Saturday, August 08, 2009

News from My Neighborhood: The Jehovah Witnesses are Here

This morning I went out to my car to get something (okay, okay, my kids left their hairbrush in the car and couldn't find it themselves). As I bent over, rummaging through the detritus of accumulated child life in the back seat, a strange male voice floated over to me and said good morning.

I stood up and saw a man who had apparently just arrived from attending church in the 1950s. Next to him was a lady wearing a lovely floral dress to compliment his suit. He began, as I recall, by asking me if I had my Saturday chores all planned out. I told him we had a new baby and therefore wouldn't be doing chores. We exchanged baby related pleasantries.

I turned back to the car and bid them a good morning, and the man called for my attention once more so that he could show me a copy of the Watchtower, which would guide me through my confusion about the Bible by giving me a reading plan. Then he showed me how you could cut it out along the dotted lines. I liked how he assumed that I both wanted to read the Bible and also that I found it intimidating and difficult.

I told him that I didn't need his magazine, but thanks. He asked, "Are you a Bible reader yourself?" I told him yes. He asked if I had a special Bible verse for being a father. I wasn't sure what he meant. He said a special verse I went to as a father. I scratched my head and told him that so far as I knew they were all equally special and I hadn't really singled any out for special duty to me as a father. He quickly agreed and said good-bye.

I went out a minute later and they had moved on to our Russian neighbors, who never get up that early in the morning. At this time of the morning the father usually answers the door in his shorts. Then they went to the next neighbor down. He's deaf, and they seemed discouraged when no one answered. They got in their car (which, strangely, had two more JWs inside) and left the neighborhood.

I was a little disappointed that I didn't have the energy to engage in a lively conversation with them. Oh well. I'm sure they'll be back.

4 comments:

  1. They way we work a territory is that we return to the not-at-homes or the home-but-hiding ones. If you ever want to speak with one, we have services on Sunday and depending on the area, another one during the week. You can also go to: www.watchtower.org and request a visit. Better yet, at your own leisure, read some of our publications available online. Educate yourself about us and why we preach.

    I was a Catholic before and if you think about religion this way, it helped me find the truth. "If your religion was water and it was designed to support your life, is yours as pure as possible" Searching around, I found every religion added their own twist, doctrine but could never support it with the bible. With the Jehovah's Witnesses, if it is NOT in the bible, it is not teached. How can you argue with that?

    We will be back, it typically takes 1 year to do a territory but if your heart is open, you will either find us our Jehovah God will help us find you.

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  2. I love to sit down with the JWs when they come to our door. My husband and I talk to them about Jesus, which is really the main issue where we disagree, isn't it? Our questions to them, which have yet to be completely answered/challenged after 5 years, is 1) When is Jesus first seen in scriptures (the answer is in Joshua, as the commander of the Lord's army), 2) If Jesus is the commander of the Lord's army, and if he isn't God, then why was Joshua told to take off his shoes while he was standing on holy ground (as Moses was told by God at the burning bush), and 3) why was Joshua not punished for falling down and worshiping Jesus...or others for that matter. There are other references to Jesus being God, but these are the items to which none of the JWs at our door have ever been able to really answer. These things we show them...in their own Bible, so they can't say it isn't there or that we're twisting things around. We come to them on common ground. No argument...just telling it like it is.

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  3. wanted to clarify....Joshua and others worshiped Jesus...not that Joshua worshiped others.

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  4. oh i hope they come back and matt blogs about it

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