Talked to JW's today

[rpinion]

A couple of JW’s stopped by my house today. We talked for a while. I asked them who was Jesus. She stated the Jesus was the Divine Son of God. I asked her if Jesus was created, or was he the Creator. She said he was with the Father for ever. He answers seem to contradict what I have read about JW’s and their beliefs about Jesus. Have they changed their teaching (again)?

 

[mrsdizzyd]

No. They are well-coached on what to say and how to say it before they are allowed to knock on doors. Talk to them a few more times and you’ll see.

Read what you wrote again. She did not contradict JW beliefs. She was circumspect and did not actually answer your questions.

 

[Ioannes_L]

“Could we talk with you for a few minutes about God?”
(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)

 

[Dan_Defender]

Maybe you met a JW heretic
I believe it is standard JW teaching that Jesus and the archangel Michael are one and the same

 

[Diaconia]

Maybe you met a JW heretic
I believe it is standard JW teaching that Jesus and the archangel Michael are one and the same

Well, to be fair, Daniel (love that name - it means “God is my judge” in Hebrew)- all JWs are heretics. Perhaps @rpinion met a material heretic that is also in schism from the original heretical group. An old heresy poured into a new wineskin changeth nothing.

JWs are forbidden from reading materials from other faiths, if you ever need a quick exist give them a Catholic tract.

When they knock again ask them about the hypostatic union, or how to translate homoousios. Or what happened to Jesus body after the dogs ate it, etc.

Their teachings are neck in neck with the lunacy of Mormonism. I’m just not sure who’s in the lead presently.

In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God Jn 1:1

A sinner I remain,
Deacon Christopher

 

[UltimateChikorita]

if you meet a JW, use John 1.

 

[adf417]

A couple of JW’s stopped by my house today. We talked for a while. I asked them who was Jesus. She stated the Jesus was the Divine Son of God. I asked her if Jesus was created, or was he the Creator. She said he was with the Father for ever. He answers seem to contradict what I have read about JW’s and their beliefs about Jesus. Have they changed their teaching (again)?

Chances are if you pushed her on the created-creator question and have her define “forever” you will see the problem. They as a group belive Jesus was both created and creator. They profess Jesus was the 1st thing God created and everything else was created by Jesus. “Forever” in this sense starts after Jesus was created. Either this lady is truly uninformed or and/or very cunning.

Peace!!!

 

[pacloc]

She said he was with the Father for ever.

There is no way a JW would say this unless they didn’t understand what you meant. They do not usually shy away from boldly stating that only Jehovah is God and that Jesus as Michael the Archangel was the only creatiom directly made from Jehovah. They do claim that Jehovah used Jesus to make all other creation. The word forever could be the problem, but I think most JWs think of it as only fitting for Jehovah, not Jesus. Maybe they really wanted to ease passed the conflict so they could talk about something else that they had already planned on talking about.

 

[dochawk]

Well, to be fair, Daniel (love that name - it means “God is my judge” in Hebrew)- all JWs are heretics. Perhaps @rpinion met a material heretic that is also in schism from the original heretical group.

A counter-hereitc?

Heretic squared?

a double negative?



hawk

 

[Odilon]

My standard response is this: “So you are trying to tell me that God would allow a lie to continue on and on through many centuries condemning millions of souls to eternal damnation, until your guy came along in the year 1870 and suddenly got it all right”?

 

[ZeugenJehovas]

XD Good one! We’re already prepared for that misunderstanding. It’s very curious how the Catholic Church infiltrated their ideas into the bibles available back then into them replacing hades into hell as their preconceived idea was of what occurred after death. I thank Yahweh for having conserved Master Texts such as the Septuagint texts besides other ones.

 

[Unnamed]

I like to ask JWs why the Watchtower has gotten so many prophecies wrong. Also ask them where did Jesus say to listen to the Watchtower?

 

[Dorothy]

I always tell them that I am a Catholic and believe everything in the Apostles Creed. I emphasize that I believe our Lord Jesus Christ is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity and he became man to suffer and die for us, and that He is 100% human and 100% Divine.

End of conversation.

I say that calmly and with faith and peace. May the Lord always help me to do that.

 

[mVitus]

Christ promised that not even the gates of hell would prevail against His Church. JW beliefs in the Great Apostasy contradict that. Such beliefs say that hell prevailed against the Church Christ founded. That there had to be a second attempt. To propagate the Great Apostasy, one must deny Christ’s promise.

 

[ZeugenJehovas]

Yes, because He did not make the lie. He allowed the lie because he gave freedom of choice of people to choose the opposite way of his teachings (1 Timothy 4:1) Besides those who for centuries believed what the Catholic Church taught for centuries are not condemned, because they did not know better (James 4:17) God continues to allow people to worship the mysterious god that the Catholic’s claim God is, as if humanity could not know God as Jesus said of the Samaritans, “You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know.”—John 4:22. All this for what? To distinguish those he wanted from those that would not be his for various reasons. Understood by John 6:44 & 65.

If you’re referring to Charles Taze Russell as “our guy”, we know he did not get it ‘all’ right. He was simply a sincere man desiring to go back to the original Biblical teachings by studying it diligently with the resources available at the time. He therefore initiated a group in which they were all to have the Bible as its own interpreter. He then, with aid, formed more groups or congregations (Church-groups) to join his ongoing study and for good reason named themselves ‘International Bible Students Association’ to continue the ongoing study of the Bible to filter out the weed-teachings as we now know. This was prophesy in its making without them having known that they were fulfilling, the Biblical knowledge to be accessible worldwide. (Daniel 12:4) That is why we know studying the Bible is beneficial and we encourage that without fear.

 

[DeniseNY]

All I do is tell them that we’re Catholic, wish them a good day, they wish me a good day and that’s the end of it. I’ve never experienced a problem with them.

 

[ZeugenJehovas]

I would like to ask you where did they make prophetic statements without doubt? I’ll answer you the second question, Jesus did not tell Christians to listen to the Watchtower, rather, he prophesied a faithful and discreet slave would be found educating Christ’s followers on a regular basis. (Luke 12:42) So far Jehovah’s Witnesses as a whole are being educated regularly.

 

[ZeugenJehovas]

Matthew 16:18 “So I now say to you: You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my community {That is, congregation}. And the gates of the underworld can never overpower it.”

We do not deny Christ’s words ever, rather, we look into what was the context and on the same or similar terms used to get the best understanding of what they believed in.

We examine carefully, who was the rock? If it is assumed Peter is the rock, why would Jesus build his congregation upon a man who did not die for all mankind?
If the rock was Jesus, then all the pieces fit in together as Revelation 1:18 says Jesus would not die evermore, so also would anyone who believes him would come to have eternal life (John 3:16), yet that does not mean they could not die, because Jesus’ example is that he did once but would have the promise of resurrecting and therefore death would not overpower them sufficiently when compared to eternal death (never coming to life again). The church as a whole would not be allowed to be “dead” so-to-speak forever but the word does allow for it to be temporarily inactive, but ultimately not forever.

Ephesians 2:20 defines who the rock he referred to is, “You are built upon the foundations of the apostles and prophets, and Christ himself is the cornerstone.” 1 Corinthians 10:4 “For nobody can lay down any other foundation than the one which is there already, namely Jesus Christ”. (Confirmed by 1 Corinthians 3:11) So going against that would be apostasy since it is well stated in the Bible.

 

[mVitus]

We do not deny Christ’s words ever, rather, we look into what was the context and on the same or similar terms used to get the best understanding of what they believed in.

You might consider looking at the Early Church Fathers then who were definitely Catholic.

Matthew 16:18 “So I now say to you: You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my community { That is, congregation }. And the gates of the underworld can never overpower it.”

A different translation than I’m used to, but if your use of congregation is synonymous to Church we might be able to work with that.

why would Jesus build his congregation upon a man who did not die for all mankind?

I could ask you the same about Charles Russel. But why Peter? He knew that He would not always be physically present on this earth. People would come along preaching false gospels. There needed to an authority in interpreting Tradition and Scripture. Christ didn’t leave us a book. He left us a church. And The Church was able to authoritatively decide what was or was not Scripture. (The Bible has no Inspired table of contents.) It’s quite similar to the Rabbis with authority from the Chair of Moses. (Jesus, who criticized the Pharisees, still told people to listen to the teachongs of the Pharisees because they had taken their place on the Chair of Moses. http://www.usccb.org/bible/matthew/23 ).

Side note: It seems you think the rock He mentioned was a literal rock. Is that what you meant or am I misreading you?

 

[Ardent_Fire]

My dad used to invite them in, which annoyed my mom so much.