because people keep giving them the fisheye when they say ‘Yahweh.’ After that they will stop witnessing altogether, because it is hard, they find themselves unsupported, and they have also lost the thread of what to talk about. That is the pattern that is seldom deviated from.

He works with them very well indeed, just like he worked with the ‘earthen vessels’ of the first century. One cannot shoot oneself in the foot more decisively than by insisting, ‘If it is not perfect, then it is filthy.’ What! Because you and your friends are trying to take them down means that God is not working with them? There is not one writer in the Christian Greek Scriptures who does not devote attention to ‘the burning that is taking place among you’. (1 Peter 4:12) https://www.tomsheepandgoats.com/2019/01/who-are-the-apostates.html

Does he do that? I have wondered what his hangup was.

I think it is more along the lines of what a certain brother observed. The younger ones got to be ragging on each other, and he would lean back and marvel, “It’s amazing what Jehovah accomplishes considering what he has to work with.”

"A week later I was working on Pretencia Pond Way with Tom and Pearl Pearlsnswine, and also Bill Ding. I was already off to a bad start. It’s always dicey working in the same car group with Tom Pearlsnswine. I knew he’d do something outrageous. He always does. More than once I’ve vowed never to work with him again, but I always repent....As we cruised by the massive homes of Pretencia Pond Way, where the only Bible to be found in many is Consumer Reports, I watched uneasily in the mirror as Tom’s brow darkened. He began to mutter under his breath and presently erupted: “I don’t know how it happened! The pigs have escaped from the barn and they’re in the farmer’s house!” He is such an idiot!" - Tom Irregardless and Me If I ever rewrite this, I will include the detail that Pearlsnswines live in the trailer park. Actually, I think I have included that somewhere.

“How does it feeeel, to be on you own, with no direction hoooome, like a rolling stooone.”

No. You still don’t have it right. If one is witnessing for Jehovah, then that person is one of Jehovah’s Witnesses because he or she is doing what the name says. Why should that be so hard to understand? Baptism indicates a resolve to be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. It doesn’t indicate whether one is doing so or not. That is made clear by giving evidence of having a ministry—in this case, by turning in the time that you object to.