so, we have apparently been blacklisted by the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
This morning two young ladies were ringing doorbells in our apartment block wanting to talk about “how the world can be a better place”. For some bizarre reason then didn’t ring ours.
Could it possibly be due to the fact that the last 2 Jehovah’s Witnesses that came round here really didn’t do to well? FWIW, they got a nice cup of coffee out of it and some cake but when it came to discussing the bible, well it was a bit embarassing.
Shame. I like having the cults round.
1 it keeps them out of other people’s houses
2 I get to tell them the gospel. You know, the real one, where God does all the work and we trust Christ.
That is kind of sad!
Edith, who turns 88 today, used to convert them.
The JWs stopped visiting me when I told them there never was a time when the Son was not. ๐
not you as well!! that’s so divisive of you!
and, of course, this has nothing to do with my previous post….
Actually, I really did do almost that. I told them that unless they honored Christ as God I wasn’t interested.
I’ve never given JW’s much of a chance to share their points of view with me…what do they say to you that’s different? (just curious)
i always ask questions of any cult around 2 areas:
who is Jesus?
how does one have a perfect relationship with God?
when I hear an answer I usually say “how do you understand that works when the bible says…?”
pretty much runs from there.
i always ask questions of any cult around 2 areas:
who is Jesus?
how does one have a perfect relationship with God?
And what kind of answers have you gotten? (again, just curious)
oh, the standard for both. Mormon: Jesus is the only-begotten Son of God, JW: Jesus is “a” God.
For the second both are works religions.
You mean “do works to earn God’s salvation”?
yup
of course, like the Roman Catholics, it’s all dressed up in the language of “grace” but it’s no such thing – just as Abraham our forefather learned (Rom 4).
I know…that’s why I’ve steered away from Catholicism, even though I was raised in that denomination!!
I think you mean Roman Catholicism
the Catholic church, of course, is what you and I belong to.
Yeah, that’s what I meant. =P My bad ๐
Shawn and I had a whole JW family come by our house. The mom and one of the kids waited in their van. Dad and a little girl came to the door. We just listened to them and shared some things that we know about the Bible. He tried to convince us that we need a theocracy. We explained that Jesus would reign for 1000 years. And we talked about a few other little doctrinal things that we could point out from scripture that were the truth… we didn’t even overtly say, “You’re wrong and this is why.” We just shared things back and forth with smiles on our faces. Then he said, “Well, you two have a vast Bible knowledge.” He said goodbye. We said goodbye. And they never came back. ๐ That was about 3-4 months ago. The Mormons blacklisted me years ago. :'(
Yep as soon as they realize that a person has a good command of the totality of scripture they pretty much give up. It really makes me wonder how those who come up against a person who can counter each one of their arguments can remain in their delusions. I had Eleanor the JW calling me for quite a while back when I lived at my previous address. I was always so amazed how at the end of each conversation, when I had come up against every one of her positions with something from scripture, she would give me a cheerful “May I send you [insert misc JW publication] and call you in a week to discuss it further?” And I would always reply with a huge smile “SURE!” That lasted for about two months before her phone calls stopped. I’m still wondering what happened with her.
It really makes me wonder how those who come up against a person who can counter each one of their arguments can remain in their delusions.
I have to play devil’s advocate here, although I don’t actually fit on either side of this particular argument. I have to point out that there is a difference between debate skill and possession of the truth. Losing a debate should be cause for further research, not mindless conversion right then and there.
so when should conversion happen?
Good question. When there has been an honest change of mind(/heart) upon careful reflection(/prayer & soul-searching), I guess.
what makes you think that’s any different to the scenario i talked about above?
It isn’t necessarily any different. I was simply questioning the logic of‘s comment: “It really makes me wonder how those who come up against a person who can counter each one of their arguments can remain in their delusions.” I was going for a hypothesis of why what “makes wonder” might occur.
The bottom line is that you can guess but you don’t really know how the experience was honestly understood from the Jehovah’s Witnesses’ end. Maybe this hasn’t happened to you yet, but I think the statistical odds are high that at some point in your life you will clearly lose an argument, and yet understand clearly that you were not in the wrong, and at that point you’ll see what I mean: that debate victories do not equal truth. Especially since both sides often claim victory.
sorry, where I’m coming from that sounds like a way of avoiding the consequences of losing a debate even when it’s obvious one is wrong.