A continuance of the discussion of Jeremiah.
In the 19th chapter of Jeremiah the prophet was ordered to go buy an earthenware flask from a potter. God then ordered him to take a few elders out to the edge of the city, specifically to the Valley of the Son of Hinnom and there inform the elders that Jehovah was going to destroy the city.
The Valley of Hinnom had been used as a place where the kings of Judah performed child sacrifice. Interestingly, Ghenna is a derivation of Hinnom, and of course, Jesus used Ghenna in a symbolic way to illustrate an ignominious and permanent death. Hold that thought.
Then Jeremiah smashed the flask to demonstrate how God was going to shatter Jerusalem. Jeremiah proceeded to the courtyard of the temple and spoke Jehovah’s message of doom to all.
A certain son of a priest named Pashhur was listening to Jeremiah and he struck him and had him put into stocks. The next day Jeremiah was released from bondage and the prophet promptly prophesied to Pashhur, saying: “Jehovah has named you, not Pashhur, but Terror All Around. For this is what Jehovah says, ‘I will make you an object of terror to yourself and to all your friends, and they will fall by the sword of their enemies while your eyes are looking on; and I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will take them into exile in Babylon and put them to death by the sword. And I will give all the wealth of this city, all its resources, all its precious things, and all the treasures of the kings of Judah into the hand of their enemies. And they will plunder them and seize them and take them to Babylon. And as for you, Pashhur, and all who live in your house, you will go into captivity. You will go off to Babylon and die there, and you will be buried there with all your friends, because you have prophesied lies to them.’” — Jeremiah 20:3-6
As any discerning student of God’s word knows, the destruction of Jerusalem was not only the theme of many Hebrew prophetic books such as Jeremiah, but it was also the focus of Jesus’ end times prophecy. Jesus even urged the reader to consult the book of Daniel concerning the desolation of the holy place, which, was located in the heart of both Jerusalems—the one destroyed by Babylon and the one destroyed by Rome. Clearly, this means that the Jerusalem in Jeremiah’s day foreshadows the Jerusalem that will experience desolation during the great tribulation.
For the past two decades, I have played the role of Jeremiah in relation to the Watchtower—laying out before them in numerous Kingdom Bulletins as well as distributing books and pamphlets to the leadership concerning what is to come. They have demonstrated a similar attitude as the kings and priests of Judah. No doubt the books and letters I have sent to the Governing Body and their helpers have been discarded, much like King Jehoiakim when he burned up the scroll of Jeremiah after a brief portion had been read to him.
Anyone who dares to correct the Governing Body or who has the audacity to rebuke them is regarded as an apostate enemy of God and disfellowshipped—symbolically put into stocks, which was intended to publicly humiliate the one shackled.
When the king of Judah discarded Jeremiah’s scroll God saw it and responded. Jehovah reiterated His determination to bring the king of Babylon to destroy Jerusalem and terminate the kingdom of David. And for his impudence, Jehoiakim’s dead body would be left on the ground, exposed to the heat of the sun and the frost at night.
As mentioned, the kings prior to Jeremiah had practiced child sacrifice—a hideous form of demon worship. The Watchtower has a policy that is akin to child sacrifice in that it has enabled pedophiles to destroy the innocence of thousands of children—sacrificing them to the demons.
More recently, the Watchtower has cajoled all of Jehovah’s Witnesses into submitting to a potentially lethal medical procedure in order to maintain theocratic unity. Although it is humanly impossible to quantify the deaths from the vaccines because there are many and varied reactions that take place long after the injections, still, Jehovah knows and will require an accounting.
Like those kings and priests of Judah, the leaders of the Watchtower are unreachable and unteachable. They will never humble themselves. On the contrary, they are advancing from bad to worse.
Jehovah foresaw long ago that the only remedy is terror. Regarding His strange work to be carried out with the coming of Christ, Isaiah 28:19b simply says: “Only terror will make them understand what was heard.”
So it is as if God will call the exalted Governing Body “Terror All Around.”
Like Pashhur, the Governing Body has prophesied lies. When the world erupts in war, unleashing the most terrifying weapons ever devised—crashing the system all around them—then they will understand that they have offended Jehovah and misled Jehovah’s Witnesses as to the coming of Christ. No doubt they will quake and tremble and be gripped with great fear.
But what parallel is there with the literal death sentences God imposed upon individuals like Pashhur and Jehoiakim?
Jesus spoke of two sorts of slaves—those who are faithful and those who will be judged as evil. What shall be the outcome for those whom Christ judges to be wicked? Jesus said “he will punish him with the greatest severity and will assign him his place with the hypocrites. There is where his weeping and the gnashing of his teeth will be.”
Being assigned a place with the hypocrites means that the evil ones will be put out and condemned with the world. However, they will have time to contemplate their ultimate, terrible fate; hence, “there is where his weeping and the gnashing of his teeth will be.” The evil slave will know what is symbolized by Ghenna.
In the case of Pashhur, he was not executed outright like the king of Judah. Instead, he was taken to Babylon where he died. We might say there is where he wept and gnashed his teeth.
Jesus foretold that the great tribulation would be cut short on account of the chosen ones. That is reflected in the fact that many Jews, including Jeremiah, survived the destruction of Jerusalem. Even a remnant that had been taken to Babylon was among those repurchased who returned to rebuild Jerusalem. But only those chosen by God could walk the Highway of holiness.
