Intro

There are some who detest the Jehovah’s witnesses. I remember once when I was in community college, and was standing outside smoking (this was about 3 years before I was saved) with who a person who turned out to be one of the campus cooks (younger guy, probably late 20’s), and he told when he saw them approaching his place he’d strip off his clothes and answer the door. More recently, one staunch roman catholic man I occasionally do yardwork for, told me as we were discussing them coming to his place frequently (and religion in general), when told him I had to go grab my calculator to get him his bill, “when they come to my door I tell them I charge them $20/hr. And I don’t need a calculator to figure out the tax…I was born catholic and I will die a catholic!”. But at the very least they must be commended for their diligence in evangelism. And in accordance with Peter’s admonition to “…be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear” (1 Pet. 3:15) I’ve “Stud[ied] to shew [my]self approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15), and therefore look forward to any opportunity I get to speak to them.

One of the central tenants of the Gospel is the deity of Messiah, for if the Savior was not “God manifest in the flesh” (1 Tim. 3:16), then we are yet in our sins, because mankind has a fallen nature and is born in sin (Ps. 51:5), and only One without sin could take the punishment we deserve. Therefore, while there are many doctrines in Christendom not worth making a big deal of, this definitely cannot be considered one of them, being central to one’s salvation status. And thus, one of commonalities of all the other world religions (whether overtly or covertly) is an attack on this doctrine. And so likewise do all of the english Bibles subsequent to the KJV (which have an ecumenical bent to them). And of course anyone that’s familiar with with JW’s knows that they reject the notion of Messiah’s Deity, and have their own Bible translation to “prove” it called the “New World” Translation (kind of like New World Order, yeah?).

Before moving on, I think it should also be mentioned that if you are seventh-day adventist, JW’s share many of the Biblical aspects of your denomination which are uncommon in traditional Christianity (such as the notion of freewill in a “great controversy” over God’s law, the mortality of the soul, that we are living in the endtimes, they historically identified the papacy as the antichrist, and evidently as of 2004 anyways still publishing, “anti-catholic” material, etc.)

Main Verses Attacked

I suppose before we get to the apologetics I should probably elucidate the verses which have been significantly altered in their translation to remove the Deity of Messiah, so that you will know which verses you will not be able to use:

“Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God”-Phil. 2:6 (KJV)

Vs.

“who, although he was existing in God’s form,+ gave no consideration to a seizure, namely, that he should be equal to God.”–Phil. 2:6 (NWT)

–

“And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.“-1 Tim 3:16 (KJV)

Vs.

“Indeed, the sacred secret of this godly devotion is admittedly great: ‘He was made manifest in flesh,+ was declared righteous in spirit,+ appeared to angels,+ was preached about among nations,+ was believed upon in the world,+ was received up in glory.’”-1 Tim 3:16 (NWT)

–

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”-Jn. 1:1 (KJV)

Vs.

“In the beginning was the Word,+ and the Word was with God,+ and the Word was a god.“-Jn. 1:1 (NWT)

Directing the Conversation

In many of my encounter’s with JW’s they’ll say oh no we can use translation that’s fine. But of course as soon as you point to the scriptures in the KJV which infallibly prove the deity of Messiah they start pull out their “Kingdom Interlinear” (essentially their concordance) to tell you what it “Really” means. Therefore one must be prepared to ultimately be able to make the case from their own translation, which in spite of being diabolically inspired, yet retains enough evidence to do so sufficiently.

So I might begin by telling them that I to worship Jehovah and witness for Him, and commend them for their evangelistic efforts. Then I would say something along the line of, “Hey I want to ask you a question. Do you believe that only God is infallible?” To which they will of course respond yes. Then you say “okay, you would acknowledge it’s possible that you could be in error in matters of doctrine”? And they will of course generally say yes. Then ask them, “if you were wrong and it could be proven from your own Bible, would want to know about it?”, which again, they will generally say yes, because though brainwashed, they are generally honest and well intentioned people.

Two Key Verses

It’s actually really simple, there’s only a couple verses that you need to memorize (but I nonetheless will elaborate on a couple other points for arguments sake after this section).  The following Bible quotes are be from their translation:

“But about the Son, he says: “God is your throne forever and ever, and the scepter of your Kingdom is the scepter of uprightness.”-Hebrews 1:8

“For a child has been born to us, A son has been given to us; And the rulership will rest on his shoulder.His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace. To the increase of his rulershipAnd to peace, there will be no end, On the throne of David and on his kingdomIn order to establish it firmly and to sustain it Through justice and righteousness, From now on and forever.The zeal of Jehovah of armies will do this.”-Isaiah 9:6-7

Now bear in mind that when you point these things out to them, they probably will not then receive it, they say “yeah but…” and jump to another text denying the incontrovertible texts you just showed them instead of seeking to reconcile those passages to it. But nonetheless, rest assured that you planted a seed that will never be forgotten, and by God’s grace will set them free and lead them out of this cult to belief in the true Gospel.

Another set of passages which when compared settle the matter

Jehovah:

“This is what Jehovah says, “The King of Israel and his Repurchaser, Jehovah of armies:
‘I am the first and I am the last. There is no God but me.”-Is. 44:6

Jesus:

“‘Look! I am coming quickly, and the reward I give is with me, to repay each one according to his work. I am the Alʹpha and the O·meʹga, the first and the last, the beginning and the end…I, Jesus,”-Rev. 22:12-13, 16

Additional Points of Conversation

First I would point out to them that the one thing that all the pagan religions have in common is attacking the Jesus’ deity. I would also remind them of their denomination’s anti-catholic roots, and then show them how on Pg. 9 their own Kingdom Interlinear it actually admits that there were two jesuits (catholic military order) who were part of creating their translation, and that it’s also largely based on the catholic Westcott-Hort manuscripts, and ask them how, knowing that, they could have confidence in their translation.

Then I would procede to show them the a glaring inconsistency in their translation, for instance, how the same underlying Hebrew describing Messiah as being “from everlasting” (Micah 5:2, as translated in the KJV) but translated “from the days of long ago” in their translation, was correctly translated “from everlasting”, “From Eternity” etc. in 8 other instances in their translation (Ps. 41:13; Ps. 90:2; Ps. 93:2; Ps. 103:17; Hab. 1:12).

Finally I would ask them if someone such as myself, who loves Jesus, loves His Word’s, and who’s clearly bearing fruit, and has a burden to fulfill the great commission is going to be condemned  according to their teachings since I reject Jehovah’s Witness-ism. They will invariably say something along the lines of, “oh no we don’t believe that, we can’t judge your heart, only God can.” I would then point out to them how, while they’re expressed viewpoint is laudable, it’s inconsistent, and does not represent the teaching of their denomination which teaches:

“The ideological argument states that, since absolute truth is unitary and exclusive of all relativisation, there can only ‘logically’ be one human organization to represent it. Consequently, all other religious organizations are in error and are to be strictly avoided. The absolutist view of truth further implies that, since anything less than absolute truth can only corrupt and destroy it, there can be no justification for Jehovah’s witnesses having any kind of association with other religionists, however sincere the motivation might be.”-as Quoted in The Trumpet of Prophecy by James Beckford (1975), p. 202 

(refer also to their articles, Is Interfaith God’s Way?, and Should the Religions Unite?)

Obviously the doctrinal points of disagreement cannot be said to be minor or non-salvation related issues, if they merit such a separation (which grounds of separation the Bible alone commends).

In Conclusion

And through the process of seeking to witness to anyone, when they bring up “objections” to what your espousing, if you find you don’t have a satisfactory Biblical answer to some of them, use the opportunity as a learning experience. Reflect on every interaction afterwards, how you could answered better, etc. And those things for which you had no answer, when you get home, on the Sabbath, or w/e take the time to search the internet and find a logical answer to whatever objections they tried to bring up so that you are more prepared next time.