JW subtitle extractor

Welcome, brothers and sisters!
It’s a pleasure to be with you.
In this update, we’re going to share
a few brief reports.
Then we’ll watch
a very encouraging video interview.
I’m sure you’ll find it faith-strengthening.
First, here are the updates.
In late April,
Brother Mark Sanderson traveled to Poland.
A special meeting
was held at the Assembly Hall in Warsaw
to encourage the brothers and sisters
affected by the ongoing war in Ukraine.
Over 250,000 from Poland,
Ukraine, and the Donbas region
tied in for the program.
One circuit overseer
in the Donbas region wrote:
“[It was a] wonderful program
“and ‘food [at the] proper time.’
“It brings tears of joy
to see how Jehovah loves us!”
After the program,
Brother Sanderson
and three Branch Committee members
traveled 2,500 kilometers,
or 1,550 miles,
throughout Poland to visit refugees
and hardworking volunteers at Assembly Halls,
Kingdom Halls, and border crossings.
Truly, this visit was a warm expression
of Jehovah’s love for his people.
We sincerely
thank all of you for your prayers
and generous donations
that make the relief work possible.
On May 4,
71-year-old Sister Valentina Baranovskaya
was finally released from prison.
She was imprisoned for well over a year.
What a warm reception she received!
We rejoice with you, Sister Valentina!
But we’ve not forgotten that your son,
Roman, is still in prison for his faith.
We keep you both in our prayers.
On May 24,
Brother Dennis Christensen
was released from a prison in Russia.
He spent five years
in various detention facilities.
After his release,
he was immediately deported.
He and his wife, Irina,
are now safe in Denmark,
as we can see in the following video.
Today is a happy day
—a happy day because I,
at least I, got freed from the prison
and I came home to Copenhagen, Denmark,
where I can again be together
with my friends and my beloved family.
I am also looking forward to living
a more normal family life
with my beloved wife, Irina.
I’m very glad,
and I appreciate
all that the brothers and sisters
have done for me in these five years.
All these thoughts, all these letters,
all these prayers,
all the drawings and other gifts
that I got from the children
have encouraged me a lot.
And through all this,
I have always felt that I was not alone,
that Jehovah’s hand
was never too short to save,
to support, and to help.
Many people ask me:
“Oh, Dennis, has the prison time crushed you?
Did they break you?”
No way!
Never ever!
And you know what?
I am more determined than ever
to be faithful to Jehovah,
more determined to preach the good news,
to help other brothers and sisters
and other people to gain their goals.
The goal is eternal life in Paradise,
where we all have the opportunity
to serve and praise Jehovah forever.
So, no, I’m not broken.
No, I’m not crushed.
I’m still here.
I’m back!
We rejoice with you, Dennis and Irina!
Your faith and integrity
have strengthened all of us.
We are overjoyed to have you back.
Although we’re happy
about these developments,
we keep in mind that around the world
over 150 of our brothers and sisters
are in prison for their faith.
In Russia, four brothers
are serving eight-year prison sentences,
and one sister
is serving a six-year sentence.
Hebrews 13:3 says:
“Keep in mind those in prison,
as though you were imprisoned with them.”
How can we keep
our imprisoned brothers and sisters in mind?
If we live close by,
there may be practical things
we can do to assist.
But all of us can pray for them
and their family members every day.
We also can meditate on their fine example.
When we see these brothers and sisters
endure unjust imprisonment
—and do so with joy—
we’re encouraged to imitate their faith,
we’re motivated
to endure our own current trials,
and we’re assured that we can endure
future trials with joy.
In the following video interview,
two brothers from Russia share how they
faithfully and joyfully
endured a four-year prison sentence.
My criminal prosecution
began on July 22, 2018.
It was a Sunday.
A meeting was in progress.
After the search had finished,
they told me that I had to go with them.
I opened the door because FSB officers
were persistently ringing the doorbell.
Then after a few seconds
came the sound of smashing glass.
They had smashed the balcony
and then had broken down
the door on the balcony.
And when my wife had tried
to tell them the door was already open
so that they wouldn’t smash anything,
pieces of glass cut her forehead.
And a vein was—
They cut a vein in her hand.
And then the officers approached me
and showed me the search warrant.
And I said to them:
“I’m not interested in the warrant.
Call an ambulance!”
I wanted to send my wife to the hospital,
but she decided to stay with me.
The search continued for five hours.
So they locked me up.
Two days later there was a court hearing
at which they ruled to place me under arrest
and send me to a pretrial detention center.
The most difficult part
of all the persecution
was being in the pressure cell.
When I entered, or rather,
when the workers and guards
of the detention center
pushed me in there,
the first thing I heard were the words,
“Get down on your knees!”
But I told them that the only person
I bend down on my knees for was God.
Then they started shouting, ridiculing me,
though I didn’t understand
what they were asking of me
or what they wanted.
I only found out after several hours
when they told me directly
that I had to give them information
about two brothers who had been
detained in a neighboring town.
They laid out instruments
of torture in front of me
and said that I wouldn’t
be able to stand it or hold out,
so I’d better agree to cooperate with them.
I didn’t give any evidence
against those brothers
because I knew it would
make their situation worse.
I faced my own hardships
when I was put into pretrial detention.
Every day from morning to night,
they had the radio on.
The radio was very loud in the cells.
People were talking.
Then after several months
in the detention center,
they put me into a solitary-confinement cell.
I was worried about who I would
preach to if I had to spend
the whole period there.
That evening I prayed very hard.
A few days later,
a man was placed in the cell next to mine.
He had been in prison for 13 years.
In the last year,
he had begun to think deeply
about spiritual subjects
and had even started to read the Bible.
We often talked about spiritual matters
—every day for several hours.
I sang Kingdom songs to him
and read scriptures
that the brothers and sisters
had sent me in letters.
One of those who was in the pressure cell
collaborated with the administration,
and physically he was very strong
—like a mountain of muscle.
The thought came to me
that what was in front of me
was actually 80 percent water.
I don’t know,
but maybe at that moment, I even smiled.
But that thought,
which undoubtedly Jehovah gave me,
at that moment
changed my view of those people.
There was a cell next to mine
that was also a solitary-confinement cell,
and it was often empty.
Almost every day,
I prayed to Jehovah
that my friend and brother, Vadim,
would be transferred to that cell.
When Vadim found out that I was making
requests like that to Jehovah, he said:
“Sergey!
You’re too naive!
“You and I, in prison terms,
are ‘partners in crime.’
So by law, we wouldn’t be allowed
to be in adjacent cells.”
I said, “Let’s just wait and see.”
But in the evening,
someone came into my cell and said,
“Levchuk, you are being transferred!”
And they took me out to a different block,
took me into a cell,
and I heard Sergey’s voice
in the next cell through the wall, saying:
“Vadim?
Is that you?”
I said, “Yes, it’s me!”
And he said: “Oh, that’s wonderful!
I begged Jehovah for you!”
And when I heard that he had begged
for me to be moved to the next cell,
I was quite angry
because my return visits had been messed up;
we had agreed
that I would tell them a Bible story.
But then I realized why Jehovah
had arranged things in that way,
because we both needed
emotional support from each other.
And we were together for two weeks.
We read and discussed the text for each day,
and we shared thoughts from letters.
There was a situation
when I was depressed for several days
when I was in the solitary-confinement cell.
Then I received a new package of letters.
I usually sorted them
into those I would read first
and those I would read later.
There was one letter
that I didn’t want to read at all,
so I put it in a separate pile
for the future.
But then something inside said to me,
‘No, you need to read that letter.’
And that letter was the answer to my prayer.
The main theme of this letter
is how Satan uses
one of his most effective weapons
—discouragement.
I started applying the counsel
on that subject straightaway,
and that helped me
to come out of that state of mind
and get rid of negative thoughts.
Everywhere, I was having good discussions
with those in the neighboring cells.
We were able to talk through the walls.
And I kept asking myself
why I was constantly being moved around.
‘Couldn’t I just be left in one cell?’
And at that moment,
I received a letter
in which a sister wrote the phrase,
“If you move from one cell to another,
“view it as being
assigned to a new territory,
as you have completed the previous one.”
I had such a reaction to that!
I said, “That’s the answer!”
In their letters,
brothers and sisters from all over the world
sent various illustrations,
pictures, photographs.
Someone sent this portrait, for example.
It’s my wife, Natasha,
and I sitting in Jehovah’s hands.
All the spiritual food
we got was in the letters,
to the extent that even the entire
three-day convention was written out
and sent to us in letters.
And when I was reading the letters,
it was as though I wasn’t there
in the detention center or the prison colony.
I was with my friends,
as if being with them as guests,
when I was reading their letters.
So it was as though for half
of the three-and-a-half-year sentence,
I wasn’t really there
in the detention center or the prison colony.
Each day throughout
the entire time of my imprisonment,
each morning,
I would ask Jehovah for godly peace,
or a sense of calm.
And in circumstances like that,
words just cannot express
how much you feel that calmness.
It is totally opposite
to the circumstances you’re in,
the company that surrounds you,
or even your state of health.
But to have peace of heart,
that’s a real sense of calm.
As well as that,
I felt enormous support from the brothers
and Jehovah’s love
during the court proceedings
because there was always a large number
of brothers and sisters
at the court hearings.
For the first few times
when brothers and sisters
came for the hearings
on the measures of restriction,
the FSB would write down their names
and then hand them orders
to appear for interrogation.
Then we would arrive for the next hearing
and see the same brothers and sisters there,
and that really strengthened us.
We saw that they were not afraid,
and that they sincerely wanted to support us.
And that was how it was right to the end.
In one letter,
I received the outline for the Memorial,
and I was very eager to give the talk.
Just a few days later,
while exercising in the prison yard,
I started speaking with an inmate
who was interested in the Bible.
On the day before the Memorial,
we were talking again,
and I said to him,
“Did you know that tomorrow
a celebration will be taking place
all over the world?”
I explained to him what the celebration was,
how it was going to be held,
and that there will be a talk given.
And he said to me,
“Sergey, do you have this talk?”
I said, “Yeah, I do!”
And so we agreed that the next day,
on the day of the Memorial,
I would give the talk.
And so the day came.
It was already ten o’clock in the evening,
and the man was still busy with something.
I prayed to Jehovah, “What shall I do?”
And then at 10:30,
he shouts to me:
“Sergey, you can begin!
We’re all listening to you carefully!”
And that was how I began my presentation.
Literally, a few minutes pass,
and I hear footsteps in the corridor.
The inspector comes to my door
and looks through
the spyhole on the cell door.
I ask him, “Did something happen?”
He says: “Nothing, nothing!
Continue reading!
Read!”
I said: “Oh, Jehovah!
Thank you so much.”
And so I continued with the talk.
I knew that we would probably be separated
and that we could be assigned
to separate sections,
so we wouldn’t have
the opportunity to support each other
and conduct meetings,
which was really important to me.
He explained his position,
that he needed to look after me
as I was disabled,
and the administration made the concession.
That was such a support
—spiritually, emotionally, and physically.
We conducted congregation meetings together.
Each week at the same time,
we held the congregation meetings.
Sometimes others would join us
to listen to the talk.
Vadim and I always prayed
in full view of everyone;
that was in the dining hall,
before meetings, after meetings,
and before going to bed.
It was a witness to the others,
and people took note of it.
And because of that,
we were respected for being people of faith.
I always knew that I had
to make special use of this time.
And I prayed.
The whole time,
I said a particular prayer to Jehovah.
I said to him, “Jehovah, you are the Potter,
and I am the clay,
so please mold me.”
So the situations
that I found myself in throughout
those three and a half years,
both the good and the bad ones,
were always opportunities to be molded.
In going through all of those trials,
I saw and felt
that my relationship with Jehovah
was getting stronger
—stronger and more trusting.
That was because in those circumstances,
there was a lot of time for prayer.
And I saw very often how Jehovah
answers specific prayers.
That really drew me closer to Jehovah.
Throughout the whole period of persecution,
I was strengthened
by the words of Jeremiah 48:10:
“Cursed is the one who carries out
the mission of Jehovah neglectfully!”
When I found myself in such
hard and difficult circumstances,
I understood that I had the responsibility
to give a witness for Jehovah’s name
by my conduct and deeds.
Another thing that always
strengthened me throughout the whole time
was the scripture at Isaiah 57:15
and the thought that Jehovah
lives with those who are “crushed”
and who are in a bad place emotionally.
At such times, I was able to imagine
Jehovah sitting right next to me
and stroking my shoulder
and reassuring me: “Everything will be fine.
I am with you.”
I have seen that in all the trials
that have been allowed,
despite their difficulty,
Jehovah has turned them all into blessings.
What a touching interview!
Did you notice
what helped our brothers to joyfully
endure their unjust imprisonment?
They mentioned how vital it was
to keep a good routine of Bible reading,
prayer, and meetings
even though they were in prison.
They witnessed
to others at every opportunity.
And they saw Jehovah’s love and care
in very personal ways.
We can do these same things
to strengthen our faith
and maintain our joy.
Speaking of joy,
what a blessing it has been for us
to return to in-person meetings!
It takes some effort to attend,
but seeing our brothers and sisters,
hearing their laughter,
and joining with them in song and prayer
makes the effort so worthwhile!
It’s another gift from Jehovah
to help us joyfully endure.
So whatever trials you’re dealing with,
don’t lose your joy in serving Jehovah.
As Nehemiah 8:10 says:
“Do not feel sad,
for the joy of Jehovah is your stronghold.”
Brothers and sisters,
we appreciate you
and the joy that you maintain
despite the many challenges we face.
It makes us love you all the more.
From the World Headquarters
of Jehovah’s Witnesses,
this is JW Broadcasting®.

2022 Governing Body Update #4
- 

2022 Governing Body Update #4

Welcome, brothers and sisters!
It’s a pleasure to be with you.
In this update, we’re going to share
a few brief reports.
Then we’ll watch
a very encouraging video interview.
I’m sure you’ll find it faith-strengthening.
First, here are the updates.
In late April,
Brother Mark Sanderson traveled to Poland.
A special meeting
was held at the Assembly Hall in Warsaw
to encourage the brothers and sisters
affected by the ongoing war in Ukraine.
Over 250,000 from Poland,
Ukraine, and the Donbas region
tied in for the program.
One circuit overseer
in the Donbas region wrote:
“[It was a] wonderful program
“and ‘food [at the] proper time.’
“It brings tears of joy 
to see how Jehovah loves us!”
After the program,
Brother Sanderson
and three Branch Committee members
traveled 2,500 kilometers,
or 1,550 miles,
throughout Poland to visit refugees
and hardworking volunteers at Assembly Halls,
Kingdom Halls, and border crossings.
Truly, this visit was a warm expression
of Jehovah’s love for his people.
We sincerely
thank all of you for your prayers
and generous donations
that make the relief work possible.
On May 4,
71-year-old Sister Valentina Baranovskaya
was finally released from prison.
She was imprisoned for well over a year.
What a warm reception she received!
We rejoice with you, Sister Valentina!
But we’ve not forgotten that your son,
Roman, is still in prison for his faith.
We keep you both in our prayers.
On May 24,
Brother Dennis Christensen
was released from a prison in Russia.
He spent five years
in various detention facilities.
After his release,
he was immediately deported.
He and his wife, Irina,
are now safe in Denmark,
as we can see in the following video.
Today is a happy day 
—a happy day because I,
at least I, got freed from the prison
and I came home to Copenhagen, Denmark,
where I can again be together
with my friends and my beloved family.
I am also looking forward to living
a more normal family life
with my beloved wife, Irina.
I’m very glad,
and I appreciate
all that the brothers and sisters
have done for me in these five years.
All these thoughts, all these letters,
all these prayers,
all the drawings and other gifts
that I got from the children
have encouraged me a lot.
And through all this,
I have always felt that I was not alone,
that Jehovah’s hand
was never too short to save,
to support, and to help.
Many people ask me:
“Oh, Dennis, has the prison time crushed you?
Did they break you?”
No way!
Never ever!
And you know what?
I am more determined than ever
to be faithful to Jehovah,
more determined to preach the good news,
to help other brothers and sisters
and other people to gain their goals.
The goal is eternal life in Paradise,
where we all have the opportunity
to serve and praise Jehovah forever.
So, no, I’m not broken.
No, I’m not crushed.
I’m still here.
I’m back!
We rejoice with you, Dennis and Irina!
Your faith and integrity
have strengthened all of us.
We are overjoyed to have you back.
Although we’re happy
about these developments,
we keep in mind that around the world
over 150 of our brothers and sisters
are in prison for their faith.
In Russia, four brothers
are serving eight-year prison sentences,
and one sister
is serving a six-year sentence.
Hebrews 13:3 says: 
“Keep in mind those in prison,
as though you were imprisoned with them.”
How can we keep
our imprisoned brothers and sisters in mind?
If we live close by,
there may be practical things
we can do to assist.
But all of us can pray for them
and their family members every day.
We also can meditate on their fine example.
When we see these brothers and sisters
endure unjust imprisonment
—and do so with joy—
we’re encouraged to imitate their faith,
we’re motivated
to endure our own current trials,
and we’re assured that we can endure
future trials with joy.
In the following video interview,
two brothers from Russia share how they
faithfully and joyfully
endured a four-year prison sentence.
My criminal prosecution
began on July 22, 2018.
It was a Sunday.
A meeting was in progress.
After the search had finished,
they told me that I had to go with them.
I opened the door because FSB officers
were persistently ringing the doorbell.
Then after a few seconds
came the sound of smashing glass.
They had smashed the balcony
and then had broken down
the door on the balcony.
And when my wife had tried
to tell them the door was already open
so that they wouldn’t smash anything,
pieces of glass cut her forehead.
And a vein was—
They cut a vein in her hand.
And then the officers approached me
and showed me the search warrant.
And I said to them:
“I’m not interested in the warrant.
Call an ambulance!”
I wanted to send my wife to the hospital,
but she decided to stay with me.
The search continued for five hours.
So they locked me up.
Two days later there was a court hearing
at which they ruled to place me under arrest
and send me to a pretrial detention center.
The most difficult part
of all the persecution
was being in the pressure cell.
When I entered, or rather,
when the workers and guards
of the detention center
pushed me in there,
the first thing I heard were the words,
“Get down on your knees!”
But I told them that the only person
I bend down on my knees for was God.
Then they started shouting, ridiculing me,
though I didn’t understand
what they were asking of me
or what they wanted.
I only found out after several hours
when they told me directly
that I had to give them information
about two brothers who had been
detained in a neighboring town.
They laid out instruments
of torture in front of me
and said that I wouldn’t
be able to stand it or hold out,
so I’d better agree to cooperate with them.
I didn’t give any evidence
against those brothers
because I knew it would
make their situation worse.
I faced my own hardships
when I was put into pretrial detention.
Every day from morning to night,
they had the radio on.
The radio was very loud in the cells.
People were talking.
Then after several months
in the detention center,
they put me into a solitary-confinement cell.
I was worried about who I would
preach to if I had to spend
the whole period there.
That evening I prayed very hard.
A few days later,
a man was placed in the cell next to mine.
He had been in prison for 13 years.
In the last year,
he had begun to think deeply
about spiritual subjects
and had even started to read the Bible.
We often talked about spiritual matters
—every day for several hours.
I sang Kingdom songs to him
and read scriptures
that the brothers and sisters
had sent me in letters.
One of those who was in the pressure cell
collaborated with the administration,
and physically he was very strong
—like a mountain of muscle.
The thought came to me
that what was in front of me
was actually 80 percent water.
I don’t know,
but maybe at that moment, I even smiled.
But that thought,
which undoubtedly Jehovah gave me,
at that moment
changed my view of those people.
There was a cell next to mine
that was also a solitary-confinement cell,
and it was often empty.
Almost every day,
I prayed to Jehovah
that my friend and brother, Vadim,
would be transferred to that cell.
When Vadim found out that I was making
requests like that to Jehovah, he said:
“Sergey!
You’re too naive!
“You and I, in prison terms,
are ‘partners in crime.’
So by law, we wouldn’t be allowed
to be in adjacent cells.”
I said, “Let’s just wait and see.”
But in the evening,
someone came into my cell and said,
“Levchuk, you are being transferred!”
And they took me out to a different block,
took me into a cell,
and I heard Sergey’s voice
in the next cell through the wall, saying:
“Vadim?
Is that you?”
I said, “Yes, it’s me!”
And he said: “Oh, that’s wonderful!
I begged Jehovah for you!”
And when I heard that he had begged
for me to be moved to the next cell,
I was quite angry
because my return visits had been messed up;
we had agreed
that I would tell them a Bible story.
But then I realized why Jehovah
had arranged things in that way,
because we both needed
emotional support from each other.
And we were together for two weeks.
We read and discussed the text for each day,
and we shared thoughts from letters.
There was a situation
when I was depressed for several days
when I was in the solitary-confinement cell.
Then I received a new package of letters.
I usually sorted them
into those I would read first
and those I would read later.
There was one letter
that I didn’t want to read at all,
so I put it in a separate pile
for the future.
But then something inside said to me,
‘No, you need to read that letter.’
And that letter was the answer to my prayer.
The main theme of this letter
is how Satan uses
one of his most effective weapons
—discouragement.
I started applying the counsel
on that subject straightaway,
and that helped me
to come out of that state of mind
and get rid of negative thoughts.
Everywhere, I was having good discussions
with those in the neighboring cells.
We were able to talk through the walls.
And I kept asking myself
why I was constantly being moved around.
‘Couldn’t I just be left in one cell?’
And at that moment,
I received a letter
in which a sister wrote the phrase,
“If you move from one cell to another,
“view it as being
assigned to a new territory,
as you have completed the previous one.”
I had such a reaction to that!
I said, “That’s the answer!”
In their letters,
brothers and sisters from all over the world
sent various illustrations,
pictures, photographs.
Someone sent this portrait, for example.
It’s my wife, Natasha,
and I sitting in Jehovah’s hands.
All the spiritual food
we got was in the letters,
to the extent that even the entire
three-day convention was written out
and sent to us in letters.
And when I was reading the letters,
it was as though I wasn’t there
in the detention center or the prison colony.
I was with my friends,
as if being with them as guests,
when I was reading their letters.
So it was as though for half
of the three-and-a-half-year sentence,
I wasn’t really there
in the detention center or the prison colony.
Each day throughout
the entire time of my imprisonment,
each morning,
I would ask Jehovah for godly peace,
or a sense of calm.
And in circumstances like that,
words just cannot express
how much you feel that calmness.
It is totally opposite
to the circumstances you’re in,
the company that surrounds you,
or even your state of health.
But to have peace of heart,
that’s a real sense of calm.
As well as that,
I felt enormous support from the brothers
and Jehovah’s love
during the court proceedings
because there was always a large number
of brothers and sisters
at the court hearings.
For the first few times
when brothers and sisters
came for the hearings
on the measures of restriction,
the FSB would write down their names
and then hand them orders
to appear for interrogation.
Then we would arrive for the next hearing
and see the same brothers and sisters there,
and that really strengthened us.
We saw that they were not afraid,
and that they sincerely wanted to support us.
And that was how it was right to the end.
In one letter,
I received the outline for the Memorial,
and I was very eager to give the talk.
Just a few days later,
while exercising in the prison yard,
I started speaking with an inmate
who was interested in the Bible.
On the day before the Memorial,
we were talking again, 
and I said to him,
“Did you know that tomorrow
a celebration will be taking place
all over the world?”
I explained to him what the celebration was,
how it was going to be held,
and that there will be a talk given.
And he said to me,
“Sergey, do you have this talk?”
I said, “Yeah, I do!”
And so we agreed that the next day,
on the day of the Memorial,
I would give the talk.
And so the day came.
It was already ten o’clock in the evening,
and the man was still busy with something.
I prayed to Jehovah, “What shall I do?”
And then at 10:30,
he shouts to me:
“Sergey, you can begin!
We’re all listening to you carefully!”
And that was how I began my presentation.
Literally, a few minutes pass,
and I hear footsteps in the corridor.
The inspector comes to my door
and looks through
the spyhole on the cell door.
I ask him, “Did something happen?”
He says: “Nothing, nothing!
Continue reading!
Read!”
I said: “Oh, Jehovah!
Thank you so much.”
And so I continued with the talk.
I knew that we would probably be separated
and that we could be assigned
to separate sections,
so we wouldn’t have
the opportunity to support each other
and conduct meetings,
which was really important to me.
He explained his position,
that he needed to look after me
as I was disabled,
and the administration made the concession.
That was such a support
—spiritually, emotionally, and physically.
We conducted congregation meetings together.
Each week at the same time,
we held the congregation meetings.
Sometimes others would join us
to listen to the talk.
Vadim and I always prayed
in full view of everyone;
that was in the dining hall,
before meetings, after meetings,
and before going to bed.
It was a witness to the others,
and people took note of it.
And because of that,
we were respected for being people of faith.
I always knew that I had
to make special use of this time.
And I prayed.
The whole time,
I said a particular prayer to Jehovah.
I said to him, “Jehovah, you are the Potter,
and I am the clay,
so please mold me.”
So the situations
that I found myself in throughout
those three and a half years,
both the good and the bad ones,
were always opportunities to be molded.
In going through all of those trials,
I saw and felt
that my relationship with Jehovah
was getting stronger
—stronger and more trusting.
That was because in those circumstances,
there was a lot of time for prayer.
And I saw very often how Jehovah
answers specific prayers.
That really drew me closer to Jehovah.
Throughout the whole period of persecution,
I was strengthened
by the words of Jeremiah 48:10:
“Cursed is the one who carries out
the mission of Jehovah neglectfully!”
When I found myself in such
hard and difficult circumstances,
I understood that I had the responsibility
to give a witness for Jehovah’s name
by my conduct and deeds.
Another thing that always
strengthened me throughout the whole time
was the scripture at Isaiah 57:15
and the thought that Jehovah
lives with those who are “crushed”
and who are in a bad place emotionally.
At such times, I was able to imagine
Jehovah sitting right next to me
and stroking my shoulder
and reassuring me: “Everything will be fine.
I am with you.”
I have seen that in all the trials
that have been allowed,
despite their difficulty,
Jehovah has turned them all into blessings.
What a touching interview!
Did you notice
what helped our brothers to joyfully
endure their unjust imprisonment?
They mentioned how vital it was
to keep a good routine of Bible reading,
prayer, and meetings
even though they were in prison.
They witnessed
to others at every opportunity.
And they saw Jehovah’s love and care
in very personal ways.
We can do these same things
to strengthen our faith
and maintain our joy.
Speaking of joy,
what a blessing it has been for us
to return to in-person meetings!
It takes some effort to attend,
but seeing our brothers and sisters,
hearing their laughter,
and joining with them in song and prayer
makes the effort so worthwhile!
It’s another gift from Jehovah
to help us joyfully endure.
So whatever trials you’re dealing with,
don’t lose your joy in serving Jehovah.
As Nehemiah 8:10 says:
“Do not feel sad,
for the joy of Jehovah is your stronghold.”
Brothers and sisters,
we appreciate you
and the joy that you maintain
despite the many challenges we face.
It makes us love you all the more.
From the World Headquarters
of Jehovah’s Witnesses,
this is JW Broadcasting®.


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