Elsewhere in scripture; namely in Jude and 2nd Peter, we are warned that false teachers will infiltrate Christ's congregation and will lurk among us like submerged rocks below the waterline. It is not so clear-cut that the Christian congregation is either perfect or evil. According to Christ, both the evil slave and the faithful slave work side-by-side in God's house up until the time that the master arrives for judgment. The influence of both slaves is evident in the Watchtower Society today. So, accordingly, no matter how respected the source, each of us have the personal responsibility before God to be diligent students of his Word in order to 'test the inspired expression' as to its authenticity.

While Jesus was resurrected as a spirit, for a brief period after his resurrection, in order to fully convince his apostles that he had indeed been raised from the dead, Jesus manifested himself in different human bodies. On one occasion, Jesus even manifested himself with the wounds inflicted from his impalement. When Jesus materialized as a human, he was at that moment—human. The Bible records many occasions when angels crossed over from the spirit realm into the physical realm. And when angels materialize they are no longer spirits. For example, in Abraham's day, three angels materialized and had a meal with Abraham—just as Jesus ate with his apostles after his resurrection. And that's why Jesus said that a spirit does not have flesh and bones: because when Jesus materialized he was no longer a spirit; otherwise he would have been invisible. But, it is interesting in the account in the 24th chapter of Luke, that Jesus suddenly appeared in their midst out of nowhere. In the 20th chapter of John, it adds the detail that Jesus appeared in a room with his disciples even though the doors were locked. That is something that flesh-and-blood humans cannot do. It is apparent, then, that Jesus was a spirit, but that when he materialized flesh he was not a spirit at that point. But, since the Scriptures are clear that flesh and blood cannot inherit God's kingdom, it is evident that when Jesus eventually left this earth and entered heaven, it was as a spirit and not as a man.

It is evident that the Devil has waged a long-running campaign to have God's personal name removed from the Bible, or at least de-emphasized, so that the Divine name is hidden from mankind. To that end, the clergy of Christendom and Bible scholars have been more than willing accomplices of that demonic crusade to obscure the importance of the name of Jehovah. Even the notion that YHWH should be pronounced as Yahweh has been shown to be false. Click Here.  Since the adoption of the Trinity in the earliest days of Christendom, the obvious intent of the enemies of the truth is to confuse the identity of Jehovah with Christ. In order to accomplish that, the name of Jesus' Father has been shoved into the background, so that most people who consider themselves to be Christians do not attach any special importance to the name.

The above verse indicates that God does not intervene to prevent us from making wrong choices. He respects that we are free moral agents, and apparently he is interested in watching to see how we use our free will. The fact that there would be an exaltation, apparently in heaven, in accord with Jesus' own comments about the angels rejoicing over one sinner that repents, indicates that Jehovah and his heavenly family do not choose to know our individual outcomes. Instead, they are cheering us on to make the right decisions. After all, God wants his creatures to love him. Love, by it very nature, must be voluntary and spontaneous—not controlled or contrived in anyway. Of course, though, we also recognize that God does, at times, intervene to countermand and over-ride the will of man in order to ensure that his will is ultimately accomplished—which is his prerogative as God Almighty. But, such occasions are rare.

Jesus once stated that Jehovah is so cognizant of his creation that it does not escape his notice when even one lowly sparrow falls to the earth. Even though through prophecy God demonstrates his ability to know the end before the beginning, the very fact that Jehovah watches the goings-on of his vast Creation so closely indicates that he gets great satisfaction out of little surprises—particularly as it relates to those creatures who are made in his image and the choices they make in order to demonstrate their love and affection for their heavenly Father.

When Paul spoke about anointed Christians meeting Christ in the air, he was not saying that Jesus was going to miraculously levitate his chosen ones bodily into the heavens. That is pure fiction. It comes from the same source that teaches such unbiblical nonsense as the Trinity and that God tortures poor sinners forever in hell, etc. The truth is that all of God's anointed sons and daughters must first die in order to receive their heavenly reward. Paul said that we must die a death like Christ's. There are numerous prophecies, which I am not willing to discuss in depth at this particular time, that indicate that during the tribulation all of the remaining sons of God will be martyred. It is by means of death that they will instantaneously be united with Christ in heaven.

Also, the evangelicals teach that the rapture beams up all Christians before the tribulation. However, Jesus indicated that the tribulation would be cut short in order for flesh to survive. Contrary to evangelical fiction, besides the anointed, Jehovah's blessed ones are going to survive the end of the world and they will have the privilege of remaining upon the earth after the smoke clears.

As for the millions that you suppose were killed in the Coliseum—that was not the case. For one thing, killing people is hard work. Killing millions of people is a holocaust, and cannot be done easily. Hitler, for instance, devoted the industrial resources of a mighty nation to exterminating peoples and yet with all of his machinery working night and day, he only killed six to ten million over a span of approximately 10 years. Having said that, apparently hundreds of thousands were killed in the Roman Coliseum, but most of them were not Christians.

Besides that, the coliseum in Rome was not built until 80 CE. That was toward the so-called "last hour" of the apostolic era, when the anointing was winding down. Although Paul spoke about fighting wild beasts in Ephesus, evidently that arena did not slaughter Christians on the scale as Rome did afterwards.

Furthermore, Paul cited the prophetic account of Elijah, where the prophet was assured that he was not alone—that Jehovah had let remain 7,000 who had not bent their knee to Baal. At Romans 11:5, Paul applied that account to the 1st century, saying: "In this way, therefore, at the present season also a remnant has turned up according to a choosing due to undeserved kindness." In order for the comparison to have any significance, the number of Christians at that "present season" in the first century had to be comparable to the 7,000 figure Paul cited in prophecy. That is nowhere near the millions that some suppose. Interestingly, in this 'present season,' today, there are also a comparable number of professed anointed ones.

The purpose of e-Watchman discussing the matter in the first place is to draw attention to Jehovah's judicial decisions regarding his people. Jehovah's Witnesses should not be so naïve so as to imagine that even some of those who were originally anointed by God cannot become apostate and act as a corrupting influence within the organization. If even Christ's own apostle, Judas, could go undetected up until he betrayed the Son of God, why do we suppose that no such creatures ought to roam among us presently? It is all the more reason for us to wait on Christ in anticipation of his bringing such matters to light and the eventual punishment he is destined to mete out upon the wicked slave in our midst.

It is not so much that the Watchtower has changed its teaching on abstaining from blood. The reality is that the medical use of blood has gradually changed over the years. Originally, blood transfusions were pretty straightforward—there was either whole red blood or plasma in a plastic bag with a tube and a needle inserted into the recipient's arm. There was no ambiguity about it. Now, though, blood is broken down into numerous constituent parts and micro-fractions of the original substance and these various components are used in all sorts of pharmaceuticals and other treatments. The question, though, is whether the use of blood derivatives amounts to using blood itself. At what point are the micro-fractions of blood so far removed from the whole that they are not really recognizable as blood? Those are very complicated legalistic questions for which there is no right answer because God has not told us exactly how he thinks on the issue. Hence, the Watchtower has wisely left it up to each Christian to decide for themselves.

It is similar to the Sabbath issue that the Jews and Christians had to grapple with. The Bible forbade all work on the Sabbath under pain of death. However, questions naturally arose as to what exactly constituted "work." There were exceptions. For example, the Bible made allowance for a Sabbath day's journey, so that while traveling long distances was considered a violation, traveling a short distance was considered a reasonable allowance. A Sabbath day's journey was a little over one-half mile. But, then, some are going to push the issue and want to define exactly how many inches a Sabbath day's journey should be. The Pharisees legislated thousands of Sabbath laws to 'clarify' God's law. Many of their regulations were absurd. For example, swatting a fly might be interpreted as a violation of the injunction against working on the Sabbath.

Thankfully the leadership of the Watchtower has so far successfully avoided falling into the pharisaic tar pits on the issue of forbidding the use of every molecule that derives from blood. They have instead placed the responsibility where it ultimately belongs—on each one of Jehovah's Witnesses—in order that each of us may determine what is right and what is wrong for ourselves in the sight of God.