The WTS no longer teaches that each individual must be contacted and are subject to community responsibility what the government and community they live in chooses. (Remember quoting the WTS does not mean I am supporting their beliefs)
*** w10 9/15 pp. 9-10 pars. 11-12 Earnestly Seek Jehovah’s Blessing ***
We believe God’s Word when it says that by giving a thorough witness in the short time that remains, we will save both ourselves and those who listen to us.—1 Tim. 4:16.
We recognize that the end could come at any time; Jehovah’s timing is not contingent on our giving a personal witness to every individual on the planet. (Matt. 10:23)
*** w00 1/15 p. 13 “Keep on the Watch” ***
Fifth, we see a global preaching work being accomplished, which Jesus said would take place just before the end of this system. Jesus stated: “This good news of the kingdom will be preached in all the inhabited earth for a witness to all the nations; and then the end will come.” (Matthew 24:14) Today, that prophecy is in the course of fulfillment on an unprecedented scale. True, untouched territories still exist, and it may be that in Jehovah’s due time, a large door leading to greater activity will open. (1 Corinthians 16:9) Nevertheless, the Bible does not state that Jehovah will wait until every individual on earth has received a personal witness. Rather, the good news must be preached to Jehovah’s satisfaction. Then the end will come.—CompareMatthew 10:23.
*** su chap. 18 p. 143 par. 14 Are You Loyal to Earth’s New King? ***
Jesus foretold what true Christians would be doing today when he said: “This good news of the kingdom will be preached in all the inhabited earth for a witness to all the nations; and then the end will come.” (Matthew 24:14) It is by means of this preaching of the good news that the Kingdom issue is being presented to people everywhere so that they can make a personal decision. For a great crowd, that decision will lead to preservation through the great tribulation. (Revelation 7:9, 10) Are you loyally sharing in this urgent work?
*** w79 12/15 p. 8 How Powerful Is The Good News? ***
That is why, ‘in all the inhabited earth’ today, Jehovah’s Witnesses are calling at the people’s homes with the Kingdom message. (Matt. 24:14) And surely, individually we want our relatives, our acquaintances, yes, anyone whom we can personally reach, also to hear and act on the “good news.” Only by their accepting the “good news” can they escape the divine wrath that is to be expressed against godless mankind, and in that way alone will they see the time when God’s kingdom by his Christ transforms this earth into a place free from pain, sickness and death.—2 Pet. 3:13; Rev. 21:4, 5.
*** w74 1/15 p. 61 Do You Remember? ***
What did the apostle Paul mean when he indicated that the ‘good news was being preached in all creation under heaven’?—Col. 1:23.
This did not mean that every individual had personally been reached, but that the preaching was being pushed to all parts of the earth under heaven.—P. 683.
*** w52 6/1 p. 347 par. 19 Fixing Destinies in This Judgment Period ***
If ignorance during this present judgment period is an excuse and is going to mean a resurrection for ignorant ones in the millennial reign, would it not be advantageous to let all remain ignorant now? If all those not personally preached to now and who are slain by Jehovah at Armageddon are going to return in the resurrection of mankind, why preach now at all? Even those who oppose the view that all Armageddon’s slain are forever dead will admit that those hearing but not accepting the witness now will perish eternally at Armageddon. Just for the sake of reasoning together, adopt their view for a moment. We preach to one thousand persons now, and perhaps one accepts the truth, while all the others reject it and die forever at Armageddon. But if we refrained from preaching to this one thousand, all would die at Armageddon but all would return in a resurrection, not having heard the message. Surely when they returned in that new world far advanced toward perfect paradise, with no corrupting humans around and demonic influence gone, so our opposers would incline to think and say, many more than one of that thousand would conform to new world requirements. Maybe only one would refuse. So why preach now and save one out of a thousand? Why not be silent now and save 999 out of a thousand?
*** w52 6/1 pp. 347-348 pars. 20-21 Fixing Destinies in This Judgment Period ***
That, of course, would be folly. It would mean eternal destruction for the witness who remained silent. It means the stones would cry out the warning, if the watchman class failed to do so. (Ezek. 33:7-9; Luke 19:40) The gospel-preaching is going to be done earth-wide, for Jehovah says so. And whether it is done on the basis of personal or family or community responsibility, the peoples of all nations are going to be separated into “sheep” and “goat” classes, for Jehovah says so. Those whom he slays at Armageddon will remain forever dead, for his prophetic pictures made at the time of the Flood and at the time of Sodom and Gomorrah’s destruction say so, along with the parable of the sheep and goats. This view is corroborated by John 5:28, 29 (NW): “The hour is coming in which all those in the memorial tombs will hear his voice and come out.”
21 Note that John 5:28, 29 limits resurrections to those “in the memorial tombs”. This means that only those whose existence Jehovah retains in his memory will be resurrected, which remembrance is indicated or symbolized by the expression “memorial tombs”. That is why criminals considered unworthy of a resurrection were unceremoniously tossed into the Valley of Hinnom, or Gehenna, where their bodies were consumed, unlamented, unburied, without any tomb to remind of or memorialize their former existence. So those not “in the memorial tombs”, or not thus symbolized as being in God’s memory, will not be remembered at resurrection time. What this means to us today is that those now living in this time of judgment and who fail for one reason or another to take a stand for Jehovah, and are therefore slain by him at the battle of Armageddon, will not be retained in his memory for a resurrection. That this group will include the majority of humans now living on earth is shown by Jeremiah 25:33: “The slain of the LORD shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto the other end of the earth: they shall not be lamented, neither gathered, nor buried; they shall be dung upon the ground.” These vast numbers slain by Jehovah and likened to dung strewn over the earth could hardly be considered as being “in the memorial tombs” for Christ to remember and call forth during the Millennium. He does not remember dung.
*** w52 6/1 p. 348 pars. 22-23 Fixing Destinies in This Judgment Period ***
Notice that this period of last days climaxed by Armageddon is called a “day of judgment and of destruction”, after which comes the promised new world of righteousness, the millennial reign.
23 This baptism of fire was foreshadowed by an ancient one, when upon “Sodom it rained fire and sulphur from heaven and destroyed them all”. Later Jehovah “burned up Jacob like a flaming fire” and “poured out his wrath like fire” and “kindled a fire in Zion”, when in 607 B.C. he used Nebuchadnezzar to immerse Jerusalem and Judah in a fiery baptism because of their gross sins. (Lam. 2:3, 4; 4:11, AS) When Christ came to earth John the Baptist spoke of the nearness of a baptism of fire upon the nation of unbelieving natural Jews, when they would be as a tree “cut down and thrown into the fire” and as “chaff he [Christ] will burn [them] up with fire that cannot be put out [by man]”. (Matt. 3:10-12, NW) This baptism of fire came A.D. 70, when Rome’s imperial legions destroyed Jerusalem and killed 1,100,000 Jews and took 97,000 into captivity. A final baptism of fire will come upon those siding with Satan at the end of the thousand-year reign: “Fire came down out of heaven and devoured them.” (Rev. 20:9, NW) Like other fiery baptisms, this one comes at the end of a judgment period, a thousand-year one. There is certainly no resurrection from that baptism of fire, for it is tied in with second death, the lake of fire and sulphur. So fire is unquestionably the symbol for destruction that is final, whether used in connection with Armageddon or with the end of the millennial reign.
*** w52 6/1 pp. 348-349 pars. 24-25 Fixing Destinies in This Judgment Period ***
Those who are disturbed by this view of matters should remember several points. First, if Jehovah destroyed everyone there would be no injustice involved, since none has any inherent right to life. Second, the witness work will be done to the extent he deems necessary for separating all peoples and he will make no mistake. Did he not know before Noah ever preached or built that no others would join Noah and his household in the ark? Did he not know before Lot preached or angels performed miracles in Sodom that there were not even ten righteous ones there? Long before we can determine the bent of man’s mind toward sheeplikeness or goatlikeness Jehovah and Christ can judge and divide without making mistakes. And they are the Judges, not we. Third, the division is not completed yet, the judgment period not over. It is not the unfinished division now existing that counts, but the finished one that obtains at Armageddon’s start. Though we are in a judgment period, we need not view as finally destroyed all who die from various causes prior to the execution of judgment at Armageddon. Some in the preflood world who died before the deluge may be resurrected; some Sodomites who died before fire and brimstone rained down may return; some Jews of Jesus and the apostles’ day not destroyed by the Roman executional forces may live again. But not those slain by the Lord in the Flood, or in the fiery rain on Sodom, or in the judgments executed A.D. 70, or during Armageddon. Some may die during Armageddon who are not slain by Jehovah, such as some of his people whose physical organisms may not be able to endure the ordeal; but the vast majority will be “the slain of the LORD” who litter the earth like dung. They remain dead forever.
*** w52 6/1 pp. 349-350 par. 26 Fixing Destinies in This Judgment Period ***
The preaching work yet to be done, the increases yet to come, the persecutions yet to be endured—all of this will be a further manifestation of Jehovah’s spirit working upon his people and will effect a further, sharper division of mankind before Armageddon strikes. It is not by our own power and might that we will work and increase and endure, but by God’s spirit. Those who fight Jehovah’s visible organization, upon which his spirit is manifest, sin against the holy spirit, unforgivably so. Those not participating in this opposition but condoning it or indifferent to it fit those the parable pictures as goats. Whether actively or passively or indifferently going along with the world in its assaults against Jehovah’s witnesses, individuals come under either personal or community responsibility therefor.—Zech. 4:6.
