Jehovah’s Witnesses are very zealous with door-to-door evangelism.

They will usually engage people with their views about God’s kingdom on Earth, and they call their meeting houses Kingdom Halls.

However, they have a fundamental error. They do not believe that Jesus Christ is God. They believe that the Son of God is the first and highest of God’s Creatures, but not that He is God, and so they do not believe in the Christian Trinity.

This is their most fundamental error. Their error can be demonstrated by Jesus’ own teaching. The Jehovah’s Witnesses’ version of the Christian Bible reads:

“For the Father judges no one at all, but he has entrusted all the judging to the Son, so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.”

John 5:22-23 in the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ New World Translation.

Note the phrase – “just as” they honour the Father. However, Jehovah’s Witnesses do not “honor the Son just as they honor the Father”. How so?

Jehovah’s Witnesses honour the Father as God, but they do not honour the Son as God.

They use various devices to get round this text, but the teaching is plain, even in their own version of the Bible. Jesus explains at length in John’s Gospel what He means by being the Son of God, but Jehovah’s Witnesses prefer to listen to what their leaders say.

Father and Son

Where there is a son, there is a father. There is no God the Father without God the Son. Jesus, as the Son of God, teaches us about the Father and He is the only Person Who can teach us about the Trinity.  Only God can teach us about the holy Trinity – one God existing as Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Unipersonal god

Before Christianity, people believed in many gods, called polytheism. Only the Jews were monotheistic.

“Hear, O Israel. The LORD our God is one LORD, and thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”

Deuteronomy 6:4-5

The Hindus were polytheistic, with thousands if not millions of gods, which modern Hindus now reinterpret as multiple facets of the one God, because polytheism is now seen to be so crass.

The Greeks were polytheistic, with multiple gods. The Romans were also polytheistic, copying the Greek gods, using Latin names for the same Greek gods and goddesses. For example, the Greek god Zeus was called Jupiter by the Romans, although Apollo had the same name.

The Lord Jesus Christ taught the Jews that their one God was three Persons – God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Ghost – in eternal communion with each other.  God is not lonely and He is self-sufficient.

Rabbinic Judaism rejected this teaching to the present day.  Muhammad copied this Jewish monotheism and developed the mantra you will often hear from muslims, about the one god of islam.  However, in both cases it is “unipersonal monotheism”, which has been adopted by Christian Unitarians, Jehovah’s Witnesses and other sects.

Jesus teaches us “Trinitarian monotheism” – one God as a Trinity of Persons.

Theism to atheism

There is a spectrum of beliefs about God. Theological terms include theism (belief in God), atheism (belief in no God nor non-material spirit) and pantheism (everything is god or spirit, such as animism or paganism).  In the western world you will come across people who say that they are spiritual but not religious, meaning that they believe in Something spiritual but not the standard religions nor the Christian God.  They acknowledge that there must be some “explanation” for the world and the universe but they do not know what it is, nor how to describe it.  It was ever thus.  The apostle Paul preached to the Athenians about “The Unknown God” Whom they did not know Act 17:23.  Although our conscience bears witness to the Being of God, He is unknown until He explains Himself to us.  This is why we need His revelation of Himself, and in particular His Own Son, Jesus Christ Heb 1:1-2.

Religious zeal

Jehovah’s Witnesses are zealous; but religious zeal is not enough.

The apostle Paul bore witness to Jewish zeal.  Writing to the Christian church in Rome, he acknowledged:

“I bear witness to them that they have a zeal for God, but it is not according to knowledge.  For being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God.”

Romans 10:2-3.

One will discover that individual Jehovah’s Witnesses do not have a personal relationship with Jesus Mat 7:22-23, just like many others who zealously follow their religious leaders thinking that they are following Christ.

Most Jehovah’s Witnesses do not partake of the Lord’s Supper but simply watch the bread and wine go past them.  They desperately need a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ, and so do all of mankind.  However, Jehovah’s Witnesses are not taught the whole truth about Jesus, nor about God.  This is serious. 

Jesus pointed out that zeal is not enough. 

More importantly, Jesus bore witness against false Christian zeal.

Come and welcome to Jesus Christ.

Links

27 Jun 2017: Do you honour Jesus Christ as Lord?