Posts by myelaine

49

Is the Jehovah's Witness religion Christian?

by Zagor Almanah in

is the jehovah's witness religion christian?the answer to the question is, "no.

it is not christian.

" like all non-christian cults, the jehovah's witness organization distorts the essential doctrines of christianity.

myelaine

dear Cold Steel...

you said: " What troubles me is when someone not only condemns the doctrines of other Christians, but then puts them on a greased slide to Hell. To my understanding, Hell is not vindictive, but remedial,"

I don't know if you are talking to me specifically because I haven't put anyone on a "greased slide to hell". Jesus was the one who expounded on hell and the merits of HIS sacrifice in order to AVOID it. As to my mentioning OTHER faiths...they are just that. Neither the JW's, the mormons nor the bahai's have the bible as their sole source for doctrine. They have added to, and in the case of the JW's and bahai's, taken away from the message of salvation for all who would believe (john 8:24) found in the bible.

JW's proclaim that Jesus is the Mediator for the F&DS only and that the rank and file themselves are granted mediation through the F&DS. The bahai's don't call themselves christian as that faith group is comprised of many different faiths under the direction of their own GB who follow the teachings of their founder whom they perceive to be the returned spirit of Christ in the person of a persian man named baha'u'llah(1817-1892). the mormons, as you know, believe that the bible speaks of the God of THIS planet and that there are MANY other gods ruling on many other planets and that male adherents are in training to become one of those many OTHER gods...to the mormon, Jehovah is a true God as much as the male adherent will be a true god some day too.

as to leading "godly" lives, there is no question that each individual JW, bahai, and mormon is encouraged to do just that. but...the bible states that in the apostasy of the last days, as well as the willfully wicked, there will be those having a form of godliness but never coming to the knowledge of the truth.(2 timothy 3:1-8)...notice vs. 8...these resist THE truth and are disapproved concerning THE faith. it seems that paul believes and teaches that disapproved is disapproved...in the same way that sin is missing the mark whether by an inch or a mile. these people are estranged...how do YOU explain that a person can be estranged from THE truth of THE christian faith yet at the same time BE a christian?

where do you get your understanding that hell is remedial and that people will be released?...that idea is similar to the catholic doctrine of purgatory that can be drawn from the words of Jesus in luke 16:19-31, which I think is picturing the intermediate "staging area" after death where the righteous and the unrighteous go before the resurrection of the just and the unjust (daniel 12:2) but even in daniel 12:3 there seems to be a need for those resurrected to turn TO righteousness and the NT identifies the only means of achieving that "state" of being righteous before God is through the mediation of Jesus Christ...being washed clean by the blood of the Lamb. Our own righteousness being as filthy rags.

love michelle

49

Is the Jehovah's Witness religion Christian?

by Zagor Almanah in

is the jehovah's witness religion christian?the answer to the question is, "no.

it is not christian.

" like all non-christian cults, the jehovah's witness organization distorts the essential doctrines of christianity.

myelaine

dear Kosonen...

the JW "theologians" have misconstrued the form of the Godhead and perceive Jehovah as the Father (only). The trinity doctrine provides for the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit being Jehovah.

This can be shown by the scripture that you have quoted...otherwise both God the Father and Jesus the Son as well as the apostle paul have been dishonest. The scripture that you quoted says that Jehovah (whom you say is the Father only) is the redeemer...and Jesus affirms that He is the redeemer...and the scriptures say that the same Spirit (Spirit of God, Spirit of Christ) that raised Jesus from the dead will also redeem from death BY giving life to our mortal bodies. romans 8:9-11...if you believe that the bible is a source for the truth about God then do you see how these references to scripture need to be reconciled because we KNOW that there is only ONE true God?...that is what the trinity doctrine does. the JW theology leaves the questions that these and many other references in scripture generate...unresolved.

you are somewhat right when you say: "Jesus replaced Adam as father for christians." Jesus didn't replace adam as father, we are still of adam and born in sin because we are human. Jesus is Father of the NEW creation (2 cor 5:17)...by the Spirit we cry out, "ABBA Father" (romans 8:15)...

we KNOW that Jehovah said this:

"The LORD of hosts, Him you shall hallow;
Let Him be your fear,
And let Him be your dread.
He will be as a sanctuary,
But a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense
To both the houses of Israel, As a trap and a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
And many among them shall stumble;
They shall fall and be broken,
Be snared and taken.”

Bind up the testimony,
Seal the law among my disciples.
And I will wait on the Lord ,
Who hides His face from the house of Jacob;
And I will hope in Him.
Here am I and the children whom the Lord has given me!
We are for signs and wonders in Israel From the Lord of hosts,
Who dwells in Mount Zion. isaiah 8:13-18

...Jesus is the stone of stumbling, it was Jesus and what He taught about WHO He was that became the snare and trap for the pharisees (john 8:19, 24) and it is Jesus who is the Father of many children of the NEW creation...BUT, as you can see, it is Jehovah (LORD) speaking in this scripture... Jesus doesn't "replace" the Father that the JW calls Jehovah. Jehovah is the exponent of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit being the ONE true God.

you said: "I draw a logic conclusion between the confusion in the second and the third centry among christians that lead to the Nicean Creed and what the apostles and even Jesus forewarned about."...How IS it logical to you that satan is able to thwart Jesus, the apostles, all the people who are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and the whole plan of God for the church by infiltrating and dislodging the truth by means of "imposters" within a few hundred years...and then THAT church of "imposters" and the message it preached grew and covered the whole earth?...Who do YOU ascribe Almightiness to with your "logic"?

love michelle

49

Is the Jehovah's Witness religion Christian?

by Zagor Almanah in

is the jehovah's witness religion christian?the answer to the question is, "no.

it is not christian.

" like all non-christian cults, the jehovah's witness organization distorts the essential doctrines of christianity.

myelaine

“Hear, O My people, and I will admonish you!
O Israel, if you will listen to Me!
There shall be no foreign god among you;
Nor shall you worship any foreign god.
I am the Jehovah your God,
Who brought you out of the land of Egypt;
Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.

“But My people would not heed My voice,
And Israel would have none of Me.
So I gave them over to their own stubborn heart,
To walk in their own counsels.

“Oh, that My people would listen to Me,
That Israel would walk in My ways!
I would soon subdue their enemies,
And turn My hand against their adversaries.
The haters of the Jehovah would pretend submission to Him,
But their fate would endure forever.
He would have fed them also with the finest of wheat;
And with honey from the rock I would have satisfied you.” psalm 81:8-16

love michelle

49

Is the Jehovah's Witness religion Christian?

by Zagor Almanah in

is the jehovah's witness religion christian?the answer to the question is, "no.

it is not christian.

" like all non-christian cults, the jehovah's witness organization distorts the essential doctrines of christianity.

myelaine

I look at it this way...

the early followers of Jesus were taught by the apostles using the OT scriptures to identify and authenticate Jesus and what He was sent to do. Besides this there was a lot of oral teaching regarding the formation of the church including the organizational structure, doctrines, beliefs etc. In this they formed the church body. As the apostles died others were entrusted to continue on in the ministry. We should hope that as the decades turned into centuries there WAS an unbroken line of people in authority united by LOVE and RESPECT for the Lord Jesus, the gospel message...AND a healthy fear of displeasing the God that they worshipped (integrity and honesty demands it considering WHAT was written and passed down both OT and NT) By the time that the Nicene creed was formulated and the canon was agreed upon there is no reason to believe that LOVE, RESPECT and a healthy fear of God had diminished within the core church.

To deny the orthodox doctrine of the deity of Jesus Christ and the doctrine of the trinity is to call into question the agenda of these most early followers of Jesus Christ and WHO motivated them. That smacks of disrespect and a lack of brotherly love for ALL those who cultivated THE faith.

I can't help but think of the apostle Paul and his willingness to enter into congregations and root out sources of error in God's field. He was completely adverse to accommodating those who would corrupt the gospel message that he was given to preach...anti-Christ's and other gospels (possibly gnostisism?) abounded and he endeavoured to stamp them out with as much (not the same) ferver as he put into stamping out the first christians. That "speaks" to me...that tells me that he was concerned about the truth being administered because the real truth does mean more than prevailing opinion.

The JW, the mormon, and the bahai all have different definitions of WHO Jesus is and WHO God is...these definitions are different from each other and different from the orthodox. If it doesn't make much difference what you believe about the One who saves you, then why would the apostle paul bother to try and correct erroneous BELIEF?...What we believe about God and Jesus IS important...it unites us where differing beliefs have a tendency to cause division.

Moses wasn't allowed by GOD to enter the promised land because of unbelief...to what degree are His modern day representitives willing to accommodate unbelief by the supposed authority of in His name?...will the result fracture more than unify?...WHO motivates the modern agenda and is it the same as the early christian congregation?

I like the scripture about the Master who hired workers for a denari and the same amount was paid to each regardless of how long they worked...the above mentioned from OTHER faiths still have opportunity to labour for the Master and receive as much for an hours work as those who have worked all day :)

love michelle

12

Red Sky, the Morning

by compound complex in

upon a sea of glass i'd set my sail,.

awaiting another dawn's new light.

approached the hour and morning's .

myelaine

"Fear not, for I am with you;
I will bring your descendants from the east,
And gather you from the west;

I will say to the north, ‘Give them up!’
And to the south, ‘Do not keep them back!’
Bring My sons from afar,
And My daughters from the ends of the earth—

Everyone who is called by My name,
Whom I have created for My glory;
I have formed him, yes, I have made him.” (isaiah 43:5-7)

143

A thought experiment about what it means "to be" GOD

by Terry in

all believers in god begin with the premise that he is the creator.. but-stop!.

go back one step.

what about before god was a creator.. creation is the "beginning" for the created--but--not for god.. .

myelaine

dear Terry...

you said: "You are using words, but, you are not communicating."...

In my first sentence I said that God always knew and experienced LOVE. In humans, the emotional state of being in love with someone is a learned experience. A few days ago my son was racing upstairs to get something and he stopped short grinned at me and said: "Random hug" and came and hugged me...I didn't take that as an opportunity to teach him that the feeling that caused him to want to give me a hug was an emotion called love...he likely would have looked at me and said, "I know". God didn't have to learn through experience...He knows LOVE.

you said: For God to always know.......is a phrase at odds with meaning.

God=an existing intelligence without origin...(you seem to understand what I was communicating here)

always=non identifiable position in time (in which no events can be measured)...(and here)

know=to possess facts, knowledge, ideas OF non-events, non-things, non-existent insubstantiality...(but here?...the emotion of LOVE though it IS real it is not generally considered a fact, a non-event, a non-thing, or a non-existent insubstantiality)

Every component of your sentence FAILS to communicate an actuality...(you left out the word LOVE and love is an emotion that doesn't need words in order to communicate that it is an actuality)

you said: "Just like me saying "circle that is square" is stringing together a non-thought into a sentence.

Love=the strongest possible emotion attached to a value placed on something...(now you isolate the word LOVE from my sentence construction (a deconstruction) in order to show what?...how I string together a non-thought into a sentence?)

Trinity=primitive pagan construct which posits mutually exclusive disambiguity while asserting identity without differentiation!...(the construction of the doctrine of the trinity was about differentiating between the persons that exist in the Godhead...would it have made more sense to YOU if I said a unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit?...somehow I think you knew what I was talking about when I said unity of trinity but you chose to express your ignorance by calling that phrase "nonsense")...

If you would avail yourself of the VITAL WITNESS of the Holy Spirit then satan might not be able to take advantage of your egotism which labels these things which relate to God..."non-sense".

love michelle

143

A thought experiment about what it means "to be" GOD

by Terry in

all believers in god begin with the premise that he is the creator.. but-stop!.

go back one step.

what about before god was a creator.. creation is the "beginning" for the created--but--not for god.. .

myelaine

dear Terry...

you said: "BEFORE God began creating...there was nothing and nothing to know....nobody and nothing to LOVE."...

God always knew and experiences love because of the unity of trinity...another "other" toward which love can be given and received...a constant reciprocity, so to speak, apart from creation. This God wanted to share the beauty of love.

the WTBTS Jehovah God is portrayed as a solitary entity who "needed to create" an object(s) for His affection.

love michelle

148

Jehovah's Witnesses View of Jesus Compared to the Early Church

by cofty in

the following is an extract from something i wrote 16 years ago soon after leaving the watchtower.

i am posting it because it may help honest jws consider how far their beliefs are at odds with new testament christians.

if they have "the truth" then their attitude to jesus ought to reflect that of the apostles.

myelaine

dear Vanderhoven...

you said: "It is sufficient for salvation to believe Jesus is the Son of God without fully grasping His ontology...if one has a relationship with Jesus Christ."...

how can a person who doesn't understand the ontology of Jesus but who continues denying the teaching of the Holy Spirit by clinging to their own understanding actually be in a "biblically normative" relationship with Jesus if they have been denying the teaching of the Holy Spirit through His MANY means?...

the OT has statements saying that God is our salvation, King etc., Jesus said: "before abraham was, I AM","the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son and shall call His name Immanuel". isaiah 7:14...which is translated, "God with us". matthew 1:23...the NT testament saints called Jesus God, Saviour and King, the orthodox church has consistantly taught that God is a unity of trinity...and the Holy Spirit is behind leading all of these people to believe and write this truth.

I think that accepting that Jesus is God the Son based on what the Holy Spirit began to teach in isaiah, what Jesus said in the NT, what the NT saints said and what the church teaches (whether one understands it or not) displays subjection to God in humility. That is the kind of person that the Holy Spirit CAN teach...

love michelle

5

Jesus the proto suicide martyr...

by mP in

jw
friends

why couldnt god simply forgive the so called sin debt, why lower his standards and require human sacrifice....

myelaine

dear mP...

you asked: "Why couldnt god simply forgive the so called sin debt"...

scripture says that the wages of sin is *death...so, while death pays for sin it doesn't forgive sin or populate Gods kingdom.

God bought those who would believe back from death BY forgiving the sin debt with shed blood (OT and NT) while giving these ones life through or because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

" But concerning the resurrection of the *dead, have you not read what was spoken to you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” matthew 22:31-32

*the implication of scripture is that the physical death of a man isn't followed by death of the spirit as well.

love michelle

148

Jehovah's Witnesses View of Jesus Compared to the Early Church

by cofty in

the following is an extract from something i wrote 16 years ago soon after leaving the watchtower.

i am posting it because it may help honest jws consider how far their beliefs are at odds with new testament christians.

if they have "the truth" then their attitude to jesus ought to reflect that of the apostles.

myelaine

dear mP...

you said: "I love how people go about making statements about early xians when the truth is we know next to nothing about them...they treated them [slaves] so well they ran away aka Philemon"...

you just stated that onesimus ran away because he was being treated badly...you don't know that but you state it as fact.

The few words we do have suggest he could have "ran away" to hear paul and while with him he became a believer(v. 10)..."For perhaps he departed for a while for this purpose, that you might receive him forever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, as a beloved brother, especially to me but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord." philemon 15-16

love michelle