Jehova Witness/the Kingdom of God

[jessaka]

Jessaka, your experience cannot be verified until after you leave this world. In the meantime, it’s merely your opinion.

I experienced God; it was not an opinion. If it is only an opinion, then I didn’t experience God, did I? That too is only an opinion. And your belief in God is only an opinion too; you don’t really know. And every NDE experience is an opinion, not an experience.But what you don’t realize is that these experiences are not opinion; they are knowing just like Co-redemer’s post above when he explan what it is like when people die. It changes people’s lives after they have NDE experiences.

So what you are asking me to believe is that I did NOT experience God, and if that is true, then I am back to being an atheist. Sorry. No one can take away this experience, this knowing.

I am referring to post 241: “once a person has died they receive a greater awareness of reality, which means, our human brains function around 10% while living on this earth and the other 90 % does nothing. Then upon death a person has a fully matured conscious or awareness at work. Which means that our spirit, our consciousness, our awareness, is functioning for our-very-selves 100 %, not 10%. Well, we begin to see the colors we never saw before death, we begin to see perhaps even radio waves, we even begin to be very very intuitive to the things around us, knowing even the events of the world around us even after death. We have become spiritual because we are spirits. Which means, we do not need to ask why this or why that, because we have become a pure spirit, we’re intuitive, knowing things to its full capacity, since we no longer have an impediment, an obsticle to our consciousness, awarenesses, since we’re nothing but pure spirits.”

I wish you the peace of Christ and I pray that He grants you the grace needed to see the truth of His word and His Church.

 

[CoRedeemer]

If any man will tell you, Jesseka, about the life after death then it would be Fr. Zlatko Sudac who has died well over 90 times. He has the stigmata, (the wounds of Christ) and has monthly the sufferings of Christ. He literally dies and he knows for sure about what happens after you have died. And as I said before, this man dies every time he experiences the sufferings of Christ.

His name is Fr. Zlatko Sudac, a Roman Catholic priest and I’ve got a few videos of him in english.

Here’s a little trailer narrated by the actor: Armand Assante the actor. youtube.com/watch?v=7fi6NouPe3o

If you want to know about Fr. Zlatko Sudac - Click here - stjeromecroatian.org/eng/frsudac.html

Concerning about you death experience: what did you see? And if you had died, therefore, how could you have known that there is no literal hell? What evidence can you give to verify that there is no literal hell?

Besides all that, it is the church’s teaching to believe in hell because it is scriptural. If any man say that there is no literal hell then they are going against the church’s teachings. And we know that the church has power (Matthew 18:17.) Therefore what you are saying is that the Catholic Church has got it wrong for over 2,ooo years. Then it is you against the Catholic Church.

 

[jessaka]

Then you don’t believe in this either?

http://rcspiritualdirection.com/blog/topics/mystical-experience

What I experienced was like what NDE’s experience. I was actually praying deeply because I wanted to know if there were a God, and then I had the experience of God and knew then that there was a God. I was enveloped in Love. That was all there was, and I knew. (That is what NDE’s experience) In this Love there was no judgment, God loved all. When there is Love there is nothing other than Love. Before that I believed that God did not exist. You cannot explain my experience because it is mine alone. I can’t explain it to others either. You can pick it apart if you desire, but it will not change anything for me. The Buddhists said it wasn’t real because they don’t believe in God, but that had no affect on me. You can tell me it is from Satan, but I know better. Satan is not filled with Love. Up until that moment I believe that if there were a God, I was dead in his eyes as the JWs claimed.

P.S. Not everyone who dies experiences God, so just because that saint died 90 times, it doesn’t mean anything.

 

[CoRedeemer]

Dear Jesseka,

What evidence can you give of your NDE to verify that there is no literal hell? And how do you know for sure that you where in hell considering that you did not get the chance to see all the other spiritual places there are?

Do you ever think like this: With due respect to humility, could I be in error about my experience since I don’t have enough experience of it?

Also I have heard testimonies of NDE patients saying that they have seen a place of literal fire. Likewise they have heard their friends’ voices coming out of the blazing fire and telling them to go back and not to come in this place. Do you believe this, and if not, why is this a Near Death Experience report?

If you don’t believe me that there is a literal hell then watch this video? Just look at this man’s face for proof. He was burnt in a plane crash and died.

youtube.com/watch?v=xRSjzY0s0SM&feature=related

youtube.com/watch?v=2hp-ZhXrFxs

 

[jessaka]

Re-read my post. I didn’t have an NDE. What I had was like what they experience. I was praying to a God I didn’t know existed. I never said that I was in hell or in heaven.

Can I look at my experience differently? No. It was too deep for that. Knowing and opinion are different.

I don’t take the words, “fire” as a literal fire. Yes, a few, very few, NDEs experience hellish visions. And maybe they are just visions. I didn’t have a vision. I don’t believe as one NDE said, that he went to heaven and the streets were paved in gold either. I said that I do believe that your post on dying is what is experienced by those who die. We end up where our karma takes us, or as the bible said, “you reap what you sow”, but this doesn’t mean that we will end up in a firely hell or that God is putting us in a firely hell. The bible is filled with metaphors. If you desire to take hell literally, then that is fine.

 

[jessaka]

His experience was being cut off from everything, not a burning fire. Then he experienced God’s love. Do you believe he had this experience of God. This being cut off to him meant that he has always been cut off from God, not that he was literally in hell. If we are to take visions literally, then the book of Revelation’s vision are all literal.

And I believe in Universal Salvation:

Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you. But love you your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again, and your reward shall be great, and you shall be the children of the Highest: for he is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil. Be you therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Luke 6: 27, 28, 35, 36. Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you, that you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven, for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just, and on the unjust. For if you love them which love you, what reward have you? do not even the publicans the same? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more than others? do not even the publicans so? Be you therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect. Matt. 5: 44-48.

Could this language be employed concerning God, if he consigned the sinner to an endless hell? And if he did torment his enemies forever, should we be like him, if we loved our enemies.

The fact that we are like God only when we are kind to those who injure us, demonstrates that God is the same, and as he is without variableness, or even the shadow of turning," James 1: 17, the same yesterday to-day and forever, Heb. 13: 8, it follows that he will always manifest himself with impartial kindness towards all. The spirit of this language is in eternal hostility to the idea of

39

endless torment, and inculcates the restitution of all souls to Him whose property they are. We must treat each other as God treats us, in order to be merciful as God is merciful. If God is not merciful to all who offend him, where is our obligation? and if we must not be unmerciful because he is not, how can he eternally punish? God forbids us to overcome evil with evil, and demands of us that we overcome evil with good.

tentmaker.org/books/Bibleproofs2.html#BD

The Son of Man is come to save that which was lost. Luke 19: 10.

What man of you having a hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, does not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it.

 

[jessaka]

romancatholicism.org/universal-salvation.htm

The Catholic Church on Universal Salvation

 

[T_More]

jessaka:
Jessaka, my statement was in reference to you stating that you know that hell doesn’t exist. I didn’t doubt that you believe in the existence of God.

 

[jessaka]

Hell doesn’t exist as an eternal fire. It is a condition of separation from God. Many people on earth today are in hell, ultimately I believe that all will be saved. Some of these people have a strong belief in God.

Co-Redemer or anyone else: Why do you feel that I need to believe in a literal hell-fire that lasts forever?

I love this post from here:

No, not really. The thing is, you see, I read. And one thing I’ve read is St Isaac, one of the most outstanding representatives of Eastern Christianity. Having read him (no simple task) I can now appreciate why St Thomas Aquinas, after a lifetime spent struggling to express ideas similar to those of some on this thread, dismissed his own entire lifework as “chaff” and refused to write another word.

It appears that St. thomas Aquinas changed his views.

St Thomas Aquinas spent his whole life struggling to make Christianity, an Eastern religion, fit into the procrustean bed of Western (Aristotelian) thought. And his is the style of thought you folks seem to have inherited, one that goes with an unsophisticated and even blasphemous idea of God.

I can’t type up St Isaac’s works for you, but here’s a relevant passage about him by A. M. Allchin from his Introduction to ‘Daily Readings with St Isaac of Syria’ ISBN 0872431738:

" In his own century Isaac seems at times to have been criticized for teaching openly things that many people thought were better kept secret. His teaching that in God mercy has wholly conquered justice could be a case in point. . . . Undoubtedly the hope and prayer that in the end ‘all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well’ has been more firmly planted at the heart of Eastern Christianity than it has been in the West. With us it is only recently that the optimism of grace which we find in Julian of Norwich has begun to outbalance the pessimism of judgement which for centuries has weighed so heavily on the Western Christian mind."

Those with open minds should read the editions of St Isaac by Wensinck, Miller, and Brock, since to dismiss someone without first having read them is hardly wise. Others may continue to slumber on their procrustean beds. It doesn’t really matter since all, eventually, shall be well.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=57181&page=2

If I should read anyone man’s work (not a woman’s view if you notice since I was told that since I was a woman I didn’t believe in a fiery hell), it would be St. Isaac.

 

[Riddle_me_this]

I wonder if Yolene is still reading this thread?

My feeling is that I would not engage myself in any conversation with a Jehovah’s Witness because they do practice mind control even though those who are members do not realize this. A great book to read is: Combatting Cult Mind Control by Steven Hassan. I would suggest she read the book, Crisis of Conscious by Franz. That book is enough to help any person stay away from the Jehovah’s Witnesses. Franz was the in the governing body of the JWs, if not the president. He could have been the president. I would also suggest she begin reading posts on this website:

exjehovahswitnessforum.yuku.com/
What I have experienced myself while being on the forum is that it is filled with the most loving people I have ever met, exJWs, who accept people, who never argue, and who are there supporting each other and all are either disfellowshipped or about to be. And so lest of all I would read this website. It is free; the other books cost.

Well I can definitely see why the disfellowshipping thing would cause suffering but doesn’t the bible say that God disciplines those that he loves. Catholics have ex-communication and this caused some people to starve to death because of being rejected by the church and therefore rejected by the people. I really don’t understand this new way of thinking that a person can do whatever they want and still remain Holy. I mean do you even know what the definition of Holy is? Maybe do some research on that.
But I do believe that the Jehovah’s Witnesses are loving people, just that they do not see the suffering they are causing through disfellowhipping others, and we were taught to believe that all who were disfellowshipped were not repentent (as if that mattered), and that they did not suffer. This website says otherwise.

 

[Riddle_me_this]

Riddle_me_this:
See that’s what I mean. A cult by its very nature tries to stop people from talking to others about their beliefs. They usually hide away in some remote location and have nothing to do with the outside world.
I hear a lot of people on this forum saying that they should do just that. If you are saying that JW’s are a cult and therefore are under the realm of the Devil then you are saying that the Devil is stronger than God.
I don’t remember Jesus or Paul or any of the apostles being afraid to talk to any different faiths.
Personally I enjoy talking to the Mormons and to the JW’s. I find it refreshing that people have enough love for God that they are willing to sacrifice their time and energy to go around and talk to people about the importance of drawing close to him.
The only way another person can shake your faith is if you are extremely weak minded and if you are not prayerfully approaching God before you speak to them.
I mean when you think about it, most of the religions in the world believe basically the same thing. You live your life on earth now and depending on whether you are a good person or a bad person there will be consequences in the next life. As far as Christians go there beliefs are even more similar. They obviously believe in the ransom sacrifice of Jesus Christ hence the title Christian and they all believe in God.
I really don’t see why each sect of faith has so much hatred for another. To me that really doesn’t seem Christian at all.

 

[Theophorus]

romancatholicism.org/universal-salvation.htm

The Catholic Church on Universal Salvation

If you want to know what the church believes on a certain subject I would suggest you check the catechism of the catholic church( available in a very searchable format here: scborromeo.org/ccc.htm and also here:vatican.va/archive/ccc/index.htm) or for a more indepth view the documents from the various councils themselves(most of which are available here: papalencyclicals.net/Councils/index.htm) rather than relying on the skewed views of “ultra-traditionalist” who don’t even believe that there is a pope at the moment.

 

[jessaka]

If she knows enought about her religion then the JWs may not be able to influence her, but the need for posting here tells me that she doesn’t know.

I have studied mind control, especially after leaving the JWs, and that is how I learned that they used it. They use many methods that are of mind control. Not all cults hide from the world, but the JWs don’t allow you to have friends outside of the organization.

youtube.com/watch?v=sw-oF-Z_I7U

and this: jehovahswitnessrevealed.com/2006/jehovahs-witness-mind-control

I consider any religion that tells you that you cannot think for yourself, that you have to believe everything they tell you, and if you don’t, they will shun you, well, that is a cult.

I really don’t care what the majority of Catholics believe in regards to hell. I was curious, but I will hold my own beliefs because I have a mind of my own and can reason.

 

[Kc906]

I really don’t see why each sect of faith has so much hatred for another. To me that really doesn’t seem Christian at all.

I am not sure what your definition of a sect is, and Hatred is a very strong word to use when generalizing. I do see animosity between different denominations, but sometimes it can be justified by scripture.

2 Corinthians 11:3-4 3 But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity[a] that is in Christ. 4 For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted—you may well put up with it

You mention both Mormons and JW’s in your response; well both of these denominations definitely preach a different Jesus than that of Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Many Protestant Denominations. Our calling from God is to be with him for eternity; he wants us to choose him and life instead of the flesh. Being our choice to follow or not, it is also our choice to choose which “lens” we choose to view both scripture and God through. Politically correct or not, all religions are not equal.

If one could discern that Jesus is God, the second person of the Holy Trinity, from both sacred scripture and early Christian testimony, then how could you not want to save your fellow brother and sisters who have been deceived, just as the serpent deceived Eve? How people go about preaching this is what you may dislike based on some examples you have come across, but if this is done through love and compassion then we are obeying God’s calling revealed to us through scripture.

 

[jessaka]

I really don’t see why each sect of faith has so much hatred for another. To me that really doesn’t seem Christian at all.

I didn’t post from hate; I post from concern. If you haven’t been reading this thread, then you don’t realize that I was a JW. I have love for them as I do all people, but I also feel it necessary to warn others when great harm can be done in the name of religion. The JWs happen to be a religion that causes great harm to others, and if you don’t think that shunning is harmful, well, you just don’t know. Those who leave the JWS are often suicidal and alone and are abandoned by family and friends. Think how you would feel if your family members could never speak to you again just becaue you left or were kicked out. Now that is hell.

 

[jessaka]

Passages from the works of Clement, only a few of which we quote, will sufficiently establish the fact that he taught universal restoration.

romancatholicism.org/clement-apokatastasis.htm

“For all things are ordered both universally and in particular by the Lord of the universe, with a view to the salvation of the universe. But needful corrections, by the goodness of the great, overseeing judge, through the attendant angels, through various prior judgments, through the final judgment, compel even those who have become more callous to repent.”

“So he saves all; but some he converts by penalties, others who follow him of their own will, and in accordance with the worthiness of his honor, that every knee may be bent to him of celestial, terrestrial and infernal things (Phil. 2:10), that is angels, men, and souls who before his advent migrated from this mortal life.”

“For there are partial corrections (padeiai) which are called chastisements (kolasis), which many of us who have been in transgression incur by falling away from the Lord’s people. But as children are chastised by their teacher, or their father, so are we by Providence. But God does not punish (timoria) for punishment (timoria) is retaliation for evil. He chastises, however, for good to those who are chastised collectively and individually.”(1)

**Clement insists that punishment in Hades is remedial and restorative, and that punished souls are cleansed by fire. The fire is spiritual, purifying (3) the soul. **“God’s punishments are saving and disciplinary (in Hades) leading to conversion, and choosing rather the repentance than the death of the sinner, (Ezek. 18:23, 32; 33:11, etc.,) and especially since souls, although darkened by passions, when released from their bodies, are able to perceive more clearly because of their being no longer obstructed by the paltry flesh.”(4)

 

[jessaka]

Pope John Paul II:

“Eternal damnation remains a possibility, but we are not granted, without special divine revelation, the knowledge of whether or which human beings are effectively involved in it.” (General Audience — July 28, 1999)

“If the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, is to convince the world precisely of this “judgment,” undoubtedly he does so to continue Christ’s work aimed at universal salvation. We can therefore conclude that in bearing witness to Christ, the Paraclete is an assiduous (though invisible) advocate and defender of the work of salvation, and of all those engaged in this work. He is also the guarantor of the definitive triumph over sin and over the world subjected to sin, in order to free it from sin and introduce it into the way of salvation.” (The Holy Spirit as Advocate; General Audience — May 24, 1989)

“[The Church] is because of all that more serviceable for her mission of salvation for all: God ‘desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.’ … Accordingly, what is in question here is man in all his truth, in his full magnitude. We are not dealing with the “abstract” man, but the real, “concrete”, “historical” man. We are dealing with “each” man, for each one is included in the mystery of the Redemption and with each one Christ has united himself for ever through this mystery. … The [Second Vatican] Council points out this very fact when, speaking of that likeness, it recalls that “man is the only creature on earth that God willed for itself”. Man as “willed” by God, as “chosen” by him from eternity and called, destined for grace and glory-this is “each” man, “the most concrete” man, “the most real”; this is man in all the fullness of the mystery in which he has become a sharer in Jesus Christ, the mystery in which each one of the four thousand million human beings living on our planet has become a sharer from the moment he is conceived beneath the heart of his mother.” (Encyclical Redemptor Hominis 5, 13)

 

[Riddle_me_this]

How was I “wrong, wrong, wrong” when you agreed “it is only a matter of time before” the Kingdom will be set up on earth? That’s my point. Jesus said 2,000 years ago the Kingdom was “at hand” and even arrived. The JWs say it still hasn’t arrived.

They are forbidden from doing independent Bible study, including doing word searches and examining the Greek words.
True.

Hmmm that’s weird, because when I had a JW at my door they said that the Kingdom arrived on 1914 and they used the scripture from my bible at Matt 24:3-14. So I guess that means that they believe the Kingdom is now, not in the future and they can use any bible you have laying around.

 

[Riddle_me_this]

If she knows enought about her religion then the JWs may not be able to influence her, but the need for posting here tells me that she doesn’t know.

I have studied mind control, especially after leaving the JWs, and that is how I learned that they used it. They use many methods that are of mind control. Not all cults hide from the world, but the JWs don’t allow you to have friends outside of the organization.

youtube.com/watch?v=sw-oF-Z_I7U

and this: jehovahswitnessrevealed.com/2006/jehovahs-witness-mind-control

I consider any religion that tells you that you cannot think for yourself, that you have to believe everything they tell you, and if you don’t, they will shun you, well, that is a cult.

I really don’t care what the majority of Catholics believe in regards to hell. I was curious, but I will hold my own beliefs because I have a mind of my own and can reason.

Well I am sorry but by that definition Catholics are a cult. Are you trying to tell me that early Catholics didn’t shun ex-communicated people? Check out what happened to Galileo when he had a different view than the church. Not only was he shunned buy he was put under house arrest. That is a stupid definition of a cult.

 

[Riddle_me_this]

I am not sure what your definition of a sect is, and Hatred is a very strong word to use when generalizing. I do see animosity between different denominations, but sometimes it can be justified by scripture.

2 Corinthians 11:3-4 3 But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity[a] that is in Christ. 4 For if he who comes preaches another Jesus whom we have not preached, or if you receive a different spirit which you have not received, or a different gospel which you have not accepted—you may well put up with it

You mention both Mormons and JW’s in your response; well both of these denominations definitely preach a different Jesus than that of Catholicism, Orthodoxy, and Many Protestant Denominations. Our calling from God is to be with him for eternity; he wants us to choose him and life instead of the flesh. Being our choice to follow or not, it is also our choice to choose which “lens” we choose to view both scripture and God through. Politically correct or not, all religions are not equal.

If one could discern that Jesus is God, the second person of the Holy Trinity, from both sacred scripture and early Christian testimony, then how could you not want to save your fellow brother and sisters who have been deceived, just as the serpent deceived Eve? How people go about preaching this is what you may dislike based on some examples you have come across, but if this is done through love and compassion then we are obeying God’s calling revealed to us through scripture.

So what is there, one scripture that gives reference to the Trintiy? I would think that if it were so important that it might have been mentioned by Paul or maybe Peter. They believe in God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit and they believe they reside together they just don’t believe they are a Tri-God. So because of that detail God is going to damn them to Hell? Hmm doesn’t seem logical to me.