Apostles, Judas, GB, Raymond, Satan, Holy Spirit

[Witness]

20 minutes ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Where does the scriptures actually talk directly to the earthly class ?  And i mean to not about. 

 There were many believers in Christ who were baptized, but not all were anointed. I like Acts 2, the Day of Pentacost,  as a good example. Everyone hearing the “great rushing wind”,  question the kerfuffle going on, and Peter explained what happened inside by quoting Joel 2. 

 Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. ³⁹ For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”  

And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” 41 Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.  Acts 2:38-41

[JOHN BUTLER]

33 minutes ago, Witness said:

 There were many believers in Christ who were baptized, but not all were anointed. I like Acts 2, the Day of Pentacost,  as a good example. Everyone hearing the “great rushing wind”,  question the kerfuffle going on, and Peter explained what happened inside by quoting Joel 2. 

 Then Peter said to them, “Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. ³⁹ For the promise is to you and to your children, and to all who are afar off, as many as the Lord our God will call.”  

And with many other words he testified and exhorted them, saying, “Be saved from this perverse generation.” 41 Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them.  Acts 2:38-41

How do you know they were not anointed ? 

[JW Insider]

46 minutes ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

How do you know they were not anointed ? 

I think there are only a couple examples of persons who were not anointed, about 13 men in all. Interestingly, Luke (as the writer of Acts), mentions that while not "anointed" Apollos was "aglow with the spirit."

• (Acts 18:24-19:7) . . .Now a Jew named A·polʹlos, a native of Alexandria, arrived in Ephʹe·sus; he was an eloquent man who was well-versed in the Scriptures. 25 This man had been instructed in the way of Jehovah, and aglow with the spirit, he was speaking and teaching accurately the things about Jesus, but he was acquainted only with the baptism of John. 26 He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, and when Pris·cilʹla and Aqʹui·la heard him, they took him into their company and explained the way of God more accurately to him. 27 Further, because he wanted to go across to A·chaʹia, the brothers wrote to the disciples, urging them to receive him kindly. So when he got there, he greatly helped those who through God’s undeserved kindness had become believers; 28 for publicly and with great intensity he thoroughly proved the Jews to be wrong, showing them from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Christ. 19 In the course of events, while A·polʹlos was in Corinth, Paul went through the inland regions and came down to Ephʹe·sus. There he found some disciples 2 and said to them: “Did you receive holy spirit when you became believers?” They replied to him: “Why, we have never heard that there is a holy spirit.” 3 So he said: “In what, then, were you baptized?” They said: “In John’s baptism.” 4 Paul said: “John baptized with the baptism in symbol of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus.” 5 On hearing this, they got baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus. 6 And when Paul laid his hands on them, the holy spirit came upon them, and they began speaking in foreign languages and prophesying. 7 There were about 12 men in all.

Some scholars have assumed that, for many of the early years at least,  Baptists were probably a larger group than the Christians. John had obviously baptized many persons before Jesus got there, and there were already crowds being baptized by John. The similarities of their beliefs might have allowed some to join with Christians and not realize that there was more to being a Christian than just verbal acceptance of a Christian message on top of a Baptist message. Some scholars also believe there is early documented evidence of an ongoing debate or even a competition between followers of John the Baptist and followers of Jesus the Christ.

Interesting, too, is the story that explorers in the Middle East in the 1700's came across one or more Bedouin groups, who explained that they were not Christians but claimed to have been followers of John the Baptist for thousands of years. I'll have to look up the story again to get the exact details. It's possible they were followers of Mandaeism, who see John the Baptist as a more important person than Jesus. 

Some scholars, and I might be using the term loosely, have also thought that the Qumram community (the probable guardians of the Dead Sea Scroll "library") was related to John's preaching, and that most of John's followers would have been Essenes.  

Another aside, but Apollos, by some, is considered a prime candidate to have been the author of the book of Hebrews. Note that he was eloquent, and zealous in preaching to Hebrews about Christ. I think it is a minority of modern scholars who believe that Paul wrote the book of Hebrews. We have no evidence one way or another in scripture itself except style and content, but Paul's "calling" or ministry was not to the Hebrews.

 

[Queen Esther]

@JOHN BUTLER  Only a "BIG handful" of anointed brothers/sisters we've worldwide,  the number is variable.  To be anointed,  that ONLY  knows Jehovah and the brothers / sisters  itself.

Read,  what  jw.org  is  telling  us:

HOW THE ANOINTING PROCESS WORKS

What might an anointed Christian wonder, but what does he never doubt?

https://www.jw.org/de/publikationen/zeitschriften/wachtturm-studienausgabe-januar-2016/geistsalbung/#?insight[search_id]=20cc91aa-b857-47e9-8030-ab08237150f9&insight[search_result_index]=3

What are the “token” and the “seal” that each anointed Christian receives from God?—2 Cor. 1:21, 22; ftn.

https://www.jw.org/de/publikationen/zeitschriften/wachtturm-studienausgabe-april-2016/unterpfand-siegel-gesalbte-christen/#?insight[search_id]=0d98457b-eabe-4a1d-8224-0574cadc0cec&insight[search_result_index]=4

[TrueTomHarley]

7 hours ago, JW Insider said:

that link to "rapist" is to another snopes debunkable which has been told in versions quite similar to the Witness version:

I believe it was at a District Convention, and the speaker was exhorting those not to believe every dumb thing, when the he related the one about the sole Witness walking the gritty streets at night with all the Society’s money and how he escaped mugging on account of the huge angels walking alongside.

”What was he doing alone at night with all the Society’s money?” the speaker said. “I’m sure the Society would like to know.”

7 hours ago, JW Insider said:

it ends up sounding like the way people apply Dylan lyrics to their lives or Shakespeare quotes to describe an experience or a "moral" of a story

I’ll overlook this bit of clumsiness just once. The byline for ‘TrueTom vs the Apostates!’ is a Dylan line: “The game is the same, it’s just up on another level.”

5 hours ago, JW Insider said:

don't consider bad spelling and grammar to be any kind of "fail" on your part, 

It is best to blame things like this on autocorrect. May its inventor rot in hello.

[TrueTomHarley]

44 minutes ago, JW Insider said:

It I s a minority of modern scholars who believe that Paul wrote the book of Hebrews. We have no evidence one way or another in scripture itself except style and content

 

Paul’s endlessly run-on sentences are unmistakable. I often imitate him, except I tend to lose my way in the middle and sometimes don’t emerge until days later, whereas he generally came out the other end without undue fuss.

Only recently did it dawn on me that Paul, as the scholar, connects all the dots to the Hebrew Scriptures in a way that fishermen could not be expected to, thus bringing his ‘gift to the altar’ to such an extent that persons who have never seen real unity, and thus cannot imagine it, credit him with practically forming a new religion.

[JOHN BUTLER]

24 minutes ago, Queen Esther said:

@JOHN BUTLER  Only a "BIG handful" of anointed brothers/sisters we've worldwide,  the number is variable.  To be anointed,  that ONLY  knows Jehovah and the brothers / sisters  itself.

Read,  what  jw.org  is  telling  us:

HOW THE ANOINTING PROCESS WORKS

What might an anointed Christian wonder, but what does he never doubt?

https://www.jw.org/de/publikationen/zeitschriften/wachtturm-studienausgabe-januar-2016/geistsalbung/#?insight[search_id]=20cc91aa-b857-47e9-8030-ab08237150f9&insight[search_result_index]=3

What are the “token” and the “seal” that each anointed Christian receives from God?—2 Cor. 1:21, 22; ftn.

https://www.jw.org/de/publikationen/zeitschriften/wachtturm-studienausgabe-april-2016/unterpfand-siegel-gesalbte-christen/#?insight[search_id]=0d98457b-eabe-4a1d-8224-0574cadc0cec&insight[search_result_index]=4

Sorry to upset you but I thought you would know that I'm no longer a JW, and i do not believe everything that the JW Org says.

I  have read how the W/T says for the Anointed to keep quiet and then says that the Elders are taking the lead.

Do you honestly think Elders should overrule Anointed ones ? 

Well i don't. 

 

[Anna]

5 minutes ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Do you honestly think Elders should overrule Anointed ones ? 

All the anointed I have ever known were elders, except for the sisters of course.

[Queen Esther]

Elders have NO right, to overrule anointed brothers,  WHY  THAT ?

We had a young anointed brother and he was very liked, also by our elders -   He belongs to our big Sinti family!  His wife is not anointed, sorry....  Thats all I want say --

[Anna]

10 hours ago, JOHN BUTLER said:

Quote "These ones need spiritual instruction just like everyone else." The clue comes in the last 4 words 

What the W/t writer is saying is that the Anointed need instruction from the GB / Writing dept' just like everyone else.

GB also needs instruction just like everyone else.  When Jesus fed the 5 thousand with two fishes and few loaves, his disciples were to form groups of people and then distribute this food to them. I have no doubt that the disciples not only distributed the food they had from Jesus, but they also ate it themselves. And Jesus did too.

‘Man must live, not on bread alone, but on every word * that comes from Jehovah’s mouth.’  The GB are not exempt from this. Not only that , but in reply to Satan, about changing the stones into bread, Jesus applied this to himself too, that he relied on his Father for spiritual food. So if Jesus needs "instructions" from Jehovah, how much more so the GB?  The only one that doesn't need to be spiritually fed is Jehovah.

* the Bible

[Anna]

On 1/30/2019 at 11:39 AM, JW Insider said:

Is God going to do something that is NOT the most timely and most fitting thing for him to do? The paragraph started out saying how "appropriate" it would be for Jehovah to do this. Is Jehovah going to do something that is NOT appropriate, or LESS appropriate than what is appropriate for him to do?

I think we might be a little harsh in judging F. Franz for having said this, as from your statement above it was obviously nonsensical. I feel it was just his way of saying things, or maybe the way some people spoke. Although it came across as haughty, I doubt Fred's intention was to put himself above God. Who does that?

[TrueTomHarley]

22 minutes ago, Queen Esther said:

Elders have NO right, to overrule anointed brothers,  WHY  THAT ?

The trouble with this view is that the only way to know that a person is anointed is that he or she says he is.