Archives for June 2014

The next several months had been very difficult on our family. I moved to South Florida with my two little children, Ethan was then five years old and Arielah eight months old. I left behind my work as an owner of private school of music , as a pianist and teacher, my house , my friends and my husband Steve. At this point all I cared for was to protect myself and my children from a certain “spiritual danger” .

With all of my heart I believed that the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses was infallible and I recognized the men – elders in the congregation of Jehovah’s Witnesses to be my “spiritual heads”, the final authority over me. If they have told me to stand on my head every morning – I would do just that. I was not aware that I was brainwashed and a victim of a dangerous abusive cult.

See, my behavior at that time was typical of any Jehovah’s Witness you meet at your door. Despite the fact that these people smile and claim to be “the happiest people on this Earth”, they are under serious mind control and their allegiance is solely to an organization based in New York (USA) where eight men, the governing body, decide all the doctrines and rules of conduct for each Jehovah’s Witness.

I can only imagine the pain I have caused my husband Steve. One day returning from work, he found our house empty and without his wife and children. To my surprise, Steve continued to show love to me and he worked very hard to support his family. He regularly sent me finances to care for the children and paid my housing in South Florida. Yet , after a few months , the decision to separate from Steve took its toll. As much as my husband tried to keep up the support of two places – one in North Florida where our house was and another one in South Florida where I rented an apartment, our finances were stretched to the limit as I could not work due to increasing stress that lead to deep depression.

I still loved Steve very much and prayed daily to “Jehovah” for restoration of our marriage and conversion of my husband to my faith. Thinking that “Jehovah” would only hear my prayers if I do more for Him, I increased my field service hours – house to house preaching and immersed myself in the doctrines of Watchtower even deeper. I surrounded myself only with the sisters and brothers from the Watchtower Organization where I received a great deal of emotional support .

-to be continued-

That’s right! Soon to be FOUR! It is the birth by Spirit that truly matters. (No, I am not going to reveal how old I am in my flesh:))

One beautiful sunny day in August of 2010 Yeshua delivered me from the bondage of religion. Praise HIS name!

I was born into a religion of the Watchtower Society , inc. These people are known as “Jehovah’s Witnesses”. It was my mother that overlooked the spiritual life in our family. My father only followed , mostly to keep the” peace” . I used to spend countless hours preaching “house to house” the Watchtower version of the Gospel and tried to live by peculiar rules of this religion.

After my marriage to Steven BenNun, I was challenged on the identity of the Messiah. After all, Steve knew Tanakh and was a Jew by birth. He believed in “Yeshua” as his Messiah, yet it was not the same “Messiah” I knew from the Kingdom Hall. We married despite our huge religious differences and it was not an easy route.

I loved my husband with all of my heart ( it’s easy to love such a tender soul), but I also believed that Watchtower Society is the only organization on this planet that has the “truth”. Being born in it, this was the only religion that made sense to me. I tried with all my might to persuade my husband to become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. To compromise, he has agreed to study with the elders of my local Kingdom Hall. I awaited eagerly his conversion to my “faith” and prayed several times a day that “Jehovah” would unite our family in spiritual matters. While every area of our married life was close to perfect, when it came to “religion” we had huge fights. In fact, it was so bad, that I believed our marriage would not survive, unless Steve converted to my religion.

What I did not know, was that Steve while studying with the elders of my Kingdom Hall, was writing a book in secret refuting their doctrines. He hoped that one day I would read the book and understand the reasons why he could not convert to my faith. See, by studying with the elders, Steve was learning the doctrines and rules of Watchtower Society in depth , but also challenging elders by The Scriptures on several doctrinal points.

When his “study” time had ended, one of the elders came to me privately and told me: ” Sister Jana, I have bad news for you… your husband will never be one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. In fact, he is a “spiritual danger” to you and your children. You must come to a private meeting at the Kingdom Hall , we will arrange a time for you to meet with two other elders”.

With the broken heart I had agreed to meet with three elders in the Kingdom Hall. They had informed me, that Steve was a spiritual danger to me and my children , and they, as my “spiritual heads” were advising me to separate from him (not divorce him). They suggested that I leave for South Florida where my exemplary Jehovah’s Witness sister by flesh lived and she would help me during this difficult time. They had also arranged a new congregation for me in South Florida where I would be attending regular meetings.

– to be continued-