When Jehovah’s Witnesses Come Knocking
Reflecting on a brief JW visit at my home
We were sitting down for dinner when our doorbell rang at 6:30 p.m. I opened the door to see a man politely greeting me, handing me a pamphlet for a special church service remembering Jesus’s death. It was at that moment I realized I had a Jehovah’s Witness (JW) at my door.
It was obvious he didn’t have much time for me, even though he was the showing up at my doorstep to invite me to his church. I wanted to respect his time to go around the rest of the neighborhood, but wanted to give him a few thoughts to ponder.
The Bible and The Watchtower
As with any time I speak with a JW, the first thing I brought up was John 1:1. I explained as quickly as I could that this verse says Jesus is divine, God incarnate. Weirdly enough, after I explained that to him, he just looked at me. Again, he felt in a hurry and didn’t feel as though he wanted a discussion with me. It was like he wasn’t prepared for the objections.
I politely told him, with a smile on my face, “You’re the least talkative JW I’ve ever spoken with!” I was truly confused as to why he didn’t say anything back. He told me, “I’m just listening.” But, confusing nevertheless.
The big issue we ran into was the Watch Tower Bible. He claimed that their version is synonymous with Scripture, and that there are no contradictions. Of course, that’s simply a lie. I don’t believe he was lying, but simply deceived. For example, I explained to him the truth of Ephesians 2:8-9, that we are saved by grace through faith, and it’s not our own doing, but God’s, so we may not boast. That flies in the face of what JW’s believe about salvation.
Which Jesus?
After that, I asked him how people are saved. He said, in a roundabout way, we must believe in Jesus. I asked him, “Which Jesus?”
I continued: “This is the problem with the Latter-Day Saint Church, as well. We both say ‘Jesus’ and other things but we don’t mean the same thing. We [Christians] believe Jesus is the eternal Son of God, God in the flesh. You guys do not believe that; you believe He came into being — we don’t. Those are two different Jesuses.”
Oddly enough, he didn’t necessarily attempt to argue with me over that concept, though he objected to my premise that we’re not talking about the same Jesus. (Again, this was honestly a difficult conversation because he didn’t seem too willing to converse.)
That’s when he really gave me one question that was on his mind.
Can God Die?
As I explained that Jesus is God in the flesh, he asked, “But can God die?” Of course, that isn’t necessarily a genuine question of his, but one that is nevertheless worthy of a response.
Can God die? No, He cannot. If God could die, He’d cease to be God. But therein lies the beauty and mystery of Jesus’s two natures. Jesus died on the cross as a human being—not as God. Jesus never ceased being God. Is there a bit of mystery to that? Absolutely. (I’ll explore that further in a blog to come.)
But again, Jesus died as a human because He willingly laid down His life for us. He didn’t die as the eternal God.
I tried explaining the concept of the hypostatic union to him (without using theological jargon), but he deemed it “too complex.”
RC Sproul eloquently wrote,
We should shrink in horror from the idea that God actually died on the cross. The atonement was made by the human nature of Christ. Somehow people tend to think that this lessens the dignity or the value of the substitutionary act, as if we were somehow implicitly denying the deity of Christ. God forbid. It’s the God-man Who dies, but death is something that is experienced only by the human nature, because the divine nature isn’t capable of experiencing death.
The Issue
What I knew I had to do in my five minutes with him was explain the gospel and its free offer of salvation, but also be clear about the JW religion. In his defense of Jesus not being divine, I explained: “A Jesus that is only human cannot save you from your sins.”
I told him—as we should all tell JWs if we have a conversation with them—that his religion leads people astray and is damnable. I was polite, and he knew that. He told me he disagreed. I think more than anything he was caught a little off guard with the pushback.
The point is, friend, that you need to be ready to defend the biblical gospel against the cult of JW. These conversations will happen and it would be wise to get well-equipped to answer any questions that might come up.