@Deeje
Regarding the body of Christ, I recall my last in person interaction with a Witness evangelist. I told them I was happy in my relationship with God and Christ, but that I wished him well in bringing people to turn to Christ as their savior. We ended the short discussion by agreeing that if we both love God, seek to come closer to Him in honesty, and trust in Jesus for salvation we could expect that whether I am right and we end up in heaven, or he is right and we end up in a non-heaven paradise(a new Earth? is that right?) we would both end up on the right side of things.
I feel that we both accepted each other, even through our doctrinal differences, as members of that singular body of Christ. Was he wrong to do so, in your opinion or according to Jehova's Witness orthodoxy?
We are commanded by Christ to deliver his message about the Kingdom to all who will listen.....(Matthew 24:14; Matthew 28:19-20) It wasn't an option...it was a life saving commission given to all of Christ's disciples, so it carried responsibilities. The messenger would not be a lawbreaker or an immoral person. If one was found to be guilty of any conduct that was in opposition to God's laws, the duty of the Congregation elders was to disfellowship (excommunicate) such a person after careful examination of the situation. (1 Corinthians 5:9-13; 2 John 10-11) We do not expect any humans to be perfect, but when God's laws are broken, we do expect consequences in accordance with the Bible's directives.
So when the message is received and someone expresses interest in the Kingdom message, we are to stay and instruct that person, as Jesus commanded. (Matthew 10:11-14) But if the message is rejected, then we are to move on....allowing that person to reap the consequences of their own decisions.
You see, if someone is content to remain in Christendom, then that is their choice to make, but we do not believe that staying with any self-confessed "Christian" body who teaches what Jesus did not teach, can expect his nod of approval. (Matthew 7:21-23)
In just one doctrine alone, (upheld by the majority of the churches of Christendom) we can see that the First of the Ten Commandments is broken....
Exodus 20:3....(NRSVCE)
" I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; 3 you shall have no other gods before (besides) me."
Christendom has another god in place of the Father.....yet there is not one single verse of scripture that even suggests that there is a "godhead" (a made up word) or that Jesus is God Almighty, or that he shares any equality with his Father at all. He is a servant of his God, (Acts 3:13) as he always has been.
There is a command in Revelation that is applied to "the Lord's Day" or as we believe, the time we are living in now....
Revelation 18:1-5...
"After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority; and the earth was made bright with his splendor. 2 He called out with a mighty voice,
“Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!
It has become a dwelling place of demons,
a haunt of every foul spirit,
a haunt of every foul bird,
a haunt of every foul and hateful beast.
3 For all the nations have drunk
of the wine of the wrath of her fornication,
and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her,
and the merchants of the earth have grown rich from the power of her luxury.”
4 Then I heard another voice from heaven saying,
“Come out of her, my people,
so that you do not take part in her sins,
and so that you do not share in her plagues;
5 for her sins are heaped high as heaven,
and God has remembered her iniquities." (NRSVCE)
Some have wrongly assumed that "Babylon the great" has no relationship to the church today....but that is not what the Bible indicates.
The original city of Babylon was built by the first rebel after the flood of Noah's day...Nimrod.
Babylon is connected to the false religious ideas that were promoted by those post flood rebels and taken into all the world when God confused the language at Babel....this means that the "greater Babylon" mirrors the original, which was the springboard for all the false religious ideas that permeate all the religions of the world..... multiplicities of gods, belief in an immoral soul, hellfire, mother goddess worship, idols, and everything that God finds detestable in all of them. They all have the same author.
The warning for God's people is to "
come out of her" because God is going to bring judgment upon her....so that is the decision for all who want to be saved when God brings her down......'her sins and iniquities are as high as heaven', so he does not hold back from meting out his justice. Anyone remaining associated with false worship of ant sort, will go down with that torpedoed ship.
We have to have obeyed that directive, which encompasses all the world's religion who demonstrate that they practice the worship of ancient Babylon. That is what my studies have revealed and as one who was raised in Babylon the great, I have heeded the directive and separated myself entirely from all connection to her.
Revelation 18:21...
"Then a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone and threw it into the sea, saying,
“With such violence Babylon the great city
will be thrown down,
and will be found no more". (NRSVCE)
Once it is gone, we will never see false worship practiced in the world again. This will be God's doing, according to scripture.
