To JW's: According to your practice of disassociation and staying seperate, isn't this site to be avoided?

Question

JW's You do disassociate (or whatever you are calling it these days) those who no longer are members of your religion.

You by practice do not associate with disfellowshipped family members, or any other person disfellowshipped.

You are warned about associating with "worldly" people.

OOOHHHH, so the Governing Body decides...NOT SCRIPTURES....

VERY INTERESTING

Answer 1

As someone who is affiliated with JW as an unbaptised Publisher working on baptism this year, I can say that Y! Answers is not associating with anyone on this site in itself. There is no practise of disassociation per se but there is Godly counsel in the scriptures found in:

1 Corithians 15:33 Do not be misled. Bad associations spoil useful habits

I personally do not befriend people on the internet and am not part of buddy lists of people whom I have never met so cannot vouch for their authenticity. The counsel of the Governing Body of Jehovah's Witnesses advise JWs to avoid personally associating with people on the internet as the internet can be a snare that can trap people to deceitful desires of apostates who try and turn people away from the Truth. (You only have look at some websites to know they are out there yet pretend to be affiliated with JW.)
The internet is fraught with dangers and buddying up with someone who you have never met and cannot easily prove they are who they say they are is why the counsel is given to avoid such traps.

I know some people who claim to be JW do try and get personal correspondences going and attempt to begin an email friendship but that is going against counsel they are given at meetings, assemblies and conventions and I treat such "witnesses" as highly suspect to being really in the Truth as they are ignoring sound sheperding.

There is nothing wrong with communicating to people on the internet but when you can vouch to who they really are by face to face friends you have met at meetings and other JW social events then it is good to exchange emails.
Jehovah's Witnesses have plenty of opportunities to meet one enough through meetings, assemblies and conventions they do not need to try and befriend to faceless people who claim to be JW on the internet.

Being on Yahoo Answers is not a bad thing but I accept the counsel and do not personally befriend people I do not know.

Further, Jehovah's Witnesses who have disfellowshipped family members can still communicate with them and have a relationship as they are still family. My wife who is now in a congregation in England has family members who are disfellowshipped and she just come back from the U.S. from visiting them and really enjoy her time seeing her family. She misses them dearly.
My wife hopes they will return to the Truth someday but she sets the good example for them and perhaps they will think hard about returning to Jehovah.

I thought you were asking a serious question but your additional comments prove you are not asking for genuine reasons to understand about Jehovah's Witnesses. Shame.

Answer 2

Actually, it is scriptural, 1 Cor. 5: 9-13 says: "In my letter I wrote you to quit mixing in company with fornicators, not meaning entirely with the fornicators of this world or the greedy person and extortioners or idolaters. Otherwise, you would actually have to get out of the world. But now I am writing you to quit mixing in company with anyone called a BROTHER that is a fornicator or a greedy person or an idolater or a reviler or a drunkard or an extortioner, not even eating with such a man. ...remove the wicked man from among yourselves."

When it comes to family members, we want to limit association due to their attitude being unrepentant. As mentioned the bible warns "bad association, spoils useful habits". If the unrepentant person is doing drugs, drinking etc.. is this the type of person we would want to associate with if we are trying to life a clean moral life?

As far as Yahoo Answers. I am just answering your question, I do not feel that we are associating together anymore than if I was at your door and you asked me this question.

As far as chat rooms and My Space, yes these are not a good place to hang out. That was even brought out on 60 minutes. A good scriptural reference for this is at Ps 26: 4 & 5 "I have not sat with men of untruth, and those who hide what they are I do not come in. I have hated the congregation of evildoers, and with the wicked ones I do not sit."

Answer 3

Hi. First thank you for your concern and curiosity. Let me start by explaining who and what I am.

I am James Moore. I am 22. I am Human. I am an individual. I am a Business man. Most importantly I am a Christian, one of Jehovah's Witnesses.

That said you are right there have been MANY warnings and not just to/within Witness circles but in general about chat rooms and the like. Let's face it, we live in an at times dangerous world.

I have seen quite a few on here who claimed either to be Witnesses, (current or former) or to have knowledge of us or our beliefs. Of these ones it seems most wouldn't know a scripture if it bit them. When I first came on Y!A I started sending messages thanking ones who gave ACCURATE info on us. When I saw someone say they were a Witness I would send a simple hi, and also, a please do not claim to be a Witness if you are not. Interestingly enough I got several responses from people explaining, or making evident, that they were in fact NOT Witnesses.

I am sure that some of the ones on here who post and claim to be Witnesses are in fact what they say. As for why they use Y!A I will let them say.

The reason I first started using Y!A had Nothing to do with religous beliefs. I, as I mentioned earlier, am Trying to get a business/hobby off the ground. I have started on eBay and a few other sites. I often have questions about tech and the like, also other subjects. I had/do hope that Y!A could/can help me in finding such answers. To get answers, one must ask questions, to ask questions, one needs points, to get points. one must answer questions/vote on answers, to get points quickly one needs to get Best Answers, to get Best Answers one should answer about what one knows. So I started answering about various subjects. For a larf I decided to type in Jehovah's Witness, I was shocked at how many questions they were, most rather easy for me to answer. I was also shocked at the amount of wrong(and I mean WAYYYY off) answers there were. So I started answering questions. It is as simple as that.

I am rather open to others about the fact that I use Y!A. No one has had a problem with it yet. I do agree that we, and I mean EVERYONE, must be careful what we do and who we do it with. Discernment is ALWAYS needed. Is Y!A THE place to go to preach/promote anything???? No. However being a Witness is/should be, a 24/7 thing. It is more than just knocking on doors. It is also answering questions, living by the Bible, trying to be encouraging, etc.

As for the communication and the warnings. There, sadly, are bad people in this world who LOVE to harm others. It is a very tenuous thing to communicate online. When answering on Y!A I find there is little 2way communication. For the most part it is simply someone asking a question, and then me giving my 50 cents(wow inflation). I will at times scan the other answers to get a feel for any other info I need to add. Rarely the asker or another answerer will want to follow up with me, this genrally consists of 1 IM or email. I agree wholeheartedly with trying to keep communication to the real world. Case in point if someone asks about our beliefs I try to always remember to suggest they go to a local Kingdom Hall with their Bible and ask their question.

Hope this, overlylong, answer helps answer your concerns/questions.

Answer 4

We don't have a practice of disassociation so your question is irrelevant.

My bad, didn't know that's what you meant cause it wasn't stated in the question. But that still has no relevance to what the question was. You spoke of avoiding Y/A, not those that have disassociated themselves or been disfellowshipped.

Answer 5

Jesus said that we are in the world but no part of the world. Accordingly, we are on this site but don't participate in all the beliefs of this site.

Answer 6

Poignant observation.