You get to comment at Witness meetings. You can prepare for them. This is a very unusual norm for a religious gathering, where there is usually no point in preparing, nor anything to prepare for: they are just in-the-moment experiences.
Not so with the Witnesses. One can comment. So, in connection with this week’s Bible reading (Jeremiah 16-17), I made a comment on 17:10:
“I, Jehovah, am searching the heart, Examining the innermost thoughts, To give to each one according to his ways, According to the fruitage of his works.”
My remark: The heart makes a grab for what it wants then charges the head to devise a convincing rationale. This lends the impression that the head is calling the shots but it is the heart all along
The final chapter of the Bible Stories books was reached, culminating in Revelation. ‘What Bible character would you like to meet in the resurrection?’ was a final question. I observed that the line would be pretty long for the main characters, so I would drop down to second tier, such as Elihu. He was the fellow who stuck up for Job when the other three louts were feeding him to the shredder. At the same time, though, he gave Job correction, for the latter had gone too far in pushing back on these jerks. (I remarked in Workman’s Theodicy, ‘Who hasn’t been there? Going to where you would never otherwise go but for responding to the goads and taunts of others?’)
Revelation 12:9 was included in that final chapter. I remarked on how it helps us get our heads on straight. Witnesses may hear that they are misled, that they are ‘brainwashed,’ even that they are of a cult. Revelation 12:9 points out that it is exactly the opposite, that it is Satan misleading the “entire inhabited earth.” For the most part, cult accusations come from those who want the greater world to dictate one’s terms, not any Bible-based agency that may set different goals.
There were the questions posed young people—what might you do should this or that situation arise? Say—this was one of the questions—you want to give full-time service a shot but someone is leaning on you for college. How to respond? I’ve nothing against college, assuming one knows why one is going. Just because schools push that way is not a good answer. I observed that demanding immediate action is a fine tell for sniffing out a scam. ‘Well, I’ll think about it,’ followed by ‘No! You should do it now!’ It’s a sign of a scam.
It may have changed, but I recall guidance counselors in high school alarmed at the suggestion that I might take a year or so off before pressing on to college. ‘No, you should do it now!’ they insisted, lest you lose the momentum. Mark of a scam, as far as I can see. I didn’t get much out of college, though I graduated, and never did a thing with it afterwards. My fault, not theirs. Not anyone’s fault, really, or if anyone’s fault, it was the guidance counselors who could not imagine anything but shoving kids into college whether they be ready or not.
For the opening talk, Jeremiah-centered, “It Matters Whom You Trust,” the speaker mentioned the U.S currency that reads “In God We Trust.” I have heard this so many times over the years, but there was a new twist last night. Coins have said it since the Civil War. But paper bills did not say it until 1955. In the midst of the Cold War, it was a direct kick-back at the Russians. ‘Godless, atheistic Russia’ was then the object of Western fear, so America put slogans right on the dollar bill to show that their people were not that way.
****** The bookstore
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