I heard one of the people say in their prayer, "Thank you for Jesus, our elder brother,"

We were shunned by the very people we were to go to meeting with.

I live in a little tiny town called Wittenberg in Wisconsin. My parents were born and raised here and then moved away in the 1940's. My dad drove truck out of Green Bay and then Wausau. They had known each other as they were growing up because all of their parents went to meeting together. As time went on, my mom and dad went together but my dad didn't want to get married then. He wanted to sow his "wild oats" ( those were his own words).
 
My mom went to Chicago to work when she was in her early teens. So my mom met someone else in Chicago and married him. She turned Catholic at that time too. After a few years, she had my brother. It turned out that her husband was an abuser. He beat her so bad one time, he almost killed her. Her father-in-law told her to divorce his son before he did kill her. So she did.
 
Then she started going back to meetings. So when she was back home one time, she saw my dad and he asked her if he could come visit her in Chicago. So they started going together. Within a year, they were married, and I came along a year later. So after mom and dad were married, they wanted to go back to meeting . The workers told them that they could come back, but that they couldn't take part because my mom was a divorced woman. But they wanted the children to be raised in "the truth". So we went to every meeting that there was. I can remember being about 3 or 4 and the lady workers were going to come stay with us and me worrying that I shouldn't wear my pants because it wouldn't be right. I think that this is when the guilt began <g>!
 
When I was 5, we moved from Wausau to Wittenberg because my dad wanted to get out of the city and live on a farm again. After we moved, things changed. The people from Wausau that we had gone to meeting with that my parents considered good friends, were told that they should continue to keep company with us. But, at the same time, there was a change in the workers and worker J.G. and C.M. were in the Wittenberg area. J.G. told the people in the Wittenberg area that they were NOT to keep company with us.

So in other words, we were shunned by the very people we were to go to meeting with.
 
Looking back on it, it probably was a blessing in disguise. So instead my parents had "worldly" friends. Since we didn't have that social contact with "the friends," my brother and I were raised in a different atmosphere. They said that my mom was permissive. But she wasn't. She was pretty strict ! It was just a more reasonable upbringing. I still had long hair and that smug attitude though. You know, the one that says "I'm going to heaven and you're not."
 
We continued going to meetings until I was 17. My mom kept telling my dad that these people weren't Christians and she wasn't going to go anymore. But he and my brother kept going. My brother professed and eventually married a professing girl. They, too, have since quit going to meeting. My dad stopped going sometime before my brother was married.
 
Ok, fast forward about 14 years. My dad was diagnosed with cancer. His family (brothers and sisters) had the workers come to visit. And with that, we (my mom and dad and me and my son) were going to meetings again. My dad died 13 months after the diagnosis. Those were some of the worst months of our lives!

Because of my dad’s illness and knowing that he wasn't going to get better and the way that his family treated all of us ...it was horrible!! They hated my mom and thought that she was just waiting for dad to die. Nothing could have been farther from the truth. They interfered in everything from his medical treatment to the food he ate. But at least I can Thank God that he accepted Jesus (through a lot of long talks with my mom) before he died and I know that we will be together again  someday.

Dad died in November of 1989. Mom and I kept going to gospel meetings.
 
That following September, we both professed at convention. It was a very emotional time for me. My sister-in-law said that they were tears of joy. But they weren't ! They were tears of sadness. I didn't know how this was going to effect my marriage . And I know it sounds so silly, but I thought "Now I can't polish my toenails anymore." Imagine...feeling like I was going to go to hell if I wore nail polish.

It seems so foolish now!!

I have to say that the only good thing that came out of this whole episode was that I accepted Jesus as my Savior. This happened before I professed and in my ignorance I really didn't even understand this. I can remember the exact moment that the Holy Spirit filled my body.

Here I was, free in the Lord and being led into bondage. So when we (my mom and myself) started going to meeting and listening to other people's testimonies, I thought "Hmmmmmm....I must not get it because what they are saying just doesn't make sense. And if they think that they are so undeserving and awful and they have been professing for years ...what chance do I have of getting to heaven ?"

It was so depressing to go to Sunday morning meeting.

And then, when I heard one of the people say in their prayer, "Thank you for Jesus, our elder brother," I could hardly believe my ears. I thought, "Don't these people know that Jesus and God are one and the same, yet separate ?" And then, throw the Holy Spirit in there, too. That they are 3 in 1.

And you are just making Him out to be a man? Oh my goodness!!! This is when all the doubting started. And I really started to listen to what the workers were preaching . 

It didn't make a lot of sense! My mom and I had a lot of long discussions at this time
 
It wasn't too long after that that we got a letter telling us about William Irvine.

That was the beginning of the end.

Finally I just felt like I had had it. Enough lies and deception!

I quit that December.

In January, my mom asked a friend of hers if she could go along to her church. I asked if I could go, too. That was the beginning of freedom ! After we started to go to church and we would be singing a hymn and I would think... "the tune is familiar but the words are different."

The workers even had to pervert the hymns and change the words to sacrifice and works. How disgusting!
 
Now, I have a new song in my heart and I can sing praises to my Lord and Savior everyday !

The real truth set me free !!!
 
Your sister in Christ,
Linda Boreen-Maseman.

August 1999