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I have a friend who when he was 12 years old walked into the park near his home in Austria, looked up, and said "God, if you exist I'd like to know more about you ". 2 days later he came into contact with the Witnesses. In the face of family opposition he came into the truth. The family moved Australia hoping to get him away from "those people " but the 1st friend he made in school was a witness, Jehovah looked after him. To this day none of his family have ever responded to the bible's message, how remarkable he did at 12 years of age and alone. Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk

Update: 56 deaths 130 missing 138,000 acres 35% contained 52,000 evacuees 8650 homes destroyed.

I am scared. Terrible things happened in the nearby city. Things are getting worse and worse.

We miss you...

I had to put this here

This photo sort a' sums up the futility of trying to 'fight' these types of wildfire: Wind-driven, steep terrain, no access, too much smoke for the air tankers to fly VFR (visual flight rules)... Another 70% and the Camp Fire will be contained. I can't imagine one of those 747's descending to just a 150 feet above the fire to drop their loads.

I like to bring reproduction into the discussion as well, only on a slightly different tack.. I ask them, if I go ahead and say ok, man evolved, no matter how impossible that would be, how do you account for women? How did another, almost completely different entity evolve, at the same time and rate of development, and be completely compatible in the reproductive functions? Whatever the odds are against man evolving, they just doubled when you add woman...

I want to thank you all dear brothers and sisters who replied to my status! I feel much better now (till I get next bad news:) Living here is very interesting and exiting! Hope to meet you all in person soon and tell you more. Thank you very much!!!

I always wondered why auto dealers use the phrase, "took delivery." Now I get what it's referring to. This looks like a breech birth, which may necessitate a C-section. Thanks for the thought provoking illustration.

We live in an area where, in the summertime, the threat of fire is a constant worry. Living on a mountainside...you know the direction fire goes. More then once those borate bombers have been so close overhead, that if we were outside, we could have seen the pilot. We have hepa filters that are just a part of our life in the summer. I cannot breathe any smoke. And, we have had no fire insurance. A reservation thing. Fire hydrants are alien here-abouts. We found out if we get help from tribal housing, (applied for and got a, “Toyostove”. Kerosene heater.) Anyway, we proceeded to apply for fire insurance. Not an easy process. Then, off went the documentation. Um, sorry they said, there is a moratorium on issuing policies in California. Okay. We waited. They got back to us. It was a go. We were going to fax the signed policy last Thursday. Then, we decided to go ahead and take care of it on Friday, when we were in town. Then, those horrible fires happened. That fire started on Thursday, at 6:30 am. We were afraid we were under moratorium again. When they took our money, we were grateful. But, we have plans on getting our pets out. It sickens me. I could say more about fires, but I will say, that is a fear that Jehovah’s Kingdom will remove from my heart, and, yes, I will be eternally grateful. At least until some memories are removed from my DNA.

As of right now there are 228 people missing, 42 dead...over 7,000 homes gone...

When we talk with someone who believes strongly in evolution, we might feel sometimes overwhelmed at what to say or we may wonder, "What possible example can I share with such a person that is simple yet powerful to prove creation/design?" Well here is 1 possible example. The next time we talk with someone who wants to discuss evolution, we can simply ask them to compare evolution vs. the incredible "reproduction" of life. Here is a simple but powerful reasoning that came from an article on an "Intelligent Design" website. https://evolutionnews.org/2018/11/why-evolution-and-reproduction-are-unnatural/

Like the lyrics to our "Give Me Courage" song say, "feeling fear is human" Have you tried singing the Convention song aloud and envisioning Jehovah's legions of angels, ready to go into battle behind Michael? I like to squint and envision this sight with my eyes of faith. The lyrics make me cry...but they also give me great comfort in these scary times: "Give Me Courage" Doubt and fear surround me The way ahead not clear. Through uncertainty you guide me. I know you're always near. Life may not be easy, But this I know is true: You're the God who's ever loyal. My life is safe with you. Jehovah, give me eyes of faith And help me always see There are more with us than against us. Courageous let me be... Courage, give me courage With courage I'll endure. Jehovah, give me courage. Your victory is sure. Feeling fear is human. In my own strength I'm frail. You have been my Rock and Refuge. Your power never fails. Help me be courageous And let my heart be brave. Lasting harm can never hold me, No prison gate or grave. Jehovah, give me eyes of faith And help me always see There are more with us than against us. Courageous let me be... Courage, give me courage With courage I'll endure. Jehovah, give me courage. Your victory is sure. If you pray and we pray, our Loyal God will save the day! ❤️ Cyber hugs will have to do...until we meet in person, sometime in the WONDERFUL New, non-scary World. ((((((((((((((Hugs)))))))))))))))

Told them not to cut those strings.✂️

Been following this on the news. Sad to hear brothers and sisters have been affected. The whole event is just horrendous 😪 We aren’t immune to bushfires here in Australia. Sending lots of love and prayers to our brothers there

In the 1983 our area near Melbourne was burnt out. While pictures are impressive, to live through it and see the devastation in 3D 360° vision, is unforgettable. 75 died, over 2,600 injured. We evacuated, but our house survived. The sister where we had our book study lost her home. It came with such vengeance and speed, she was unable to prepare. All her worldy possessions were reduced to 3 items: her night gown, dressing gown and a wet towel she had on her head. I fear many of the friends in California will have similar stories to recount. It brings tears to my eyes and a pain in my heart just thinking about this and what our friends are going through right now. I hope all that is lost are material possessions. Older {waiting for wiser} [emoji1353]

Well, I text my Secretary to ask if he knows the status of my application, since some Friends in our Hall were selected as they 'applied as a group'. So, it turns out, my application which I vividly recall submitting to the Brother (by hand) was not entered into the system. I ask him "I thought the Service Overseer had to sign off? He said ' yes,' , so no copy was made? I just moved into the Hall recently and I love and appreciate my Elders. I was not ask to participate with the other group who I go out in service with many of times, so it is ok. I was nonchalant and said ' it's ok'. He told me he will check the file cabinet (maybe he filed it) at the Hall on Friday. If it was his mistake ' he'll send me on vacation in the New World'. I replied " I will come and find you for sure' .

PARADISE, Calif. - The number of deaths from California's worst fire rose to 48 on Tuesday as authorities and family members mounted desperate searches for the hundreds still missing. The Camp fire has scorched 130,000 acres since Thursday, ripping through mountain towns in Butte County. More than 8,800 structures - mostly homes in Paradise - were turned to rubble as the blaze charred the region. The death toll from the fire jumped Monday when officials said they recovered the remains of 13 people as teams continued to search the burned-out rubble of thousands of lost homes. The remains of 10 people were located in Paradise, and three were found in the Concow area.

I came across this some years ago, "the Hebrew word for evening is ' erev' It's root meaning is disorder. The Hebrew for morning is ' boker', it's root being orderly, able to be discerned. So evening to morning in Genesis describes a flow from disorder to order, contrary to the 2nd law of thermodynamics which states that non managed systems do the opposite. Order out of chaos is such an improbable and unusual event that in the subtle language of Hebrew, the bible mentions it 6 times. Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk

I agree with your reasoning, that's why I think that second point should be understood the way I explained, which makes a lot more sense. That Jesus didn't die on a cross is an interesting detail that adds weight to our decision not to use the cross but it's not the main reason. The main reason is that worshipping objects is idolatry. Hmmm. Ultimately I have to agree, we cannot state with 100% certainty that Jesus didn't die on a cross because none of us was there to see it and there are no detailed descriptions nor depictions of that artifact by eyewitnesses. But I wouldn't say "there is no evidence that he died on an upright stake either" as if proof were 50/50. IMO the evidence in favor of an upright stake is overwhelming. Let me summarize some reasons: Eyewitnesses of Jesus' death use two words to refer to the instrument of Jesus' death: stauros and xylon. (I know you know, please bear with me.) In any dictionary you check, stauros means a pole or an upright stake. Homer first used this word to refer to a palisade made of stauroses. I don't know of any single pre-Christian greek text where that word is used to mean a cross. It's funny that those same dictionaries usually add that, only when used in the NT, that word means "a cross". That doesn't make much sense, does it? Did Christian writers use that word with a different meaning than the rest of the world? Why would they do that? Bible writers call that same instrument a xylon. Xylon means a tree, a trunk or a stick. In Greek sources it was never used to refer to a cross, except in late literature from apostate Christendom. That's the term used in the LXX to translate the stake from Deuteronomy or the stake Haman built to hang Mordecai. Practically all Bible translations render this word as "stake" because translating it as cross would be dishonest. So even if stauros could be used in rare occasions to refer to an upright pole with one or several cross-beams attached, the use of xylon discards that was the case in Jesus' execution. That shows that when anyone in the first century heard the words stauros or xylon they thought of an upright pole, not a cross. There was no need to further explain the shape of the instrument. Interestingly, Lucian of Samosata, a satirist from the 2nd century C.E., wrote a book ("The passing of Peregrinus") in which he ridicules Christians and calls Jesus "that sophist of theirs that was fastened to a stake". The word used by Lucian is skolops, which refers to a thorn or a pointed stake, not a cross. So even among non-Christians the widespread notion was that Jesus died on a stake. Besides linguistical arguments, there is another reasoning that sounds very convincing to me. Josephus is universally considered the best source for the practice of crucifixion in Judea in Roman times. He relates in chapter 11 of his "Jewish War" that during the siege of Jerusalem in the year 70, Roman soldiers would crucify the Jews who tried to escape the besieged city by the hundreds. They nailed them to "crosses" (stauros in the Greek original) in all kinds of humiliating and fancy positions, just for fun, and exhibited them in front of the wall to discourage others from escaping. There were so many of them that a a certain point "room was wanting for the crosses, and crosses wanting for the bodies". Now think of this. Judea is rather a desert land which doesn't have many trees. And the Roman army had already cut down thousands of trees to build "a fortification of pointed stakes" that encircled the whole city. As Josephus admits, there was no wood left in the area. Knowing this, and knowing the practical and rather thrifty character of Romans, do you think they would use two stakes for every prisoner, with the additional work of having to cut slots in both pieces and then waste nails to fix them, when they could use only one, save the work and the nails and execute a double amount of people? It doesn't make sense. Here our best source for the practice of crucifixion actually suggests that the Romans didn't use crosses at that time to execute their prisoners, but used one-piece upright stakes instead. There is no proof, archaeological or otherwise, that Romans used crosses to execute prisoners in the first century. It's very true that Christians didn't use the cross nor depicted the instrument of Jesus' death for 300 years. There was no need to, everybody knew what a stauros was like. I visited the Roman cataccombs and they were filled of Christian and "Christian" symbols, but as you mentioned, there is not a single cross there. In fact our guide, who was a Catholic priest besides an archaeologist, confirmed that. Even when the apostate church adopted the cross in the 4th century, it still was not considered the instrument of Jesus death, but rather a symbol of good luck, as it was among the pagans. It was only much later that the cross was identified with the stauros.

They have special teams of anthropologists and forensic experts searching for human remains..

Today I worked out in service with a newly baptized brother from a neighboring city and he told us a very nice story. He said after he got baptized and was in the bathroom changing, there was an older brother in his late 60s or early 70s who had just been baptized as well and they both were ecstatic. He asked the older brother how he came into the truth. The brother said that he used to be a baptist preacher. The brother said “really?! You’re going to have to give me the shortened version of this story.” He said that the brother then told him that he started to see things in the Bible that were contrary to what he was teaching his church. He realized he wasn’t teaching them the truth, so he decided to stop preaching. He said he had ideas of what the Bible really taught but couldn’t find a religion that shared his beliefs. One day he got on the internet looking for the truth and he stumbled on our website. The truth was so clear to him. Finally he had found a religion that taught what he knew to be the truth from the Bible. He’s now one of our brothers. What a great story. This brother was willing to give up his profession to do what he knew was right. If any of you guys came into the truth because of JW.org or know a story of someone who has, please share 🙂

Back in the late 1970's we had a family move into the congregation. They had moved from Michigan to Kentucky to serve where the need was greater. They experienced a flash flood. Almost no warning and they barely escaped with only one of their vehicles. They had to choose vehicles - and chose his work van so he would have his tools. They lost everything! When they moved here, all they had was his work van and the clothes they were wearing. Having been close friends with that couple, I really feel for those who are losing all they have in the various disasters that have occured recently

Some of the first responders for the fires were first responders for the Thousand Oaks mass killing. [emoji22][emoji22][emoji22] Let's just say I'm hoping the "Dutch" is wrong with his earthquake prediction. COME LORD JESUS! Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

Hello brothers and sisters, this my first post on here. After reading these nice ‘Stories about how ones have come into the truth', it reminded me of an experience that a brother told me about many years ago. While at a convention, a sister was approached by a brother who asked, remember me? She replied, can’t say that I do. It turns out that he purchased her house many years previously. The reason for him not forgetting her; he found a number of books and magazines in the loft (under the insulation) and found them interesting reading. I cannot recall the full details of how things developed at this point, but as a result of this find, he ended up having a bible study and got baptised. A nice story in itself but when coupled to the sister's account of things, its quite remarkable. It turns out that she lived in a divided home, living in fear of her husband who wouldn’t allow her to have any of our literature in the house. This resulted in her having to hide her books and magazines with the hope that he would never find them. One of her hiding places was under the insulation in the loft.