Monday, September 4
Let anyone hearing say, “Come!” and let anyone thirsting come; let anyone who wishes take life’s water free.—Rev. 22:17.
As members of the Christian congregation, how can we succeed in giving this invitation? Only by being “harmoniously joined together and made to cooperate.” To share the message of the Kingdom good news with as many people as possible, we need to carry out our preaching work in an organized manner. Therefore, we receive directions. The guidance given through congregations around the globe prepares us for a united effort. After we meet for field service, we go forth to proclaim the Kingdom message to mankind. By word of mouth and through millions of copies of Bible-based publications, we spread the message. Do you strive to follow the direction to share in special preaching campaigns? By doing so, you are joining millions of others in unitedly heralding the message of the “angel flying in midheaven,” mentioned at Revelation 14:6
Jehovah’s Witnesses are accomplishing an important phase of God’s purpose —which is two-fold. First, the gathering and testing of the called ones. And secondarily, the collecting of those who will ultimately make up the great crowd of persons who will survive the great tribulation.
At some point though, (no one knows the day or hour) the worldwide preaching of Jehovah’s Witnesses will suddenly stop. This will be considered an unprecedented disaster, as projected in the prophecy of Joel.
As Jesus said, the good news of the Kingdom will be preached in all the earth and then the end will come —the time of the end that is, the conclusion. According to Jesus’ illustration the harvest is a conclusion. In the natural order of things the harvest follows the planting and growing season and concludes the agricultural cycle. In the symbolic harvest the angels are the reapers. They will be dispatched by the Lord Jesus and will collect out of his Kingdom, which is to say his congregation, all persons doing lawlessness and all things that cause stumbling. Afterwards —still during the conclusion —the chosen ones will shine as brightly as the sun in the Kingdom of their Father. This will occur when all the sons of the Kingdom are chosen —fulfilling all 144,000 abodes within the Father’s heavenly mansion.
At that point, when the first resurrection has begun and the 7,000 remain, then the angel goes forth, as depicted in the 14th chapter of Revelation: “And I saw another angel flying in midheaven, and he had everlasting good news to declare to those who dwell on the earth, to every nation and tribe and tongue and people. He was saying in a loud voice: ‘Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of judgment by him has arrived, so worship the One who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and the springs of water.”
To their credit, some 20 years ago the Governing Body revised their teaching to now recognize that the sheep and goats are not separated until some point in the future when the Son of man sits down on his glorious throne. That will begin the hour of judgment by him.
That being the case, it should also be evident that the sheep and goats will not be be judged prior to the harvest of the wheat and the removal of the weeds and the dismissal of the evil slave. After all, what credit would it be to the sheep for doing good to those who are ultimately judged as wicked and sluggish slaves, or doing good to those who only falsely claimed to be Jesus’ brothers, but who were, in reality, workers of lawlessness?
Obviously, Jesus is not taken in by the Watchtower’s nonsensical hokum about the wheat and weeds being separated back in 1919. Nor is Christ bound by the Watchtower’s foolish insistence that the judgment of the house of God took place back during the First World War. Even by the Watchtower’s own, latest readjustment regarding when the faithful slave is appointed over his master’s belongings, there is a future day of reckoning.
In any case, after the 144,000 are joined to Christ on heavenly Mount Zion, even though some remain on earth (their places in heaven being guaranteed at that point), the announcement of the third angel goes like this: “If anyone worships the wild beast and its image and receives a mark on his forehead or on his hand, he will also drink of the wine of the anger of God that is poured out undiluted into the cup of His wrath, and he will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the sight of the holy angels and in the sight of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment ascends forever and ever, and day and night they have no rest, those who worship the wild beast and its image and whoever receives the mark of its name. Here is where it calls for endurance on the part of the holy ones, those who keep the commandments of God and hold fast to the faith of Jesus.”’
According to the Watchtower the hour of judgment began in 1914. If that were true, though, it would mean that the calling and choosing of the 144,000 was complete then. Obviously, the calling and choosing did not end then. Embarrassingly, too, the Watchtower claims that the Anglo-American beast suffered a fatal wound during the First World War. (Jehovah’s Witnesses seem to be unaware that Britain and America were victorious.) Afterwards, the supposedly miraculously revived Anglo-American duo fabricated an image of the beast in the form of the League of Nations.
The Watchtower actually teaches that people began receiving the 666 mark of the beast back in 1921, when the League was formed. Although America wasn’t even a member of the League, again, supposedly, somehow, Americans were put under compulsion to worship the League of Nations.
And even though the Watchtower has sponsored a global disciple-making work directed to people who have supposedly already received the irrevocable mark of permanent death, JW’s are oblivious to the contradiction. Indeed, the notion that the League was the image of the beast and that people are doomed to the second death because of their imaginary allegiance to it, is probably one of the stupidest things that the Watchtower has ever proffered. But, that is what is to be expected from those whom the Scriptures depict as “the stupid prophets.”
The truth is, the beast has not suffered its fated fatal head wound. Nor has it “miraculously” revived or created an image of itself. These are the things that must shortly take place to begin the hour of judgment.
Meanwhile, the nations are lining up for war. The cyber, diplomatic, trade and propaganda wars have been underway for some time. China is accelerating the move to replace the dollar as the world’s reserve currency, which it has been since the end of the Second World War. Indeed, the London-centered financial system is moving to back China and destroy the United States, while Trump is being lured to launch nuclear war over North Korea.
Unfortunately, the blindness of the leadership of Jehovah’s Witnesses is so impenetrable they will not be aware of the gravity of the present state of the world or the prophetic significance of such, until the whole mess comes crashing down on their heads. Indeed, as Jehovah stated long ago: only terror will make them understand.
