[ronald reagan]

I recently began entertaining a JW at my house. He originally came and was entirely respectful, knowledgeable about his faith, and humble beyond words. I've long been interested and impressed by other sects of faith -- how they seem to take the mission of evangelizing, spreading the gospel, and generally just taking their faith to the edges of the earth. While I disagree with the JW strongly, I find that alone no reason to ask them to leave when they come. In fact, I make coffee and offer a lunch. I believe that Christ himself would entertain them in that regard.

The encounter that I'm about to describe occurred within the last week. This was the gentleman's third visit with me. While I wasn't dishonest with him regarding my faith, I also didn't make it clear to him that I wasn't a likely conversion candidate. I suspected that doing so would have ended our chat prematurely. In fact, it was my goal to convert HIM. But in between him not converting me, and me trying to convert him -- I offered him my hand in friendship. This seems to have created an actual bond between him and I. It was actually kind of nice. I literally looked forward to his next visit. Any excuse to talk about Christ and what faith has done to and for me -- is a good one.

So allow me to set up our final meeting by telling you about the first two.

He began with the typical approach. JW's usually point to the horrible events going on in the world that almost all people would be saddened by -- the state of politics, war in the middle east, horrible natural disasters, etc. This allows them to create a common ground to stand on with you. They then get a feel for where you stand in regards to christianity in general. Sometimes they'll dig deeper and ask about your exact faith/denomination. Keep in mind, these guys are trained not only in scripture, but communication as well. And trust me, they are extremely talented at their 'job'. A poor unsuspecting, or down on his luck chap would likely find their message worthy of learning about.

It also should be pointed out that if you aren't comfortable with your own faith and understanding, and have a firm grasp on scripture... delving into a deep discussion about doctrine is probably not going to end well for you. Although they are horribly off regarding these matters, they are masters of manipulating scripture in a way that will appear as if they are 'on to something.' I liken it to top tier liberals, converting the uneducated millennial. A polished message, even when wrong, is often all that is needed to get some poor cat to be sympathetic to their cause.

After asking the man questions regarding his topics, he would always point to scripture for the answers. The trinity, heaven and hell, pre/post millennial-ism, baptism, etc. You name it, they know how to answer it. I didn't press this guy too much on our first visit. I was genuinely interested in the conversation, and had spent little time until now, brushing up on the JW doctrine. I'm a bit disappointed that I hadn't done so already, because I firmly believe that a successful debate requires that the winner know and understand the opposing views. Its extremely difficult in the political game to debate a liberal, as a conservative, if I don't actually know what the liberal believes and why. The quickest way to lose a debate with anyone, is to misstate what it is that the other side actually believes. For instance, when someone debates my catholic faith -- and they say that I worship the pope, they lose by forfeit. So before I began to debate the man, I wanted to know what it is that I was up against. I listened closely to every word he said, taking notes, highlighting passages, asking questions. When he left, I truly believe he was hopeful that he may have met the newest member of the "Kingdom." However, also when he left, I felt that I may have met a guy that I'll crush the soul of the next time he visits.

Moving on.

When he was wrapping up, a full hour and 15 minutes later, he asked if I'd be interested in reading some literature between then and the next time he visited. Of course I will! I'll read anything I can get my hands on, and especially regarding matters of faith. Plus, I assumed it would be a cheat sheet for JW ideology. And that it was. A small pocket sized book called, "What does the Bible really teach?"

I read the book that afternoon. Its highly informative, and *appears* accurate. However, being a catholic and christian scholar, I know full well that if you use single verses, you can probably prove just about anything you desire!

I waited for the man to come back, and sure enough he did. We spent another 30 minutes together the following week. Again, I continued to ask questions, but this time they were a bit more pointed. I would sometimes ask him to justify certain ideas, without really hammering the point that I disagreed of course. This forced him to be on a mild defense, and was setting him up for the devestating defeat that surely lay ahead.

This time, he left me with more literature. And I waited for his next visit in the mean time -- which came last week. This would be his last, I'm nearly positive.

The whole JW philosophy centers around the idea that the bible is the only source of truth in this world. If the bible says it, then it must be taken quite literally. If the bible is silent on it, then it mustn't be true or used. They pride themselve in the idea that because they can find a single verse to back up their answer, that they are 100% correct. Again, any biblical scholar would know -- in a book as large as the bible, written by dozens of individuals of the course of a couple thousand years, and with hundreds of translations available -- you can literally prove just about anything you want using a single verse. Especially if you use a purposely maniuplated version of the bible like the New World Translation. (it has dozens of small written changes, that cause huge doctrinal changes!).

For this visit, I had prepared a few simple points to hit him with. He began with polite and humble conversation, and it morphed into a scripture debate. He was putting the finishing touches on making me 'one of his own'. After about 20 minutes, he asked me if i had any more questions for him -- and if not, he'd love to take me to the 'kingdom' and show me the way to a new life! My thinking was, "if they can cook as good as they can express their doctrines", this might not be the worst idea in the world! haha.

So questions.... Yes, I have just a few.

(I'll highlight them, and his response in the next post.)