The 'dubs' came by today just as the wife and I were on the way out. We chatted a few moments and the two guys wanted to know if I had any questions about the Bible. So I asked them to drop by in a day or two and they left me with two thin magazines and a book they jokingly referred to as "the gold nugget."
Cute.
On the back of the Watchtower, under the Bible Questions and Answers section (Dec. 1, 2013):
Q: In what form does Christ return?
A: He was resurrected as an invisible spirit person. (1 Peter 3:18) Then, he went to heaven and sat at God’s right hand. (Psalm 110:1) Much later, Jesus was brought before Jehovah God, “the Ancient of Days,” who granted Jesus power to rule over mankind. So Jesus returns, not as a human, but as an invisible King.—Read Daniel 7:13, 14.
Do the people who answer these questions actually ever read the verses they're citing? When one goes to 1 Peter 3:18, it reads:
For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit: By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison; which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water.
Actually, do they really not understand this means that while Jesus was dead for three days, that his spirit went to preach to those who had lived in the days of Noah -- the spirits in prison? Wait, since they believe the dead "sleep," then how can there be spirits in prison? And when Jesus was resurrected, it wasn't as an "invisible spirit person." Didn't Mary see him? Didn't the apostles see him, and didn't Jesus go through incredible lengths to show the apostles that he wasn't a spirit? "For a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have," he said. He even called for food and ate a fish. Was he really hungry or was he trying to teach them an object lesson? Oh, and didn't he let them inspect his wounds and "thrust" their hands into his side? Again, for what purpose? To prove he was a spirit? Didn't Peter also say that " for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit"? (1 Peter 4:6)
Doesn't this mean that people who are dead, after they've been preached to in the spirit world, can then be judged as though they were men in the flesh, yet continue to live on as spirits? How else can it be interpreted?
When Jesus ascended into Heaven, didn't two angels appear and ask the apostles, "Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." If he was invisible, how could the apostles see him? If he was visible, then why did they say he would come back invisibly??
It makes me feel like I'm in the Twilght Zone!
Why would Jesus go through so many lengths to trick everyone...to deceive his own apostles into thinking he wasn't a spirit when he really was? And how does the writer know that the Ancient of Days is God the Father? Where in the scriptures does it say that? One can read both Old and New Testaments and not see a single reference to whom the Ancient of Days is.
Q: What will Jesus do when he arrives?
A: When Jesus arrives invisibly with his angels, he will judge mankind. He will destroy wicked people but grant everlasting life to those who accept him as King.
Why would Jesus return invisibly? And if he did so, how could anyone see him? He came in 1914, we're told, but no one saw him and, thus, no one could prove whether he did or he didn't. How do you suppose Jesus will be able to do anything if he can't be seen?
So what's this thing with Jehovah's Witnesses and invisibility? When Jesus returns, if he comes invisibly, how is it that "every eye shall see him"? Yet in the same issue of Watchtower, a writer complains people don't feel they need God any more. "They consider him too remote, too inaccessible to play any meaningful role in their lives." Why, I wonder, would that be? Jesus sneaking around invisible all the time, doing invisible things with invisible people, telling his apostles that he's not a spirit yet his body's gone and is nowhere to be seen. What if I ran a lottery and someone won and I said, "Yes, you get ten thousand dollars, only they're spiritual dollars and, by the way, invisible. We left it in cash on your front porch!"
.
