Examining Watchtower Basic Teachings #8 - What is God's Kingdom?

What does the Bible Really Teach?

Chapter 8  What is God’s Kingdom?

The book says this;

Many people know that, in the Lord’s prayer, it says, “Let your Kingdom come”. What does that mean?

The kingdom is an everlasting, heavenly government ruled by Christ the King with 144,000 people resurrected from the earth as co-rulers. “Since the days of the apostles, God has been selecting faithful Christians…to complete the number”. This is “very loving” on God’s part because all these rulers have experienced the vicissitudes of life on earth, so they will have great sympathy for those on earth, over whom they rule.

When this kingdom began to rule, there was a war in heaven and the Devil and his angels were cast out. That was good news for heaven, but bad for the earth.

Human rulers have proved to be corrupt and incapable of bringing happiness to humankind, so God’s government will destroy all human governments soon at Armageddon. Then under its direction, earth will be turned into a peaceful paradise where people will live forever, if they prove faithful to God.

“The fulfilment of Bible prophecy shows that, in 1914, Christ became king and God’s heavenly kingdom began to rule. Hence, we are living in the “short period of time” that Satan has left. We can also say with certainty that soon God‘s kingdom will act to cause God‘s will to be done on earth”.

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My response:

Unfortunately, many attendees at churches have difficulty explaining what God’s kingdom is. It is only because Jehovah’s Witnesses put so much emphasis on it, that they appear to know so much about it and this impresses weak Christians and other uninformed people.

What the Watchtower teaches now about Bible prophecy and the kingdom being established in 1914, is nonsense. The early leaders of Jehovah’s Witnesses (International Bible Students) taught that the heavenly kingdom was established in 1874, so they published a magazine called “The Watchtower and Herald of Christ’s Presence” which is still in print today, as “The Watchtower Announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom”. In 1916, the first Watchtower president, Charles T. Russell, wrote about the Great War saying “this, we believe, is the beginning of that great battle” (of Armageddon).

As you will know, if you have been doing independent research, the Watchtower has repeatedly changed its interpretation of scripture and has made numerous false predictions about the timing of Armageddon, to the great cost of their followers.

As for the date 1914, you will be surprised at the numerical convolutions required to arrive at that date. Originally, Russell arrived at his dates by using measurements from the Great Pyramid of Giza (I am not joking! Russell liked pyramids and is buried under one) and later, the Watchtower arrived at their date 1914, by plucking verses from Numbers, Daniel, Ezekiel and Revelation, books written thousands of years apart and calculating 2520 years from the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 607 B.C. There is but one serious problem; those calculations were made after 1914, once they had seen the significance of that year in world history. Do you recall what I said about “prophecies” written after an event?

Christ’s kingdom is already here, in as much as Christ is ruling over his faithful followers individually. Christians believe the Holy Spirit is active today, guiding those who follow Christ. It is true that this world, alienated from God, is not perfect, but Christ rules in the hearts of those who love him and who try to do his will. Christians are ambassadors of Christ’s kingdom now, endeavouring to lead lives which reflect Christ‘s influence upon them. Christians believe that Christ will come again, but they don’t sit around waiting for it or fearing it. They get on with their lives, while still aware that he will come again at some unexpected time.

As for the limited number of 144,000 going to heaven, you can do your own calculations. How many international stadiums would you need to accommodate that number of people? Not more than two. But how many Christians do you think have been on earth since Jesus died 2000 years ago? By all means, subtract the pseudo-Christians who did nasty things in the name of Christ, but you will still be left with quite a few. And you have to keep in mind that there are still about 12,000 “true Christians” (that’s code for “Jehovah’s Witnesses“) who take the bread and wine at the Watchtower’s annual Memorial meeting.

This smaller number itself is a joke. When I left the Watchtower religion in 1995, there were less than 9,000 of these “anointed ones”, so the number of this “remnant” has grown, when it should be declining by their natural deaths. The Watchtower gets around this by claiming that “not all Christians throughout the centuries have been faithful”. What do you think?

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