July 23, 2014
Welcome Mat
Last week a Jehovah Witness
showed up at my door and before he gained any traction with his ministry, I
turned the conversation around and told him about my ministry. I explained I was
going to every church in town in order to write articles about the various
worship services. He gave me the service times for the Kingdom Hall, but I
doubt he took me seriously about visiting. I had to laugh at the look of surprise
on Bill’s face when I showed up the following Sunday. My host understood my
visit, and that I was firmly planted in my own church, but I’m sure the other
members of the congregation thought Bill had landed a live one. I was not
prepare for the outgoing welcome given me by this group. Well over 20 people,
out of a total of 97, approached me to introduce themselves, shake my hand, and
ask where I was from. Much to my chagrin protestant churches don’t come close
to this outpouring of welcome.
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1 comment:
Gail;
-----I have a client who was once a Jehovah’s Witness. I can’t get her to say a good word about them. She tells me that her own family would not speak to her for years after she left the JW church. She said they used to drive around pointing out lavish properties and discussing who would take them after the smoke and dust clears from the tribulation. If you did anything or said anything they did not like, all the people of Kingdom Hall were ready and willing to treat you like trash until you obeyed them again. Of course, Paul demonstrated the appropriateness of putting out of the church a rebel against the Lord until he learns the submission meant for the new life. But that man was rebelling against God’s word, not the church’s. And Paul had a much better line of communication open with the Lord than even the best of people I‘ve known. He was specially conscripted by the Lord, and his thinking had a much greater level of divine inspiration. Today, attempts to act out similar authority extend from graver levels of mean aspiration. Moreover, heaped upon all of this is the JW theology which requires outright mistranslation of the Greek and Hebrew for support.
-----Don’t get me wrong. Anyone who calls upon the Lord for salvation will be saved. It isn’t about knowledge. JW’s do call on the Lord, some for salvation and the rest for other reasons. They’re kind of like the everyone else in that way. They’re also like everyone else in that their authority to conscript others into their own beliefs and practices is from their own sources, not from God. All of this is bad ethos. It’s not persuasive. I’ve pondered long about why cults tend to show better fellowship skills, like the Mormons’ penchant for taking care of their own. The fellowship is more visible than is their bad ethos. So they work it with focused purpose, some because they really do know the Lord, others because it’s a great cover.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
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