Specific Query: From what source did you obtain the 14.4 million for the 7th Day Adventists? I always thought that the JWs outnumbered the 7th Day Adventists in terms of worldwide numbers.
Preaching Work is unique identifier
by besty 23 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
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barry
steve2 the figure of 14 million is in the Wilkipedia but I beleive the JW membership is slightly higher in the US than the SDAs.
I beleive the penticostal groups would have the fastest growth of all.
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JWdaughter
Mormons do NOT count dead people as members or include them in public numbers to inflate stats.
It only takes a letter to ones Bishop or SLC headquarters to be removed as a member. It is NOT a decade long process unless you are fighting excommunication or removal-they have some pretty liberal appeals processes. This is my personal experience, but I haven't heard otherwise from former members. My (also personal) experience with LDS missionary work is that ONE LDS missionary puts probably 50+ hours a WEEK into their missionary activity. Not counting personal study and meetings. It is exhausting. If they were to count just the formal missionary work hours by the LDS versus the ACTUAL 'witnessing' hours put in by JWs, I bet the many fewer LDS missionaries would surpass them in actual missions work. And I won't even go into the 'every member a missionary' work that most active LDS families take seriously.
Don't get me wrong, not defending it, just trying to dispense 'accurate information'. At my last association with the church, what I said was accurate. (also based on personal experience with JW 'witnessing'. Yesterday we rec'd the first comm. from them in about 8-9 years. They shoved a flyer for the summer convention at my husband and walked away. Can you feel the POWER of that witness?
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neverendingjourney
The preaching work for JWs has devolved into a social exercise designed to put in enough hours to keep the elders off of their backs. For those JWs that seek positions of authority and honor, the preaching work is about racking in enough hours to make them a desirable candidate for such positions. For those JWs that already have positions, the preaching work is about keeping their hours high enough so as to not be removed for that position.
The JWs that actually go out in service because they believe it's a life-saving work and want to teach people their (perverse) understanding of the Bible are in the minority. This has been my experience. If the JWs did away with the reporting requirement and ceased to take hours in field service into account for anything they do, my guess is that the number of JWs that regularly participate in the preaching work would drop by at least 50%.
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JWdaughter
I think that to say that if the requirement to be considered an active JW were removed it would halve the number of JWs witnssing is kind generous. I think it would go down to about 20% or less of the present number. My mom gets in 2 hours a month-NO MATTER WHAT! She got a call from a 'brother' the other sunday night during a family dinner. Birthday dinner where bd's were not mentioned:) She gave him her hours. Same as always bro so and so.
That whole 'brother/sister' thing is weird isn't it? Referring to oneself as 'brother smith' is just weird.Did the early Christians refer to each other in such a formal way? I know brothers was used collectively-but they were pretty much on a first name basis weren't they?
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Ténébreux
Yes folks, it's true. JWs are the only ones engaged in the preaching work. Because when a non-JW tells someone their point of view, it's called spreading lies and propaganda; when a JW tells someone their point of view then it's called fearlessly proclaiming the good news.
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Pubsinger
I'd agree with them.
They ARE the ONLY ones who preach their unique message.
It proves that they are the ONLY ones who are followers of the WTBS. NOTHING MORE
Lots of other people preach in lots of different ways.
Try googling "Missionary Societies"
JWs assume nobody else is preaching "Their Message" out of ignorance, or reject and refuse to preach it out of stubborness and in defiance of God.
In reality it's because every other group has rejected it because they see the errors in the JW message.
Most of the doctrinal differences are thousands of years old and were addressed centuries age.
. . . but we all know WTS is bad at history
Pub (PS call me if you're free guys)
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Pubsinger
In my experience - as soon as you point out that others preach, they dismiss it and say "yes but what do they preach" and the whole discussion is now about the CONTENT of the message not the actual preaching work.
That's why I'd agree with them.
Might as well discuss what they really mean instead of wasting time on a straw man.
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Mary
The Watchtower claims that only Jehovah’s Witnesses do the preaching work commissioned by Jesus; “Do you know of anyone else who preaches about God’s Kingdom from house to house throughout the world? (Does God Care? p.30)
What the GB refuses to acknowledge is that even if Jesus and his disciples DID preach door to door, it would (obviously) be because that was really, the only way to preach 2,000 years ago. There were to televisions, no radios, no internet, so obviously everything had to be done differently back then. In the 21st century, due to technological advances, their method of preaching is completely outdated and it's like reinventing the wheel. With the radio, television and internet being able to reach hundreds of millions of people earthwide, it would make far more sense for the Society to focus on that but they won't because that would free up the R&F's Saturday mornings. And we can't have that can we? And once again it's a matter of them picking and choosing what they want out of the bible. If they're so insistent on doing things the way they were done 2,000 years ago, then why does the Society even have a website? There's no mention of Jesus, the apostles or the first century Christians having a web site or being told to report how many hours they spent preaching every month.........Golly, maybe it's because technology has changed in the last 2,000 years? Also, it appears that the first century Christians walked everywhere and didn't stop for coffee breaks so why are Witnesses allowed to ride around in cars and park their carcasses at Tim Hortons every Saturday morning?
As per usual, when you examine their "reasoning" closely, it falls flat.....just like most of their doctrines do.
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steve2
the figure of 14 million is in the Wilkipedia but I beleive the JW membership is slightly higher in the US than the SDAs.
Thanks Barry. It's the same in New Zealand and (I think) Australia: JWs outnumbers SDAs; although in New Zealand, decline is noticeable in both groups, based on census statistics. That's why it seems strange that the Wikipedia states that the worldwide membership of SDAs is 14.4 million whereas JWs hover around 7,000,000.