Jehovah’s Witnesses were always held in high esteem by my mother. Until the day she died she always referred to them as the “Bible Students”.
This name she used as a term of endearment because it reminded her of when these loving people then known as the “International Bible Students” started her on her spiritual journey.
She often recalled how as a young married woman, Dorrie, one of the Bible Students and a member of the 144,000 had called on her home. This delightful lady had interested her in Bible study as she answered questions that had long worried my mother, particularly in regard to her own parents, Bob and Alice Boyd.
Bob Boyd had been a tall happy-go-lucky Irishman, but an atheist. Alice by contrast had been a tiny devout Presbyterian. When Bob suddenly died at the age of 47, Alice sorrowfully told the children, including my mother, Effie, that he would now be tortured in the eternal flames of hell. When Alice was snatched away from her family in death five years later, they were sure that she was now looking down at them from heaven.
After Alice died, Effie looked after the younger brothers of the family until she married and moved away. Now she was worrying about her dearly loved father in the flames of hell and her mother sorrowfully looking down on the younger members of her family who still needed her.
It was a tremendous relief for Effie when Dorrie came into her life and explained from the Bible that death was a sleep until the resurrection. Her father was not suffering in hell and nor her mother sorrowing in heaven, they were in a dreamless sleep and knew nothing. (Cf. John 11:11-14, 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18, Ecclesiastes 9:5,6,10)
Effie became very fond of Dorrie. She read the books published by the Watchtower Society that Dorrie regularly brought to her. Effie now began to feel a consuming desire to discover the great truths of the Bible.
However, as time went on Effie began to get confused with Watchtower teachings. The “truths” presented in the books written by the original president of the Society, Pastor Charles Taze Russell were now being contradicted by the “truths” in the publications of the new President, Judge Rutherford. There were prophecies made by the Watchtower Society had not come to pass. Teachings taught as truth for decades were being altered and discarded.
Now in 1929 a house called, “Beth Sarim” had been built in San Diego, California, USA, for the Princes who had failed to be resurrected as predicted for 1925.
It was about this time that Effie had a Seventh-day Adventist colporteur, Harry Brooks, call on her as he visited house to house in the district. She discovered he also believed that death was a sleep until the resurrection but he introduced her to other wonderful Bible truths.
For sometime Effie compared the teachings of the two organisations. Then one day as she was studying the Watchtower book, Reconciliation (1928) she read on page 14 “…the Pleiades is the place of the eternal throne of God.”. She shook her head, closed up the book and said to herself, “They are wonderful, sincere people but this is not the truth I am looking for!”
Scanned image of Reconciliation with page 14.
In the early 1930s she was baptised into the Adventist church with my father, who always said, “I found Jehovah’s Witnesses to be fine people, – but the teachings of the Adventist church made a lot more sense to me.”
I was born shortly after my parents became Adventists. As I grew up I became interested to discover why my mother loved the Witnesses so much yet she did not join them. In later years she would say to me, “Bruce, they are wonderful people, if only we could help them to see the greater truths of the Bible!”
She lived to see me dedicate my life to the work of God. When I had the privilege of introducing the first family of Jehovah’s Witnesses to the Adventist church, she was delighted and they became her friends. Unfortunately she died before the story of this family was published in the book, “God’s Channel of Truth – Is it the Watchtower?”
The three editions of “God’s Channel of Truth – Is it the Watchtower?
Later I wrote “Our Friends: the Jehovah’s Witnesses”. After the date failure of 1975 this book was revised and in the last thirty years has gone through a number of editions as the teachings and statistics of the Society have changed.
In the past fifty years it has been my privilege to have been personally involved in the baptism of well over 200 people from the teachings of the Watchtower Society into the Seventh-day Adventist church.
In this church these sincere people say they have continued their dedication vows to serve Jehovah. They now know Him and His truth better, and have been able to serve Him more happily and efficiently.
The object of this website is to share these Bible truths and the joy of salvation as one comes to know Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour, the One who is the Way, the Truth and the Life!