Dedications of Kingdom Halls, Assembly Halls or Branch Offices

[Jack Ryan]

I understand why the Temple was dedicated and God's smoke filled the building.

But His smoke doesn't fill the buildings nowadays.

How or why is this necessary?

Is it proper from a Christian standpoint?

[The Librarian]

@Jay Witness You don't believe God's Holy Spirit fills the newly dedicated branch or KH after the prayer?

"Wherever two or three of you are gathered...."

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The only problem I can foresee with this is when we subsequently sell a branch to another religion. I personally believe that whenever a building is dedicated (such as the temple was) then it should not be used for ANY other purpose going forward in perpetuity.

I cannot imagine Solomon thinking that one day he would sell the temple to the Chinese who would refurbish it into gentrified condos.

I think we should come up with a different term for "dedication" of buildings that one day we will allow to be sold.

Will Warwick eventually be sold to Apple?

 

[Witness]

With all the warnings by God to avoid admiring the work of one’s own hands, why would any dedication to man’s work be considered a righteous act? Rev 9:20; Jer 25:12-14; Isa 2:8   And why dedicate a building to God when he says,

“‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. What kind of house will you build for me? says the Lord. Or where will my resting place be?”  Acts 7:49

Strong’s Concordance defines this “place of rest” as kat-ap'-ow-sis; from G2664; reposing down, i.e. (by Hebraism) abode:—rest.

Thayer’s Greek lexicon mentions it as being viewed metaphorically as “the heavenly blessedness in which God dwells”

Stephen was quoting from Isaiah 66, where God continued to say,

“These are the ones I look on with favor: those who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.  Isa 66:2

Why would Stephen bring this out to the disbelieving Pharisees? He told them,

“However, the Most High does not live in houses made by human hands”  Acts 7:48

He’s trying to get the same point across that Jesus did with the woman at the well:

 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem.” “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.” John 4:21:23,24

When Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days,” did he mean that in the end times, man would again devise a system of worship built around a corporate entity with roots in failed prophesies, pyramidology where 1914 originated from; and where meanings of end times must continually be changed to support an iconic date?  Acts 1:6,7

The Pharisies replied, “‘It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?’   But the temple he had spoken of was his body.”

Obviously, their hearts were hardened to the understanding that the new “Temple” arrangement would be those in Christ, his chosen ones.  Because of their lack of spiritual insight regarding this New Covenant, Stephen said,

“You stiff-necked people! Your hearts and ears are still uncircumcised. You are just like your ancestors: You always resist the Holy Spirit!”  John 2:19-21

God resides in spirit in his Temple, the Body of Christ.  1 Cor 3:16,17; 2 Cor 13:5

 “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?” For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s. 1 Cor 6:19

For those anointed who are redeemed as pure and blameless, they ultimately become one with the Father and the Son, together making up the Temple of God.   John 17:11,22; Phil 2:15; Rev 3:18; Mal 3:2

“But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.”  Rom 8:9

This truly puts a hole in the doctrine that the organization is an “earthly Zion”. The anointed Body is where God is worshiped, “in the Spirit and the truth”, as one in Christ. 1 Tim 3:15; 1 Pet 2:5; 1 Cor 6:19

 ^“And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God. As God has said:“I will dwell in them And walk among them. I will be their God, And they shall be My people.” 2 Cor 6:16

Looking back to the meaning of God’s place of rest, it is clear it is not found within man’s interpretation of Zion, but within his own spiritual Temple – within Christ and within his faithful anointed ones. 

They are the representatives of “true religion”.  2 Cor 5:20; 1 Cor 4:1; Mal 2:7; John 7:18,38; Rev 21:6; 22:17; 14:3,5; and not an arrangement made by man as an established corporation.  Acts 17:24; Heb 9:11; Eph 2:10

Because the organization overrides the Body of Christ, God’s true Temple, there is no unity of this Body within it.  Thus, Holy Spirit is absent in such a state.  A greater “Gentile” power has received dominance over Christ’s anointed ones – the elder body.  For those anointed who continue to allow it, they will permanently lose their connection with their Head, and “lawlessness” will continue to overwhelm and oppress them.  Isa 52:2; Rev 13:10; Isa 42:7; Isa 61:1

“He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.  They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might  on the day he comes to be glorified in his holy people and to be marveled at among all those who have believed. This includes you, because you believed our testimony to you.” 2 Thess 1:8-10

There is only one Zion, which is God’s heavenly spiritual Temple.  Rev 3:12; 21:22; Isa 33:20; 52:1

 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth”  Exod 20:4

"You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me”  Exod 20:5

'But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.'  Deut 18:20

“Come to Jehovah’s organization for salvation”  WT ‘81/11/15

“Righteous flee to God’s Mountain-like Organization”  Make Sure of All Things, pg 323

“For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ:  whose end is destruction, whose god is their belly, and whose glory is in their shame—who set their mind on earthly things.   Phil 3:18,19  

Earthly things = a perceived earthly Zion

Again, the WT, speaks out of both sides of the mouth.  There is a little truth in the following statement, although the redeemed, repentant, chosen ones will  “come down out of heaven” with Christ to be with faithful mankind.  Rev 3:12; 5:10; John 1:51; Rev 3:18

 “Today, Zion is represented on earth by the remaining ones of “the Israel of God,” the international congregation of spirit-anointed Christians, who have the hope of ruling with Christ in heaven.”  W 02/7/1

Through WT eyes, Zion mutates into an earthly organization and thus, becomes a full-fledged lie:

“God purposes to punish Edom for what has maliciously been done to His earthly organization, called Zion.”  ip-1 chap. 27 pp. 356-368

“The wonders about Jehovah’s organization, or “Zion,” and the truth about the spiritual paradise must be joyfully passed on “to future generations.” w15 7/15 pp. 7-11

An idol subsequently has taken form.  We should ask ourselves, if this Temple of God goes unheeded and unnoticed within the organization as the source of spiritual nourishment, and since God’s laws are written on the hearts of such ones, how does the Father in heaven view this neglect for his laws?  Rom 2:29; 2 Cor 3:3; Mal 2:7; Deut 6:24,25

“Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.”1 Cor 3:16,17

These words are referring to each anointed one, not just a handful who tout their own glory - "to their shame", as they are primarily responsible for suppressing the decrees of God fulfilled through his Son, Jesus Christ.  Isa 3:16-26; Rev 13:11-18

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