Sermon Central
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Counterfeit Christianity: The Jehovah's Witness
Contributed by Dave Kinney on Mar 21, 2005 (message contributor)
Summary: George Gallup states, “This is the most crucial decade in History. Designer, a la carte religion flourishes as traditional Christianity is undermined by counterfeits.” This is true when it comes to Charles Taze Russell the founder of Jehovah’s Witness cu
Counterfeit Christianity: The Jehovah’s Witness
John 1:1,14-17
George Gallup states, “This is the most crucial decade in History. Designer, a la carte religion flourishes as traditional Christianity is undermined by counterfeits.”
This is true when it comes to Charles Taze Russell the founder of Jehovah’s Witness cult. He was born in February 16, 1852 in Pittsburgh Pa. and died October 31, 1916.
He lived a colorful life with all kinds of legal troubles with his religious schemes.
· He was selling his so-called sermons that were supposed to have been preached on his “World Tour” in 1912 and that proved to be a lie.
· Another scheme was called the “Miracle Wheat” with claims that it would grow 5 times that of normal wheat. It sold for $1.00 a pound. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle was a N.Y. paper that had national importance and it ran from 1841 to 1955. It exposed many of Russell’s schemes through court.
P.T. Barnum said correctly, “Never underestimate the gullibility of the public…there’s a sucker born every minute.”
· In June of 1912 Reverend J.J. Ross pastor of James Street Baptist Church in Hamilton, Ontario published a pamphlet denouncing Russell as a minister and his qualifications as a scholar along with his moral depravity. Well Charles Russell sued Pastor Ross for “Defamatory Libel”.
In the pamphlet, Ross said that Russell’s system of theology was, “Anti-rational, anti-scientific, anti-biblical, anti-Christian and a deplorable perversion of the gospel of God’s dear Son.”
Under cross-examination that took 5 hours here is just one example of the Russell answered...
Q: Attorney Stanton: “Do you know the Greek Alphabet?
A: Russell: “Oh, yes.”
Q: Can you tell me the correct letters if you see them?”
A: Some of them; I might make a mistake on some of them.”
Q: Would you tell me the names of those on the top of the page?”
A: Well, I don’t know that I would be able to.”
Q: You can’t tell what those letters are? Look at them and see if you know?”
A: “My way…” (at this point Russell is interrupted).
Q: “Are you familiar with the Greek language?”
A: “No”.
The next round of questioning was about his ordination. Russell claimed that his ordination was equal if not superior to ordained and accredited ministers. Attorney Stanton asked Russell to answer “Yes” or “No” to the next questions…
Q: “Is it true you were never ordained?”
A: “It is not true”.
Q: “Now you never were ordained by a bishop, clergyman, presbytery, council, or any body of men living?”
A: “I never was.”
He lost his case, and in falling to name the Greek alphabet, he proved himself a perjurer under oath, mainly because all through his ministry he claimed to base his cult on his Greek and Hebrew scholarship!
4 areas that are always falsely taught by cults:
· The Trinity.
· Deity of Christ.
· The Person of the Holy Spirit.
· The immortality of the soul.
The Jehovah’s Witness does a good job butchering these 4 points!
1. Their Deception of John 1:1.
John 1:1 “…The word was a god.” - New World Translation
In their New World Translation of the Bible that was first published in 1950 shows deliberate misinterpretation of key phrases by their so-called scholars. I call it “scheming scholarship” – it’s a joke!
On November 24, 1954 Fredrick W. Franz, their leading representative on the NWT Bible translation committee said under oath…
Q: Can you yourself, translate that into Hebrew?
A: Which?
Q: That fourth verse of the second chapter of Genesis.
A: You mean this?
Q: Yes
A: No!
They can’t even interpret the O.T. right, how can we believe their N.T. interpretations?
Universal Greek Grammatical Rule: The subject of the sentence is “word”; the verb is “was”. There can never be a direct object “a” following “was”, since verbs cannot take on an object. It is poor grammar and poor Greek to do otherwise.
Now this is how you can get a Jehovah’s Witness – ask them why don’t your so-called scholars do the same with all the other verses in the N.T. with regards to placing a direct object after the verb? They do it here because it fits their faulty and fanciful theology!
What is this verse from the NWT saying about God and Jesus Christ?
· That God is polytheistic – not true!
Deuteronomy 5:7 “You shall have no other gods before me.”
They get around this as saying that Jehovah is higher than all other gods.
Deuteronomy 6:4 “Hear O Israel, The Lord our God, the Lord is one.” (Monotheistic)
In Exodus 3:14 Jehovah God says to Moses “I Am”
But wait - Jesus said in John 8:58, “Before Abraham was I Am.”
When Jesus said this - any reasonable person can see that Jesus was actually saying, “I Am Jehovah” in the flesh!
