Fifteen Reasons Why I Cannot be a Jehovah's Witness
Written By: Robert B. Mignard
Biblical Living Ministries
1193 Colebrook Road
Mt. Joy, PA 17552
The crystal clear teachings of the Word of God will not allow a thorough going Bible student to embrace the doctrines set forth by the Jehovah's Witnesses. The basic teachings of this sect conflict with the Scriptures. Fifteen of their unique doctrinal errors are listed here and constitute sound reasons why no one may quite unite with the Witnesses and still hold to the truth of God.
1. The Jehovah's Witnesses deny the absolute, unique divinity of Jesus Christ.
Scripture shows that the Lord Jesus Christ is Jehovah. Isaiah 41:4; 44:6 and 48:12 declare the attribute of being the "First and the Last" belongs to Jehovah alone. In Revelation 1:7, 8, 11, 17 and 22:13, Jesus is shown possessing this very attribute, thereby making Him the Jehovah of the Isaiah passages, and indeed of the entire Old Testament. Isaiah 45:22-25 speaks of a universal worship, which one day all people will render unto Jehovah. Philippians 2:9-11 applies this Isaiah passage to Jesus Christ.
Isaiah 44:22, 23 sets forth Jehovah as the redeemer. Ephesians 1:7 establishes Jesus Christ as this redeemer. In Isaiah 45:24 and 54:17 Jehovah is our righteousness. In 1 Corinthians 1:30, Jesus Christ is our righteousness. Isaiah 43:11 reserves for Jehovah alone the work of saving man. "Besides Me there is no Savior." Titus 2:13 teaches that Jesus Christ is the Savior, thereby establishing Him as the Jehovah of Isaiah Chapter 43. An honest student of the Scripture will read, study, and compare the verses used above.
2. The Jehovah's Witnesses Teach that Jesus Christ is a Created Being--Simply Another God.
This doctrinal error is achieved through a spurious translation in their New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures which renders John 1:1, "And the Word was a god." Isaiah emphatically denies this error in 43:10, 44:6, and 45:5, 21 and shows their translation of John 1:1 to be illegitimate. Four times Jehovah declares the impossibility of there being "another god" or "a god" beside Himself. Every honest student of Scripture must acknowledge the solitary aloneness of Jehovah.
3. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Personality and Divinity of the Holy Spirit.
Of the many Scripture references that show this to be false, John 16:13, 14 is representative. Eight times the Lord Jesus refers to the Holy Spirit by the personal masculine pronoun. The Greek word "Spirit" is neuter, but the pronoun employed is not "it", but rather "he" or "himself." Christ was grammatically incorrect, for the pronoun must agree with the noun in gender; but He was theologically correct in thus recognizing the Spirit's personality. Were the Holy Spirit not a person, the pronoun "it" would have been used and the grammar of the passage kept intact. Even the Witnesses' own New World Translation acknowledges the Spirit's personality in the translation of these two verses. The divinity of the Holy Spirit is clearly shown in the following references that the honest student will carefully study: Acts 5:3, 4; 1 Corinthians 3:16; 2 Corinthians 13:14. In 1 Corinthians 12:4-6 the Holy Spirit is called Lord (verse 5) and God (verse 6). In placing Isaiah 6:8-10 alongside Acts 28:25-27, it becomes evident that the God of Isaiah 6 is the Holy Spirit.
4. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Biblical Doctrine of the Trinity
Though the truth of the Trinity is amusing to the Witnesses, nevertheless it is part of the revelation of God. The Bible student discovers there is a Person in Scripture known as the Father, who is God (Ephesians 1:2). There is another Person in Scripture called the Son, Christ, Jesus, Jesus Christ who is God (Titus 2:13). There is still another Person called the Holy Spirit, Holy Ghost, Spirit of God who is God (Acts 5:3, 4). The ones Greek word theos, "God," is used of all three Persons, thus ascribing the same divinity to each. The careful student also notes the fact of the Trinity in Isaiah 48:16, 17; Matthew 3:16, 17; 28:19; and 2 Corinthians 13:14. The conclusion is simply that there is one God subsisting in three persons being of one essence, identical in nature, co-equal in attributes and perfections.
5. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Bodily, Corporeal Resurrection of Jesus Christ From the Dead.
False doctrine declares "The man Jesus is dead, only His spirit arose." The witness of Jesus Christ is quite different (Luke 24:36-45). Even a casual glance at verse 39 dispels any doubt concerning the bodily resurrection. Thomas met the physically resurrected Christ (John 20:24-29), as did the other disciples who ate fish with Him (John 21:12-14). Paul testifies to the corporeal resurrection of Jesus Christ in 1 Corinthians 15:3-19. The guards at the tomb, the chief priests, and Sanhedrin would have never become excited (Matthew 28:11, 15) if "only His spirit arose."
6. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Bodily Visible Return of Jesus Christ.
They say, "We must not expect Him to come again as a human being" --"Coming is properly translated presence and refers to the invisible presence of the Lord." In contrast, a Bible student discovers the truth that Jesus Christ IS coming back again physically, literally. In Revelation 1:7, "every eye shall see Him"; in 1 Thessalonians 4:16, 17, "the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven"; and in Acts 1:10, 11, He "shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven." The testimony of these passages is irrefutable.
7. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny Presence of the Believer with Christ Upon Death.
According to 2 Corinthians 5:8, Philippians 1:21-24, and Luke 16:20-22, the believer, immediately upon death, passes into the presence of Christ. The body sleeps in the ground (John 11:11-14), awaiting the resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:20-23), while the soul and spirit now separated from the body (James 2:26) pass into heaven.
8. The Jehovah's Witnesses Chide the Believer's Hope of Heaven.
John 14:1-3; Philippians 3:20, 21; 1 Peter 1:3-5; and Revelation 3:12 are but a few of the many passages in Scripture that speak of the "living hope" of being with Christ forever.
9. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Reality and Eternality of Future Punishment.
Scripture teaches the reality of hell. The Lord Jesus Christ spoke more of hell than heaven and informs us that hell is a furnace of fire (Matthew 13:49-50); a place for Satan and his emissaries (Matthew 25:41); and an unquenchable fire (Mark 9:42-48). Furthermore, He insisted upon the fact that hell is eternal. The Greek word translated "eternal" is aionios, which means without end. The word is also used to describe the everlasting life mentioned in John 3:16. The eternality of God in Romans 16:26 is deliberately used by Christ to describe the duration of hell (Matthew 18:8) and by John in Revelation 14:11. Aionios does not have a double meaning. If it means that God is eternal and the life that the believer receives is eternal, then it must mean that hell is also eternal.
10. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny the Perfect Salvation of Christ's Cross.
Without any warrant from Scripture, the Witnesses teach that the Millennium, the thousand-year reign of Christ upon earth, will afford all mankind from Adam onward, who will be resurrected, an opportunity, under favorable conditions, to earn salvation. Where is there a single Bible verse supporting this? The Lord Jesus Christ has purchased our salvation on the cross (Romans 3:21-26) and it remains for man to believe and be saved (Ephesians 2:8, 9 and Acts 16:30, 31). Salvation is wholly apart from any human effort (Romans 3:27, 28).
11. The Jehovah's Witnesses Deny Patriotism and the Salute to the Flag.
Scripture enjoins all believers to be loyal citizens. The careful student will see this in Romans 13:1-7; 1 Peter 2:13-15, and Matthew 22:21.
12. The Jehovah's Witnesses are Confused About the 144,000.
Through good works and sincere effort, it is the hope of a Jehovah's Witness to become one of the 144,000. In the two chapters in which the 144,000 are mentioned, Revelation 7 and 14, the student of Scripture notes that 144,000 are literal Jews of the ancient tribes with no Gentiles among them (7:4-8); are all males (14:4); are virgins (14:4); will minister during the Great Tribulation (14:6-13); and do not earn their office by works but are appointed by God (7:3). By no stretch of the imagination can sound biblical interpretation allow a Gentile sect to claim for its devotees a place among the 144,000.
13. The Jehovah's Witnesses Use a Perverted Translation of the Bible.
The New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scripture is a fumbling translation of the New Testament that no reputable Greek scholar will endorse. The Translation has been altered to fit the heresy. For instance, the Greek word for "other," allos, does not appear in the Greek text of Colossians 1:16, 17 but it is inserted four times in their translation to make Christ appear as part of the creation, and therefore fit their doctrine that He is a created son, another god. "...because by means of Him all other things were created." This and dozens of other passages make the New World Translation a travesty of God's Word.
14. The Jehovah's Witnesses' Doctrinal System is Based Upon the Interpretations of Charles Taze Russel.
In 1847, a Brooklyn haberdasher, Charles Taze Russel, announced that he possessed all the truth. In his many volumes, Russel "left scarcely one great truth or fundamental doctrine untouched with his unholy and unwarranted conclusions," (Dr. William E. Biederwolf). As a careful study will reveal, Russel's writings serve as a broad base upon which the Jehovah's Witness structure is built. Presently the Jehovah's Witnesses are following the fallen conclusions of a rascal who was divorced by his wife, was in trouble with the courts, and who fleeced his followers with "miracle wheat" sold at an exorbitant price, which he claimed would produce 15 times as much wheat as an ordinary bushel.
15. The Jehovah's Witnesses Neglect a Vast Area of Scripture Truth.
A careful analysis of the many books, pamphlets and magazines turned out by the Watch Tower Publishers reveals that only a small percentage of the Scripture is quoted, leaving untouched the rest of the Word of God.
