My wife informed me that while we were gone today, some Jehovah Witnesses came by and left a pamphlet on our door for their big “Memorial of Jesus’ Death.”
I have never had a conversation with a JW, so I was curious if anyone has talked with one and if there was a method to talking with them that you found effective. I do not know as much about their beliefs as I probably should so I am reading about them now and figured I’d ask you all as well. My guess is that they will eventually find their way back to my neighborhood so I’m preparing myself. Thanks!
The difficult part is that their Watchtower translation changes the text of Scripture to get rid of references to His divinity. John 1:1, in their translation:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god.
I have had dozens of conversations with Jehovah’s Witnesses over the years. I have found them the hardest of people, more so than any other cultists and heretics I have witnessed to (pun not intended). If they know you’re a Christian, and they sense that you are trying to convert them, they have been taught to stop the conversation and leave the discussion. The way I handled this was to tell them up front that I was a Christian and then ask them questions about some orthodox doctrine that their translation doesn’t do a good job at obscuring.
For example, they deny that God will punish the wicked for eternity in the lake of fire. Almost all references to hell have been changed, except the Watchtower forgot to delete Jude 1:7:
In the same manner, Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them also gave themselves over to gross sexual immorality and pursued unnatural fleshly desires; they are placed before us as a warning example by undergoing the judicial punishment of everlasting fire.
I use this verse to get them to think about the judgement, which they deaden their consciences to.
A few years ago I saw a video (but can’t recall where to find it right now) where a very high up member of the Watchtower was saved. It took years of witnessing by a faithful brother who never stopped pestering him with questions about their translations (you can pull out early Watchtower translations of Scripture where they had not yet changed the text). A consistent and faithful loving witness is everything.
I had a brief but productive conversation with a JW about 6 years ago. I took him to John 1, and I saw his eyes light up because he thought we were going to talk about “the Word was God” versus “the Word was a god,” which conversation I’ve had with JWs in the past, and never productively. But instead I focused on the Holy Spirit, through the apostle John, presenting Christ as uncreated. I took him to John 1:2-3, which reads, in their translation:
“This one was in the beginning with God. All things came into existence through him, and apart from him not even one thing came into existence.”
I pointed out to him that there was no clearer way for John to explain that Jesus Christ is uncreated than what he actually said—no Greek needed, right there in plain English in his own Bible. There is absolutely no wiggle room in what it says—not even one thing.
I could tell he was a little shaken up by it. We closed out the conversation pretty quickly after that. I pray that God opens his eyes.
There are lots of places where the New World Translation wasn’t modified enough to hide God’s true revelation (can you imagine even trying?!). But for whatever reason I can keep this one specific instance in my head and not the others.
(Credit where it’s due: I heard John Piper explain this years ago.)
My dad has taught us that it’s important with Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons to establish that we aren’t in agreement. Otherwise, he said there can be a lot of useless conversation where you both use some similar terms but mean completely different things.
The dad of one of my friends tells Jehovah’s witnesses that he doesn’t want to take their spot in Heaven (referring to the 144,000 they believe are saved).
I don’t know how much these get to the heart of the matter, but if it’s helpful in any way, I’m glad!
They don’t really care about this, but neither ancient Hebrew, nor Ancient Greek, nor even Latin (till the early sixteenth century) has the letter J. And whatever we know about the pronunciation of the divine name, the one thing we know for certain: it was not pronounced Jehovah.
And Thomas’ response to Jesus at the resurrection shows the disciples understood him to be God.
I always try to talk with them. JW’s are beholden to what the Watchtower tells them. Anytime I bring up anything that the Watchtower doesn’t approve, it’s rejected or falls on deaf ears.
I spent some time looking through the NWT to find passages that haven’t been twisted. Also on JW.org they have the Kingdom Interlinear. This proved helpful because of correct glosses in the interlinear that can be shown against the twisted NWT. I put together pages of Verses that I’ve used before…I’ll post a couple helpful passages later.
One thing I’ve done in describing significance of the Trinity was show how the Lord (Yahweh) of Christianity is more loving. Their Jehovah (single person) created an angelic being to do the heavy lifting in death on a cross and drinking the cup. Our Lord in the person of Christ stepped into his own creation, and was sacrificed for our sins. That seemed to be helpful to demonstrate how loving our God is and how distant their Jehovah remains.
