₦airaland Forum

Jessicha:
@ bold , correction pls lake of fire is not hellfire , lake of fire is second DEATH - Rev 20:14

The second death which burns with fire and brim stones?

truthislight:
He had said he was promised 'eternity'.

What does eternal life mean to a JW?

tempem:
How would you define a "sect"?

A religious group that is a smaller part of a larger group and whose members all share similar beliefs.

How would you define a " Sect"?

truthislight:
Lol. ^^^ On red, so you have been promised eternity?

Lol. see how ignorant you are and you still hang around to expose it.

Run along now.

You know nothing to help yourself let alone others.

It's a pity indeed.

Well... If you are not promised eternal life, i am. See here...
And this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life.
1 John:2:25

Who is the ignorant now?

Oh wait!!! You dont believe Jesus.

raphieMontella:
lol..the future in unpredictable tho'

True. So, let the future come

SaffronSpice:
A group of Christians from different ethnic backgrounds united in the worship of the Sovereign Lord Jehovah.
They help people learn about the bible and God's Kingdom.

Ok

dasparrow:
The bible also states that God hates infidelity. I can assure you that if God decided today that every Nigerian married man that has had an extra-marital affair since getting married will drop dead immediately, most Nigerian married women will be widows and Nigeria's population will decrease significantly.

Infidelity in marriage is so rampant in Nigeria but I wonder why Nigerian society never addresses that. A woman who is treated like a queen by her husband will submit to him naturally without even knowing it. The truth of the matter is, most Nigerian married men do not conduct themselves as they should. They carry young university girls up and down, infect their wives with all manners of sexually transmitted diseases, have babies outside of their marriage because they are looking for a male child, and the list is endless. And then after putting your women through so much crap, you now want her to be submissive. If Abraham was a Nigerian, he would have long gone ahead and married a second wife because Sarah could not conceive. However, it was Sarah who even forced Abraham to have a baby with her maid Haggai and today we all see the consequences of that decision.

My point is, treat your spouse the way you wish to be treated. Only a good and faithful husband complements a wise woman. Of what use is a wise woman to a foolish husband who sleeps around and destroys the very foundation of his marriage? So, lets try and be objective about this topic okay? even though I see that is difficult for most Nigerians.

I'm out.

Hahahahahahaha. Dont go yet, lets put our heads together.

It takes two to tango.

Infidelity in men is subscribed for them by the society, and its a problem that plagues marriages, not just Nigerian Marriages and that does not excuse women to turn nasty. Two wrongs can't make a right.

As humans under God, we individually have our duties and responsibilities first to God then to our Spouses. If my husband decides to gallivant with women outside of his marriage, what should be my reactions to that?

First, i will check if am lacking in someway. (Some though, if you like kill ya sef, dem go still go).

But will fighting him bring him back home? I think not. What then should i do?

The Bible says when your own Obidietnce is complete then you can ask for revenge agasint anyone.

Is my obedience complete?

Have i stayed faithful in this marriage?

Am i submitting to him? If yes, then...

I will face God, and God will face him.

A soft answer turns away wrath, but grievous words stir up anger. Now he has gone to do wrong, i will speak to his conscience, not to his reason.

I agree that its hard to submit to a man who is not himself submitted to God. Most foolish men will take the woman in this picture as a door mat.

Again, 90% of why men go out of their marriages is their wives. Do your part and leave his part alone.

Lets keep sentiments as ladies outside of this. Lets be objective. Most of us ladies wants to marry to escape the society, but are not ready to marry, and most of the time are not married to the kind of men we would really have loved to get married to, hence; they resistance to obey and submit to them.

A man you don't love, you can't respect, a man you don't respect, you can't obey/submit to. Simple.

Today most women marry the Ring, then borrow his sperms to procreate, after that the man disappears, what should be the reaction of the man in this circumstance?

Do you know whats trending now? Ladies denying their young Christian husbands sex. Its a case right now.

What do expect a man with high libido who had kept himself under control for years waiting to be married, now is married but his wife won't let him have his right?
The emotion has been let loose, now he has to keep it in again?

MOST OF THE PROBLEMS IN MARRIAGES IS FROM US WOMENm

s4short:
Please from the creation of man God's law has been present though it wasn't in written form but was passed from generation to generation, it was not merely conscience acting in those scenarios because if there was no law there wouldn't have been sin because sin is transgression of God's law and people won't have received punishments for their sins. Also Abraham and lot's lineage can be traced back to Noah which explains why they knew more abi were the inhabitants of sodom and Gomorrah devoid of conscience?

Thats my point. The law was written in their heaets. Conscience acted as an Umpire in man.

nnamdiosu:
lol @ take cover. sweet heart dont take cover jor. many people don't know (innocently too) that feminist is an agenda from the deepest pit of hell. God intended from the beginning (and bible many times says so )..that a woman should submit to her husband (totally. In return the man should love her and be patient with her (and never take that submission for granted). In return, the male children will learn patient and maturity from their daddies and the girls will learn submission and humility from their mummies, and together the whole family would love each other, because there is order and harmony. the way to a man's heart isn't food, or sex. he can get that from restaurants or brothels.
No, it's something more priceless that money can't buy. it's submission. a man can't get that anywhere except from his own wife. From his own rib of rib, and meat of meat.

That's so true. Daddy love Mummy, Mummy submit to Daddy. Daughters learn from mummy, sons learn from daddy, ORDER.
Give me wisdom Lord.

SaffronSpice:
An article that calls JWs a sect is libellous.

So what is Jw if not a sect?

thelish:
Nor be small discussion u and holy spirit get ooo
Was he dictating while ur writing? lol

Kind off.

CAPTIVATOR:
# shakes head # goodnight

Careful so that you wont shake off your head. Good nite good sir.

CAPTIVATOR:
# shakes head # goodnight

Careful so that you wont shake off your head.

Mrbllymer:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Jehovah%27s_Witnesses

Thank you.

raphieMontella:
of course i know youre a lady
..thats why i love you...
Marriage?? Kids??

Hahahahahahahaha. Abeg leave me oo. Look around there are atheist ladies here. You need an introduction?
My house is a church and my kids shall be ministers like me. So, you are out.

CAPTIVATOR:
how did you know he didn't read , the fact that he asked you to provide evidence from Russell himself claiming the founder title and you couldn't showed you are the biased one here .

Am sure you didnt read that excerpt thats why u still ask for evidence that Charles is the founder of Watchtower which houses JW.

SaffronSpice:
The site must be vetted first.
Paul Grundy and his likes dish out lots of misinformation out there.

Lolzz, didn't get them from Paul. So if Paul posts facts that a true we shd ignore?

raphieMontella:
^^^ if i say i love you now..u'd become angry...
Hahahaha

Am a babe not a guy. I think you shd be directing your love to HopefulandLand not me.

SaffronSpice:
Read this:
www.quora.com/what-is-it-like-to-be-a-Jehovahs-Witness-in-a-Muslim-country-For-eg-in-Iraq-or-Iran-or-Saudi-Arabia .

The 3rd paragraph should show you the type of challenges JWs in hostile countries weather,so your assumption that they wait for "evangelicals" to pave the way is unfounded.

I asked you if those challenges are peculiar to just JW and not to evangelicals?

SaffronSpice:
Anas09,what site did you copied your post from?Am just curious because some detractors are hell bent on denting the image of JWs.

Are facts there true or false?

Jozzy4:
copy and paste will not kill you , just a simple request: show this thread where Russell claimed to be the founder ?


baseless liars

Does it not?
Am very sure you didn't read it. Its not written by Watchtower u won't read it. U just came out to call me a liar, did u read it?

[quote author=Jozzy4 post=49362428]I guess you have no evidence .

you are the liar here , you are attributing what he never claim to him . typical!

[/quote
I have posted to one of ur broda, read it there. JW are just like Muslims.

truthislight:
Where did I speculate ? Are humans not promised Eternal life? Are humans not promised everlasting life? does that implies that humans had always existed?

So, Jesus being called Eternal father or Everlasting father does not mean he has always existed.

There is a difference between Eternal and eternity in the Bible.

If you think they are the same, can it be said you were given Eternity?

How these people even dey think sef?

Jesus said he had always existed. He was with the father from the begining. Before the foundation of thebearth, he was with the father. He said "I came from the father, am going to the father". Does that sound like someone who did not pre-exist? Humans did not pre-exist. We were created as the earth was created, but not so with Christ.

The eternity promised us has nothing to do with weda we as humans had existed before cominf to this earth.

Wow.

truthislight:
Jesus did not talk about "Hell fire". Lol. the word Hell is not part of Hebrew or Greek language.

Really? Jesus did not talk about hellfire? What will u do if i post those scriptures here?

raphieMontella:
i really dont know why your mind keeps on straying off the issue..
U wanted to imply that all ''homos'' hate yahweh...which i corrected..any other contrary meaning that holy spirit is giving you is your choice

I didnt see you correcting anythin boy. If you gay be proud to admit it so that we know how to adress you

SaffronSpice:
He asked you a question.Answer it.

I think you need to understand the hierarchical structure of the Jehovah's Witnesses is different from that of other Christian churches where you have professional pastors,the others,and the G O at the top.

The Organisation was started by a group which Russell was a part of
and played a major role in,but that does not make him the founder.

I hope u can read this. All of it

Charles Taze Russell, who was born on February 16, 1852, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Originally raised a Presbyterian, Russell was 16 years old and a member of the Congregational church in the year 1868, when he found himself losing faith. He had begun to doubt not only church creeds and doctrines, but also God and the Bible itself. At this critical juncture a chance encounter restored his faith and placed him under the influence of Second Adventist preacher Jonas Wendell.
For some years after that Russell continued to study Scripture with and under the influence of various Adventist laymen and clergy, notably Advent Christian Church minister George Stetson and the Bible Examiner's publisher George Storrs. He met locally on a regular basis with a small circle of friends to discuss the Bible, and this informal study group came to regard him as their leader or pastor.
In January, 1876, when he was 23 years old, Russell received a copy of The Herald of the Morning, an Adventist magazine published by Nelson H. Barbour of Rochester, New York. One of the distinguishing features of Barbour's group at that time was their belief that Christ returned invisibly in 1874, and this concept presented in The Herald captured Russell's attention. It meant that this Adventist splinter group had not remained defeated, as others had, when Christ failed to appear in 1874 as Adventist leaders had predicted; somehow this small group had managed to hold onto the date by affirming that the Lord had indeed returned at the appointed time, only invisibly.
Was this mere wishful thinking, coupled with a stubborn refusal to admit the error of failed chronological calculations? Perhaps, but Barbour had some arguments to offer in support of his assertions. In particular, he came up with a basis for reinterpreting the Second Coming as an invisible event: In Benjamin Wilson's Emphatic Diaglott translation of the New Testament the word rendered coming in the King James Version at Matthew 24:27, 37, 39 is translated presence instead. This served as the basis for Barbour's group to advocate, in addition to their time calculations, an invisible presence of Christ.
Although the idea appealed to young Charles Taze Russell, the reading public apparently refused to 'buy' the story of an invisible Second Coming, with the result that N. H. Barbour's publication The Herald of the Morning was failing financially. In the summer of 1876 wealthy Russell paid Barbour's way to Philadelphia and met with him to discuss both beliefs and finances. The upshot was that Russell became the magazine's financial backer and was added to the masthead as an Assistant Editor. He contributed articles for publication as well as monetary gifts, and Russell's small study group similarly became affiliated with Barbour's.
Russell and Barbour believed and taught that Christ's invisible return in 1874 would be followed soon afterward, in the spring of 1878 to be exact, by the Rapture-the bodily snatching away of believers to heaven. When this expected Rapture failed to occur on time in 1878, The Herald's editor, Mr. Barbour, came up with "new light" on this and other doctrines. Russell, however, rejected some of the new ideas and persuaded other members to oppose them. Finally, Russell quit the staff of the Adventist magazine and started his own. He called it Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence and published its first issue with the date July, 1879. In the beginning it had the same mailing list as The Herald of the Morning and considerable space was devoted to refuting the latter on points of disagreement, Russell having taken with him a copy of that magazine's mailing list when he resigned as assistant editor.
At this point Charles Russell no longer wanted to consider himself an Adventist, nor a Millerite. But, he continued to view Miller and Barbour as instruments chosen by God to lead His people in the past. The formation of a distinct denomination around Russell was a gradual development. His immediate break was, not with Adventism, but with the person and policies of N. H. Barbour.
Nor were barriers immediately erected with respect to Protestantism in general. New readers obtaining subscriptions to Zion's Watch Tower were often church members who saw the magazine as a para-church ministry, not as an anti-church alternative. Russell traveled about speaking from the pulpits of Protestant churches as well as to gatherings of his own followers. In 1879, the year of his marriage to Maria Frances Ackley and also the year he began publishing Zion's Watch Tower, Russell organized some thirty study groups or congregations scattered from Ohio to the New England coast. Each local "class" or ecclesia came to recognize him as "Pastor," although geography and Russell's writing and publishing activities prevented more than an occasional pastoral visit in person.
Inevitably, Russell's increasingly divergent teachings forced his followers to separate from other church bodies and to create a denomination of their own. Beginning, as he did, in a small branch of Adventism that went to the extreme of setting specific dates for the return of Christ and the Rapture, Russell went farther out on a limb in 1882 by openly rejecting the doctrine of the Trinity. His earlier mentor Nelson H. Barbour was a Trinitarian, as was The Herald of the Morning's other assistant editor John H. Paton who joined Russell in leaving Barbour to start Zion's Watch Tower. The writings of Barbour and Paton that Russell had helped publish or distribute were Trinitarian in their theology. And the Watch Tower itself was at first vague and noncommittal on the subject. It was only after Paton broke with him in 1882, and ceased to be listed on the masthead, that Russell began writing against the doctrine of the Trinity.
By the time of his death , Charles Taze Russell had traveled more than a million miles and preached more than 30,000 sermons. He had authored works totaling some 50,000 printed pages, and nearly 20,000,000 copies of his books and booklets had been sold.
Followers had been taught that Russell himself was the "faithful and wise servant" of Matthew 24:45 and "the Laodicean Messenger," God's seventh and final spokesman to the Christian church. But he lived to see the failure of various dates he had predicted for the Rapture, and finally died on October 31, 1916, more than two years after the world was supposed to have ended, according to his calculations, in early October, 1914..
His disciples, however, saw the World War then raging as reason to believe "the end" was still imminent. They buried Russell beneath a headstone identifying him as "the Laodicean Messenger," and erected next to his grave a massive stone pyramid emblazoned with the cross and crown symbol he was fond of and the name "Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society." (The pyramid still stands off Cemetery Lane in Ross, a northern Pittsburgh suburb, where it reportedly serves as the focal point of an eerie scene each Halloween as modern-day Russellites encircle it, holding hands, in a vigil commemorating the day of his death.)
According to instructions Russell left behind, his successor to the presidency would share power with an editorial committee and with the Watch Tower corporation's board of directors, whom Russell had appointed "for life." But vice president Joseph Franklin ("Judge" Rutherford soon set about concentrating all organizational authority in his own hands. A skilled lawyer who had served as Russell's chief legal advisor, he combined legal prowess with what opponents undoubtedly saw as a Machiavellian approach to internal corporate politics. Thus he used a loophole in their appointment to unseat the majority of the Watch Tower directors without calling a membership vote. And he even had a subordinate summon the police into the Society's Brooklyn headquarters offices to break up their board meeting and evict them from the premises. (Faith on the March by A. H. Macmillan, pp. 78-80)
After securing the headquarters complex and the sect's corporate entities, Rutherford turned his attention to the rest of the organization. By gradually replacing locally elected elders with his own appointees, he managed to transform a loose collection of semi-autonomous democratically-run congregations into a tight-knit organizational machine run from his office. Some local congregations broke away, forming such Russellite splinter groups as the Chicago Bible Students, the Dawn Bible Students, and the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement, all of which continue to this day. But most Bible Students remained under his control, and Rutherford renamed them "Jehovah's Witnesses" in 1931, to distinguish them from these other groups.
Meanwhile, he shifted the sect's emphasis from the individual "character development" Russell had stressed to vigorous public witnessing work, distributing the Society's literature from house to house. By 1927 this door-to-door literature distribution had become an essential activity required of all members. The literature consisted primarily of Rutherford's unremitting series of attacks against government, against Prohibition, against "big business," and against the Roman Catholic Church. He also forged a huge radio network and took to the air waves, exploiting populist and anti-Catholic sentiment to draw thousands of additional converts. His vitriolic attacks, blaring from portable phonographs carried to people's doors and from the loudspeakers of sound cars parked across from churches, also drew down upon the Witnesses mob violence and government persecution in many parts of the world.
Like Russell, Rutherford tried his hand at prophecy and predicted that biblical patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob would be resurrected in 1925 to rule as princes over the earth. (Millions Now Living Will Never Die, 1920, pp. 89-90) They failed to show up, of course, and Rutherford quit predicting dates. In fact, referring to that prophetic failure he later admitted, "I made an ass of myself." (The Watchtower, October 1, 1984, p. 24)
Vice President Nathan Homer Knorr inherited the presidency upon Rutherford's death in 1942 but left doctrinal matters largely in the hands of Frederick W. Franz, who joined the sect under Russell and had been serving at Brooklyn headquarters since 1920. Lacking the personal magnetism and charisma of Russell and Rutherford, Knorr focused followers' devotion on the 'Mother' organization rather than on himself.
After decades of publishing books and booklets authored by its presidents Russell and Rutherford, the Watchtower Society began producing literature that was written anonymously. But it was not impersonal, since the organization itself was virtually personified, and readers were directed to "show our respect for Jehovah's organization, for she is our mother and the beloved wife of our heavenly Father, Jehovah God." (The Watchtower, May 1, 1957, p. 285)
A superb administrator, Knorr shifted the sect's focus from dynamic leadership to dynamic membership. He initiated training programs to transform members into effective recruiters. Instead of carrying a portable phonograph from house to house, playing recordings of "Judge" Rutherford's lectures at people's doorsteps, the average Jehovah's Witness began receiving instruction on how to speak persuasively. Men, women, and children learned to give sermons at the doors on a variety of subjects.
Meanwhile Fred Franz worked behind the scenes to restore faith in the sect's chronological calculations, a subject largely ignored following Rutherford's prophetic failure in 1925. The revised chronology established Christ's invisible return as having taken place in 1914 rather than 1874, and, during the 1960's, the Society's publications began pointing to the year 1975 as the likely time for Armageddon and the end of the world.
The prevailing belief among Jehovah's Witnesses today is that the Society never predicted "the end" for 1975, but that some over-zealous members mistakenly read this into the message. However, the official prediction is well documented. See, for example, the article titled "Why Are You Looking Forward to 1975?" in The Watchtower of August 15, 1968, pp. 494-501. Allowing for a small margin of error, it concludes a lengthy discussion with this thought: "Are we to assume from this study that the battle of Armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of Christ will begin by then? Possibly, but we wait to see how closely the seventh thousand-year period of man's existence coincides with the sabbathlike thousand-year reign of Christ. . . . It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years." (p. 499) For several other quotes pointing specifically to 1975, see the book Index of Watchtower Errors (by David A. Reed, Baker Book House, 1990) pages 106-110.
Knorr's training programs for proselytizing, plus Franz' apocalyptic projections for 1975, combined to produce rapid growth in membership, the annual rate of increase peaking at 13.5 percent in 1974. All of this pushed meeting attendance at JW Kingdom Halls from around 100,000 in 1941 to just under 5 million in 1975. Growth since then has been slower, but fairly steady in most years, with the result that nearly 11.5 million gathered at Kingdom Halls in the spring of 1992 for the Witnesses' annual communion or "Memorial" service commemorating Christ's death with unleavened bread and red wine.

SaffronSpice:
He asked you a question.Answer it.

I think you need to understand the hierarchical structure of the Jehovah's Witnesses is different from that of other Christian churches where you have professional pastors,the others,and the G O at the top.

The Organisation was started by a group which Russell was a part of
and played a major role in,but that does not make him the founder.

I hope u can read this.

Charles Taze Russell, who was born on February 16, 1852, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Originally raised a Presbyterian, Russell was 16 years old and a member of the Congregational church in the year 1868, when he found himself losing faith. He had begun to doubt not only church creeds and doctrines, but also God and the Bible itself. At this critical juncture a chance encounter restored his faith and placed him under the influence of Second Adventist preacher Jonas Wendell.
For some years after that Russell continued to study Scripture with and under the influence of various Adventist laymen and clergy, notably Advent Christian Church minister George Stetson and the Bible Examiner's publisher George Storrs. He met locally on a regular basis with a small circle of friends to discuss the Bible, and this informal study group came to regard him as their leader or pastor.
In January, 1876, when he was 23 years old, Russell received a copy of The Herald of the Morning, an Adventist magazine published by Nelson H. Barbour of Rochester, New York. One of the distinguishing features of Barbour's group at that time was their belief that Christ returned invisibly in 1874, and this concept presented in The Herald captured Russell's attention. It meant that this Adventist splinter group had not remained defeated, as others had, when Christ failed to appear in 1874 as Adventist leaders had predicted; somehow this small group had managed to hold onto the date by affirming that the Lord had indeed returned at the appointed time, only invisibly.
Was this mere wishful thinking, coupled with a stubborn refusal to admit the error of failed chronological calculations? Perhaps, but Barbour had some arguments to offer in support of his assertions. In particular, he came up with a basis for reinterpreting the Second Coming as an invisible event: In Benjamin Wilson's Emphatic Diaglott translation of the New Testament the word rendered coming in the King James Version at Matthew 24:27, 37, 39 is translated presence instead. This served as the basis for Barbour's group to advocate, in addition to their time calculations, an invisible presence of Christ.
Although the idea appealed to young Charles Taze Russell, the reading public apparently refused to 'buy' the story of an invisible Second Coming, with the result that N. H. Barbour's publication The Herald of the Morning was failing financially. In the summer of 1876 wealthy Russell paid Barbour's way to Philadelphia and met with him to discuss both beliefs and finances. The upshot was that Russell became the magazine's financial backer and was added to the masthead as an Assistant Editor. He contributed articles for publication as well as monetary gifts, and Russell's small study group similarly became affiliated with Barbour's.
Russell and Barbour believed and taught that Christ's invisible return in 1874 would be followed soon afterward, in the spring of 1878 to be exact, by the Rapture-the bodily snatching away of believers to heaven. When this expected Rapture failed to occur on time in 1878, The Herald's editor, Mr. Barbour, came up with "new light" on this and other doctrines. Russell, however, rejected some of the new ideas and persuaded other members to oppose them. Finally, Russell quit the staff of the Adventist magazine and started his own. He called it Zion's Watch Tower and Herald of Christ's Presence and published its first issue with the date July, 1879. In the beginning it had the same mailing list as The Herald of the Morning and considerable space was devoted to refuting the latter on points of disagreement, Russell having taken with him a copy of that magazine's mailing list when he resigned as assistant editor.
At this point Charles Russell no longer wanted to consider himself an Adventist, nor a Millerite. But, he continued to view Miller and Barbour as instruments chosen by God to lead His people in the past. The formation of a distinct denomination around Russell was a gradual development. His immediate break was, not with Adventism, but with the person and policies of N. H. Barbour.
Nor were barriers immediately erected with respect to Protestantism in general. New readers obtaining subscriptions to Zion's Watch Tower were often church members who saw the magazine as a para-church ministry, not as an anti-church alternative. Russell traveled about speaking from the pulpits of Protestant churches as well as to gatherings of his own followers. In 1879, the year of his marriage to Maria Frances Ackley and also the year he began publishing Zion's Watch Tower, Russell organized some thirty study groups or congregations scattered from Ohio to the New England coast. Each local "class" or ecclesia came to recognize him as "Pastor," although geography and Russell's writing and publishing activities prevented more than an occasional pastoral visit in person.
Inevitably, Russell's increasingly divergent teachings forced his followers to separate from other church bodies and to create a denomination of their own. Beginning, as he did, in a small branch of Adventism that went to the extreme of setting specific dates for the return of Christ and the Rapture, Russell went farther out on a limb in 1882 by openly rejecting the doctrine of the Trinity. His earlier mentor Nelson H. Barbour was a Trinitarian, as was The Herald of the Morning's other assistant editor John H. Paton who joined Russell in leaving Barbour to start Zion's Watch Tower. The writings of Barbour and Paton that Russell had helped publish or distribute were Trinitarian in their theology. And the Watch Tower itself was at first vague and noncommittal on the subject. It was only after Paton broke with him in 1882, and ceased to be listed on the masthead, that Russell began writing against the doctrine of the Trinity.
By the time of his death , Charles Taze Russell had traveled more than a million miles and preached more than 30,000 sermons. He had authored works totaling some 50,000 printed pages, and nearly 20,000,000 copies of his books and booklets had been sold.
Followers had been taught that Russell himself was the "faithful and wise servant" of Matthew 24:45 and "the Laodicean Messenger," God's seventh and final spokesman to the Christian church. But he lived to see the failure of various dates he had predicted for the Rapture, and finally died on October 31, 1916, more than two years after the world was supposed to have ended, according to his calculations, in early October, 1914..
His disciples, however, saw the World War then raging as reason to believe "the end" was still imminent. They buried Russell beneath a headstone identifying him as "the Laodicean Messenger," and erected next to his grave a massive stone pyramid emblazoned with the cross and crown symbol he was fond of and the name "Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society." (The pyramid still stands off Cemetery Lane in Ross, a northern Pittsburgh suburb, where it reportedly serves as the focal point of an eerie scene each Halloween as modern-day Russellites encircle it, holding hands, in a vigil commemorating the day of his death.)
According to instructions Russell left behind, his successor to the presidency would share power with an editorial committee and with the Watch Tower corporation's board of directors, whom Russell had appointed "for life." But vice president Joseph Franklin ("Judge" Rutherford soon set about concentrating all organizational authority in his own hands. A skilled lawyer who had served as Russell's chief legal advisor, he combined legal prowess with what opponents undoubtedly saw as a Machiavellian approach to internal corporate politics. Thus he used a loophole in their appointment to unseat the majority of the Watch Tower directors without calling a membership vote. And he even had a subordinate summon the police into the Society's Brooklyn headquarters offices to break up their board meeting and evict them from the premises. (Faith on the March by A. H. Macmillan, pp. 78-80)
After securing the headquarters complex and the sect's corporate entities, Rutherford turned his attention to the rest of the organization. By gradually replacing locally elected elders with his own appointees, he managed to transform a loose collection of semi-autonomous democratically-run congregations into a tight-knit organizational machine run from his office. Some local congregations broke away, forming such Russellite splinter groups as the Chicago Bible Students, the Dawn Bible Students, and the Laymen's Home Missionary Movement, all of which continue to this day. But most Bible Students remained under his control, and Rutherford renamed them "Jehovah's Witnesses" in 1931, to distinguish them from these other groups.
Meanwhile, he shifted the sect's emphasis from the individual "character development" Russell had stressed to vigorous public witnessing work, distributing the Society's literature from house to house. By 1927 this door-to-door literature distribution had become an essential activity required of all members. The literature consisted primarily of Rutherford's unremitting series of attacks against government, against Prohibition, against "big business," and against the Roman Catholic Church. He also forged a huge radio network and took to the air waves, exploiting populist and anti-Catholic sentiment to draw thousands of additional converts. His vitriolic attacks, blaring from portable phonographs carried to people's doors and from the loudspeakers of sound cars parked across from churches, also drew down upon the Witnesses mob violence and government persecution in many parts of the world.
Like Russell, Rutherford tried his hand at prophecy and predicted that biblical patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob would be resurrected in 1925 to rule as princes over the earth. (Millions Now Living Will Never Die, 1920, pp. 89-90) They failed to show up, of course, and Rutherford quit predicting dates. In fact, referring to that prophetic failure he later admitted, "I made an ass of myself." (The Watchtower, October 1, 1984, p. 24)
Vice President Nathan Homer Knorr inherited the presidency upon Rutherford's death in 1942 but left doctrinal matters largely in the hands of Frederick W. Franz, who joined the sect under Russell and had been serving at Brooklyn headquarters since 1920. Lacking the personal magnetism and charisma of Russell and Rutherford, Knorr focused followers' devotion on the 'Mother' organization rather than on himself.
After decades of publishing books and booklets authored by its presidents Russell and Rutherford, the Watchtower Society began producing literature that was written anonymously. But it was not impersonal, since the organization itself was virtually personified, and readers were directed to "show our respect for Jehovah's organization, for she is our mother and the beloved wife of our heavenly Father, Jehovah God." (The Watchtower, May 1, 1957, p. 285)
A superb administrator, Knorr shifted the sect's focus from dynamic leadership to dynamic membership. He initiated training programs to transform members into effective recruiters. Instead of carrying a portable phonograph from house to house, playing recordings of "Judge" Rutherford's lectures at people's doorsteps, the average Jehovah's Witness began receiving instruction on how to speak persuasively. Men, women, and children learned to give sermons at the doors on a variety of subjects.
Meanwhile Fred Franz worked behind the scenes to restore faith in the sect's chronological calculations, a subject largely ignored following Rutherford's prophetic failure in 1925. The revised chronology established Christ's invisible return as having taken place in 1914 rather than 1874, and, during the 1960's, the Society's publications began pointing to the year 1975 as the likely time for Armageddon and the end of the world.
The prevailing belief among Jehovah's Witnesses today is that the Society never predicted "the end" for 1975, but that some over-zealous members mistakenly read this into the message. However, the official prediction is well documented. See, for example, the article titled "Why Are You Looking Forward to 1975?" in The Watchtower of August 15, 1968, pp. 494-501. Allowing for a small margin of error, it concludes a lengthy discussion with this thought: "Are we to assume from this study that the battle of Armageddon will be all over by the autumn of 1975, and the long-looked-for thousand-year reign of Christ will begin by then? Possibly, but we wait to see how closely the seventh thousand-year period of man's existence coincides with the sabbathlike thousand-year reign of Christ. . . . It may involve only a difference of weeks or months, not years." (p. 499) For several other quotes pointing specifically to 1975, see the book Index of Watchtower Errors (by David A. Reed, Baker Book House, 1990) pages 106-110.
Knorr's training programs for proselytizing, plus Franz' apocalyptic projections for 1975, combined to produce rapid growth in membership, the annual rate of increase peaking at 13.5 percent in 1974. All of this pushed meeting attendance at JW Kingdom Halls from around 100,000 in 1941 to just under 5 million in 1975. Growth since then has been slower, but fairly steady in most years, with the result that nearly 11.5 million gathered at Kingdom Halls in the spring of 1992 for the Witnesses' annual communion or "Memorial" service commemorating Christ's death with unleavened bread and red wine.

SaffronSpice:
The activities of JWs are banned in some Muslim countries.
You'll find JWs in any country in the world whose citizens are willing to listen to the tru..

And the activities of evangelical Christians are not banned in those same countries? But evangelicals still send people there. They kill us, but we keep going. These are people who are not afraid to die for the gospel.

JW waits in the sidelines for the evangelicals to make converts then they come in and confuse.

Jw hardly have any redemptive mesaage to deliver to a lost sinner, none whatsoever.

I almost was lost into you guys. At the brink of it, God saved me.

freshcvvs:
And which laws are you going to judge the pre-law humans with?
With laws are you going to judge those who lived far away from the mosaic law with? i mean the Egyptians e.t.c?

I can see i have completely confused you because you do not know where to classify me. i love it this way, coming from different angles to show you that the world is not just the way you see it.

You asked questions you didnt even allow me answer but you have concluded that you have completely confused me. Hahahahahahaha. Where do u come from pls?

Why did Adam run ans hide wen he heard God in the garden? The consciousness of a wrong doing

Was there law wen Cane killed his brother? No
Why did he trick him into following him to a secluded place, killed and hid his body? How did he know it was wrong? Conscience.

Wen God came asking for Abel his brother, why didnt he say, "I killed him"? The consciousness of a wrong done.

Why did Abram accept to obey and follow a strange God didderent from the ones his progenitors had known ans worshiped? How did he know that this new God was the real God? Conscience.

Was there law during Sodom and Gomorah? What gave Abraham the impression that righteousness could save those nations if 10 righteous souls were found therein?

How did Lot know that Homosexuality was a sin for him to have fought to protect the men under his roof? Instead he opted to give his virgin daughters to the men to defile rather than allow them sexually assault his visitors?

Which law did Lot saw that Homosexuality was a sin against God?

Conscience, Conscience, conscience...

Can you now see that you are the one confused because you follow these things based on your senses?

freshcvvs:
I read in some places that hell = grave. interpretations screwed up the real meaning. hell doesn't actually mean "real fire" afterall spirits don't feel pains so casting a spirit into fire does nothing, don't you think?

I hope u have watched a body being interred? Did you ever see fire down there? What happened to your mind? U lost it?

oneolajire:
Hahahahahahahahaha, I dey laaaaaafffffff laaaaaafffff ooooo .

You call yours evangelism too! Second degree evangelism.



The guy is happy spreading falsehood

I ministered to a Native Doctor, a man from a long line of Native Doctirs. He gave his life to Christ. Burnt every of his Arts. Started Church. He confessed to me that, no one had ever stopped to preach the Word to him once he introduces himself as a Native doctor.
As a matter of fact, he uses that to scare Bibke people off. He told me that several times, JW have come to him, but immidiately he tells them that he is a Native Doctor they turn back and run, but i sat in front of his shrine on a piece of block for two hours sharing the love of Christ with him.
That man could not believe a young lady will have that kind of guts. I was not afraid of who he was becauae i knew who i carried. I lead him to Christ, went back and brought my pastor, before us, he removed his charms, rings, amulets, neck chain and destroyed them.

Took a Bible and went to their viilage and summoned his kinsmen who most are Native Doctors. His father is a living babalawo, still alive, and preaented the Bible to them as his new way. When he return to the city, his father went to collect herbs, the spirits ceased the old man in the forest for three good days. The man could find his way out of the fimilar forest his had been going.

He called me, i called my pastor, we went into prayers. The old man was found alive. If that man had died, my convert would have been in serious trouble, because they accused him of being responsible for everything.

The fact is that he broke rank.

As his father's first son, he shd step into his father's shoes, but now he is a believer.

He is so excited to know all he now knows about God. He accuses some people around of hating him. He said they all knew he was damned but no one told him, they were all goiing to church preparing their way to heaven, while he was busy working to go to hell but no one told him.

Does that look like sexond rate evangelism? Why were JW running from preaching to him?

oneolajire:
Hahahahahahahahaha, I dey laaaaaafffffff laaaaaafffff ooooo .

You call yours evangelism too! Second degree evangelism.



The guy is happy spreading falsehood

Hmmmmmm. My evangelism is second rate, yours is first rate right? How many Islamic countries do u send missions to?
All you wen u go out is arguement, wen u meet Bible based believers, you get thrown off balance and promise to return but never do.