Hello everyone.
It’s been a few months since my last video.
I thought I would entertain a question from a reader or viewer.
He says: Robert by the time the great tribulation has been cut short and ended. Do you believe, that the JW organization will have fully been shut down and overrun by that stage? Or will the overrunning and shutdown occur after the 8th king has risen during the 1260 days? Or will the organization have some form of semblance and autonomy still during the great tribulation?
A number of questions there really. Really one main question and …. I wish it were easy to answer.
You know I’ve written quite a bit about this, more especially in the book in Jehovah himself has become king. You know and I’ve been turning these things over in my mind for a long time.
In short, … well, … I, … Again there is no short answer.
But I think, well, for one thing Jehovah’s witnesses, you know this, cannot even appreciate this question. Because according to the Watchtower the great tribulation, that will come upon Jerusalem will impact Christendom, right? That’s the antitypical Jerusalem. In fact they say it even encompasses all of, Babylon the great.
So, but we know that, that’s not reasonable. Because when Jesus is speaking about the conclusion of the system of things he urged his disciples to stay on the watch. He gave some pretty pointed counsel about “pay attention to yourselves”, “that your hearts never become weighed down with over-drinking overeating and the anxieties of life and suddenly that day be upon you“. He said because it’s coming in upon the entire inhabited earth.
So the great tribulation is not what the Watchtower says it is. It’s not the eighth king turning on that false religion.
It’s something that will affect everyone on earth but specifically Jerusalem.
And what does Jerusalem represent?
Well, it represents Christ’s congregation.
Jerusalem was Jehovah’s special possession. It was a place where he caused his name to reside.
It’s where he placed the temple. And of course it was destroyed by the Babylonians in 607 or whenever. That doesn’t matter.
But the Jews were repatriated and they rebuilt the temple. And the temple was in Jerusalem when Jesus was on the earth. And Jesus, as a Jew, faithfully went to the temple.
In fact on a couple of occasions when he went there as the Messiah he threw out the money changers, didn’t he? And he said “stop making the house of my Father a house of merchandise”.
So … and even after Jesus, you know, commissioned his disciples to preach, and they were anointed, they still were very much part of Jerusalem and the temple of worship. As a matter of fact it said, that the apostles were in the temple day and night witnessing about Jesus.
And they were in Jerusalem, … that was their headquarters, the apostles you might say. It was their unofficial headquarters. And it was up until the tribulation.
Or up until they saw you know the disgusting thing, which was a signal for them to leave Jerusalem. And so, we know there’s a greater fulfillment of that. So there has to be a an anti-typical Jerusalem.
Well, Jehovah’s witnesses don’t understand that. The Watchtower doesn’t teach that. So there’s a few of us out there, that understand some of these things and that’s why the questioner was asking what he did. Will there be anything that survives the great tribulation?
The great tribulation in Revelation is associated with the opening of the sixth seal.
In the sixth chapter of Revelation, this the first six seals are open, right? And the sixth seal is when mountains crash and the stars of heaven fall, and the sun turns black and so forth. And that represents the great tribulation. Every island is moved from its place. Just a great collapse of the system. And people will beg the mountains to fall over them “save us!”
Well, then the seventh chapter opens with the angels holding back the four winds. Tribulation is cut short. They’re holding back the four winds until the slaves of God can be sealed.
So that involves those remaining ones on the earth who have to be sealed. In other words God has to finalize whether he approves them and they are accepted into his Kingdom or not.
Jesus said in the 13th chapter Matthew that Satan has sown the weeds in among the sons of the Kingdom, the fine wheat. The Watchtower said, well, yeah, that’s Christendom. And they were, you know, the harvest took place back in 1918.
What did God pull the weeds out of Christendom? Is that how?
No. Jesus said that the angels will remove from his Kingdom, his congregation, his symbolic Jerusalem all things that cause stumbling and all persons doing lawlessness.
So, Christ recognizes that there are those in his congregation, in his spiritual temple, who are sons of Satan. And like the “superfine apostles” they’ve disguised themselves as ministers of righteousness.
So, when we talk about Jehovah’s earthly organization, where we have to understand that there are faithful ones and there are those who are unfaithful. And maybe their unfaithfulness is not so apparent. But Jehovah knows those who belong to him. He will never be tricked by someone who’s disguised themselves as a minister of righteousness.
Jehovah’s witnesses may be deceived, as the Corinthians were, which is why the apostle said, you know, ‘I’m concerned about you with a godly jealousy, that somehow as Eve was deceived, your minds may be corrupted away from the Christ’.
So, when we talk about Jehovah’s organization continuing, we have to appreciate, that it’s God’s purpose to make this separation, To uproot the weeds and gather the wheat into the storehouse. In other words bring the chosen ones, the approved ones, into the Kingdom. So that’s the work ahead. And that’s what will happen during the tribulation or shortly thereafter.
So, when the four winds are held back the sealing takes place, but also … excuse me … allergies acting up a little bit … also the great crowd is spoken of in that seventh chapter. And the angel explains “these are the ones that come out of the tribulation.
So, by the time the tribulation is cut short, shortly thereafter, there will be the sealed sons of the Kingdom, who will be the remaining ones of the 144 thousand and this unnumbered great crowd.
There’s no such thing as a great crowd yet. Even though the Watchtower refers to those who have the earthly hope as a great crowd, that’s technically not true. The great crowd are those who are protected through the great tribulation and preserved through Armageddon.
So after this gathering, then the eighth chapter opens with the opening of this seventh seal.
And it mentions there’s a respite of a half an hour of silence in heaven. And the angel with a great quantity of incense offers it to Jehovah along with the prayers of all the holy ones. And then the seven angels begin blowing their trumpets. And those are the judgments of God.
Well, what does the scripture say? Judgment begins with the house of God. So the first four trumpets are Jehovah’s judgments against his organization.
And that should be apparent by reason of the fact that trumpets five, six and seven are … well, let me see here … yeah, the trumpets five, six and seven are directed against mankind. ‘Woe for the earth’ it says.
Well, if the last three trumpet blasts are directed against mankind, what are the first four? As I say, Jehovah’s organization.
The first one blew his trumpet and there occurred a hail and fire mingled with blood. And it was hurled to the earth and a third of the earth was burned up and a third of the trees were burned up. And all the green vegetation was burned up.
Well, we know that Revelation is presented in signs. Is not talking about literal trees or literal vegetation.
Incidentally when the angels were told to hold back the four winds and do not harm the vegetation or the trees. Well, now, this judgment with the first trumpet blast is a judgment against the “trees.”
Well, what does that represent?
By the way, the chapter in Jehovah Himself has Become King on Revelation, I go into this quite a bit in fact. I’m going to read some scriptures taken from there. And in that chapter in Revelation I cite Zachariah the 11th chapter. And it says: “Open up your doors, o Lebanon, that a fire may devour among the cedars howl, o juniper tree, for the cedar has fallen because the majestic ones themselves have been despoiled. How you massive trees of bášan for the inpenetrable forest has come down. Listen, the howling of shepherds, for their majesty has been despoiled. “
So the prophecy explains itself, doesn’t it.
Those trees, … the trees in Revelation that are burned with fire, a third of them, represent elders, the shepherds.
When God was speaking to in Zechariah … If you recall Zechariah and Haggai and Malachi, those three prophetic books were written after the Jews came back from Babylon and rebuilt Jerusalem and rebuilt the temple. So here now Jehovah is talking about another judgment coming upon Jerusalem. And that judgment wasn’t fulfilled upon literal Jerusalem in 70. It’s in reference to a figurative, or a spiritual Jerusalem, the Christian congregation, which is overseen by elders.
So that’s what these Bášan was an area in Israel known for its fertility. The Bible speaks of the cows of Bášan, the bulls of Bášan. That were very powerful and beautiful animals because the grass was … the area was so fertile. And there were also massive oak trees and giant cedar trees up against the mount Hermon.
So here Jehovah says: open your doors and let the fire in. There’s nothing you can do. This is my judgment coming against you.
So that’s what the blowing of the first horn is. Jehovah’s judgment against his organization.
Second angel: “A great burning mountain with fire was hurled into the sea. And a third of the sea became blood.” Plus interesting, you know, the Watchtower has said that a third represents a sizable number, but not a majority. And I think that’s true.
Except it doesn’t apply to Christendom.
So a sizable number of those associated with God’s earthly organization will be disapproved. Put out. They won’t be among those who are saved, among the great crowd or the 144 000.
Okay, just one more here: “The third angel blew his trumpet. And a great star burning as a lamp fell from heaven and it fell upon the third of the rivers and upon the fountains of waters. And the name of this star is called wormwood. And the third the waters turned into wormwood and many of the men died from the waters because these had been made bitter.”
Well, there’s a similar judgment, … I point this out again in the in the book in Jeremiah the 9th chapter, where he said of those apostate Jews. He says: “Here I am making them that is this people eat wormwood. And I will make them drink poisoned water. And I will scatter them among the nations that neither they and their fathers have known. And I will send after them the sword until I have exterminated them.”
So, the the Watchtower speaks of, you know, dispensing the waters of life, the waters of truth. And you can only get that truth from the Watchtower, right. But already mixed with this truth is this lie, that you know, this delusion that Christ has already come in 1914, he’s ruling, and the organization is a spiritual paradise. That’s a lie. And that’s, what Paul was speaking about, where this man of lawlessness promotes this lie, this deluding influence. And God allows this lie to go to them, that they may get to believing it, because they did not accept the love of the truth.
Well right now, it matters, but it’s not necessarily death dealing. But when Christ comes we will have to accept that new reality.
And those that continue to look to whatever is left of the Watchtower, Jehovah will give them wormwood. In other words whatever is left of that organization … if a person’s trying to look back and get some spiritual water, it will be as poison. It won’t be life-giving. Christ is going to be outside the organization at that point.
That’s interesting, that’s what Paul was telling the the Hebrew christians because he knew that Jerusalem was going to be destroyed.
And he also knew that the apostles were still there and teaching in the temple. And the whole book of Hebrews … he went to great lengths to show, that you know, it had served its purpose. The law and the temple and all that arrangement it was a shadow of the good things to come. But now, that Christ has come, back then in the first century, the law and all of that had become obsolete and was near to passing away.
And it wasn’t going to pass away peacefully. It was going to be a violent death, a horrific destruction, really. It’s quite ironic, that the Romans came and surrounded Jerusalem in a very short while, that… I read that the soldiers had a contest to see how many pointed stakes they could lay in a day around Jerusalem.
But they came on the Passover. And Jerusalem was packed with Jewish worshipers and proselytes from all over. And they were, they were, trapped in the city. And a million Jews perished. And Jerusalem was not that big, but with all the sojourners there ….
So again, we have a type. And Paul was saying, you know, Christ was executed outside the city. And Paul was saying: ‘we do not have here a city that will remain.’ We have to go to Christ outside the camp.
Christ congregation now is like that Jerusalem.
We have to go outside that organization when Christ comes. And that’s what Jesus is talking about, when he said: when you see this disgusting thing, let the man on the rooftop not come down for his things. The man in the field not come back for his garment. Just go.
He’s not talking about, you know, getting your go bag and getting in the car and fleeing somewhere.
It’s spiritually leaving Christ’s congregation and going out to meet him, a special rendezvous, right.
It’s hard to understand that relatively few people have been anointed. And it’s a very special thing to be born again. People don’t understand it. I mean those who in Christendom surely don’t understand.
They think being born again simply means converting, and you know, changing your life, repenting and all of that. But that’s not what it is.
Being born again means that, … well, like Jesus said: What is flesh is flesh. What is spirit is spirit.
A person that is born again becomes a spirit person, in God’s eyes anyway. And that’s why Paul said: our our citizenship is in the heavens, even though we’re physically here on the earth. And he spoke of this heavenly Jerusalem.
So they’re really two Jerusalems, you might say.
Those who have been called are really citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem, the Jerusalem above.
And when this earthly Jerusalem is crushed, they will be too. That’s why in the….well, in Revelation the 12th chapter when Satan is thrown out, it says, it refers to him as a dragon, it says he drags a third of the stars with his tail.
Well the Watchtower says that those are the demons that come down with him. But actually, there’s a different explanation.
In the eighth chapter of Daniel there’s this little horn, that emerges from this beast, a small one. “But it grew very great. It grew so great that it reached all the way to the army of the heavens. And it caused some of the army and some of the stars to fall to the earth. And it trampled them down. It exalted itself even against the prince of the army. And from him the constant feature was taken away and the established place of his sanctuary was thrown down. And an army was given over together with the constant feature because of transgression. And it kept throwing truth to the earth and it acted and had success.”
Well the prince of the army, of course, is Jesus.
He is the Prince of princes. His sanctuary is this earthly place of worship. His anointed ones are the special priesthood. And they’re expected to declare abroad the excellencies of the one who called them out of darkness. And as I said their citizenship though is in the heavens. So when Satan is thrown down, then he uses this earthly beast to destroy God’s organization.
Those who are called, do not necessarily lose their calling but their ministry is over and meeting together. Jehovah’s witnesses aren’t far from that now are they. They don’t meet at the kingdom hall anymore. They don’t go out in service. That’s been there hallmark for as long as the Watchtower has existed.
So you know, I think I’ll have something more to say about that at a later date.
But it says that this little horn will …. the fierce-looking king really he will crush those who have their citizenship in the heavens.
So from the ashes of that ruin Jehovah brings forth the chosen ones, who will shine like the sun in the Kingdom of their father. And give this final witness.
But the Watchtower won’t have any part of that. Those who are brought to life spiritually will be, you know, …. they will have left the Watchtower. They will have gone out and seen Christ at the special place.
Anyway it’s like I say it’s a hard thing to explain in a few words. But, … and the Bible is not an easy book to understand anyway.
Thanks for your question and thanks for watching.
