You’ve got Questions? We’ve got Answers

The Watchtower Society are up to their old tricks again. I visited their website and the landing page ⁱ showed a giant clock and a man in a state of alarm. The caption ran, ‘Are we Running out of Time?’

How many times have they got this wrong, yet it’s as though they just can’t help themselves? It’s another year so let’s have another doomsday campaign.

The world, of course, is in an alarming state right now, and you might be forgiven for thinking these really are ‘the last days,’ or as I have heard some say, ‘the last of the last days.’ It is a subject we might come back to at some future time.

I live with the understanding, of course, that the Lord could come tomorrow...tonight! In light of that I keep my lamp filled and the wick trimmed ready for the arrival of the bridegroom.

That said, I am also conscious of the fact we must live until then, and live as he would have us live. Nobody can do that if they are paralysed with fear, and I’m afraid many are today, even within the church.

Cults often prey on fear, notably but not exclusively the Witnesses. If you read beyond that alarming headline you find an urgency about the plight of the world, followed by a very attractive description of the world God has prepared for those who obey God.

‘People who obey God will live in Paradise. Jesus sent his followers to search for meek people and to teach them how to become acceptable to God. Today, Jehovah is preparing millions of people for life in the future Paradise on earth.’

There is enough truth in here to be misleading, mixed with error such that it might shipwreck a person’s faith. Of course the obedient inherit the good things of God, he’s not going to populate his new world with the disobedient. However, what does the Bible say about becoming obedient, meek, and acceptable to God?

I’m going to leave that question hanging. If anyone wants to come back to me with a mini Bible study answer I would love to know what you have. This isn’t the theme of this post, however, but if you answer this for yourself you will begin to align with what is the theme.

Someone reading this Watchtower material, perhaps already alarmed by what they see on the news, will be bound to have questions. The Watchtower Society presses home the message of how millions of Jehovah’s Witnesses have learned about these things by studying the Bible.

There is an invitation on the home page to, ‘Discuss a Bible topic with Jehovah’s Witnesses…’ The visitor is assured, ‘Jehovah’s Witnesses will be happy to study the Bible with you.’

What are we to think about such times as these? Is the Lord’s coming close? How are we to live until that day? All good questions, all answered in the Bible. The Jehovah’s Witnesses are not by any means the only people offering to talk about these things from an open Bible. The question is, are we prepared?

Getting a 'Buzz'

When I was first looking at joining the Mormons, an eighteen year old with not the first idea what I was doing, a Christian neighbour offered to take me to a convention being held some miles away. So we attended a session of a very charismatic ‘tent meeting’ type of event. It was unfamiliar and quite troubling but the friend who brought me seemed right in his element.

With hindsight, what strikes me about the whole thing was the fact he didn’t invite me around to open the Bible and explain what I had just experienced. The Mormons, meanwhile, patiently ‘reasoned’ from their scriptures and got my attention and my loyalty.

I think my friend, a man for whom I have always had a great respect, expected me to simply get zapped! But I hadn’t been to the top of the mountain, I didn’t even know it was a mountain, and I had no idea what I was looking at when I got there.

Those people out there, with their worries and concerns, have questions about ultimate things as well as the matter of living every day in such times. The Jehovah’s Witnesses have answers. The Mormons have answers. The Bible has better answers. The question we must address is, do we know our Bibles?

i Accessed 25/01/2021.

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