Before joining JFJ staff, I actually believed that the phone calls I received and the visits I received from JFJ staff were sincere.
How nice that someone wanted to take the time to come by my house and talk about Jesus and act like they were interested in me and give me the impression that they thought of me as a friend.
It was puzzling that the missionary acted like he was always in a hurry and limited our time together to about 45 minutes to an hour, but, it didn't matter, I liked seeing the JFJ missionary anyway.
Then, I joined JFJ missionary staff, and I found out that I was just part of a CASELOAD. Now I had to make sure I visited at least 10--12 people a week, and at least 10 of them needed to be (excuse the JFJ lingo) UJs!
Well, as time passed, I built up my CASELOAD and I could get on the phone on Monday nights and call these people that really thought that I cared about them and try to narrow down a time to visit them during the week.
Most of the time, finding 10 unsaved Jewish people (UJs) to visit was very, very hard. The JBs (Jewish believers) were more than anxious to see me, but under JFJ rules, I could only see two of them a week and I really wasn't supposed to see the same believers weekly; every two weeks was the limit.
To make things even more difficult the "Contacts" we made were ours like a pair of shoes (actually more like a pair of pajamas). We didn't share contacts. If you got a good contact, that person was like a piece of property.
As I reflect now, I do not quite understand the logic of not sharing people to share the gospel with. Would it really have mattered if more than one JFJ missionary or even a JFJ volunteer, had taken the time to share Jesus with an individual?
What is even more disturbing is how deceptive we were. The people I visited really believed we were friends. They had no idea that I just needed to add their name to my Caseload so that I could fill up 48 plus hours a week of pretending I was doing work for God.
JFJ took any real desire to want to do the work of God away. All JFJ staff eventually became robots only interested in developing caseloads and reaching goals.
http://www.exjewsforjesus.org/
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4 comments:
How sad -- and telling -- that you were by your own words only pretending to do the work of God.
The Jews for Jesus work schedule was forced up on every missionary no matter their actual skills, interests and faults.
We were required to work "12 half days each week."
But, you were required to be at two or three 8:00 AM meetings a week, plus Sunday preaching in Churches and often other branch related events like Bible Studies and Chapel services AND NOT ONE OF THOSE "Other" events (except for the early morning staff meetings) counted on your TIME LOG, at least in my day, under my branch leader.
So your 48+ hour schedule was actually usually 8-12 hours more at a minimum each week.
In that week you did have to do 12 visits with people, two of whom could be Jewish Believers in Jesus.
That was two 1/2 days. Not including the travel time, which you couldn't put on your log, which was a minumum of 1/2 hour in each direction to each visit with someone, thus it usually averaged to at least one more 1/2 day if not two. SO, let's take the larger number which was often the case = 4 half days of work.
You had to three times of standing on a street corner each week.
That = 1.5 half days, plus travel, = 2 complete half days of work.
Subtotal: this brings us to 6 half days of work.
We were required to spend three staff meetings a week, and we were required to complete our administrative work after meetings, which included writing donor post cards thus this became 3 half days of work. Travel to and from work to wherever you were going or coming from did not count, thus you could realistically ad another three hours per day, or roughly another half day thus = 4 half days
Subtotal: 10 half days
We were required to be in the banch on Monday nights calling unbelieving Jewish people out of the phone book or off the Jews for Jesus database which in my day contained 15,000 names, addresses, phone numbers and emial addresses. This came out to at least 1 half day, plus travel = 1.5 half days.
Subtotal = 1.5 half days.
We were required to be at the Jews for Jesus office on Friday nights starting at 3:00 PM to cook a meal and eat it as a staff and invite volunteers that we were trying to "win" into the organization. Dinner was followed by assigned cleaning duties or preparation for Friday night Chapel, then Chapel itself, then cleanup from Chapel. Plus travel is another .5 of a half day.
Total for this = 2.5 half days.
Subtotal: 14 half days
We were required to preach on Sundays at least in the mornings. We could count travel for going to preach. It was RARE to have less than 2 half days on a Sunday.
Subtotal: 2 half days
Subtotal: 16 half days
If you had to preach in the evening, which happened at least twice a month you could add 2 more half days.
TOTAL: 18 half days.
If 1 half day = 4 hours then you worked an average of 72 hours per week, NOT the 48 hours that Jews for Jesus tells the world its missionaries actually work.
Note: If it also happened to be the time of the year when Jews for Jesus does organized donor events these numbers increase significantly, because it was rare that your regular schedule was adjusted to make up for any extra duties assigned to you.
Note 2: If you were in missionary training you were guaranteed to work a minimum of 60 hours per week, which most often translated to being between 72-80 hours per week.
This is abuse.
How sad - and telling - that some JFJ cult member/lover tries to imply we were only pretending to do our work.
My God, how we tried, but the cult’s culture only recorded checks on quota check boxes/required time on time sheets. The goal of JFJ – or so I thought – is to lead Jews to a knowledge of Yeshua as Messiah – and I once did this… but guess what (through no fault of my own) I did not fulfil my weekly goals and got into trouble for not turning in the required weekly quota because I spent time with the new “convert” at the expense of my own weekly log.
JFJ was inflexible, paranoid and histrionic, the Catch 22 is something I imagine all JFJ cult members have experienced - how to deal with the real world… because it does not fit comfortably into time sheets.
I typically worked more than 80 hours a week. But that was only the "logged" hours because there were many many things that I could not log. For example, If I , "God forbid," should meet with a contact who was really interested in knowing more about Jesus for more than 45 minutes, I could not count that extra time. I often met with them for 1 1/2 hours, so my real work time was often more than 100 hours a week.
But I was never sleep deprived, I was always called lazy!
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