“A wicked and adulterous generation keeps seeking a sign.”

(Matthew 16:4)

Who was Jesus talking about? God’s channel of communication answered this question a while ago: “What, then, is the ‘generation’ so frequently referred to by Jesus in the presence of his disciples? What did they understand by his words: ‘This generation will by no means pass away until all these things occur’? Surely, Jesus was not departing from his established use of the term ‘this generation,’ which he consistently applied to the contemporary masses with their ‘blind guides’ who together made up the Jewish nation. (Matthew 15:14) ‘This generation’ experienced all the distress foretold by Jesus and then passed away in an unequaled ‘great tribulation’ on Jerusalem.” – The Watchtower, November 1, 1995, page 14.

Who make up the “wicked and adulterous generation” in our day? “Those without spiritual understanding … the modern-day John class … As a class, these anointed ones make up the modern-day ‘generation’ of contemporaries that will not pass away ‘until all these things occur.’” (The Watchtower, February 15, 2008, page 24) Like the scribes and Pharisees of Jesus’ day they are “blind guides,” and soon “great tribulation” will come upon them. However, in the first century some Jewish scholars survived the Roman assault. Thus we can reckon “that some of these anointed ones may survive the destructive ‘great tribulation.’” (The Watchtower, June 15, 1976, page 384) But we do not need to worry because “all such false religion will soon be destroyed forever by God.” – Awake!, November 22, 1974, page 6.

“I … am a prophet … and an angel himself spoke to me by the word of Jehovah … (He deceived him.)”

(1 Kings 13:18, NWT 1984)

During the days of Jeroboam, some old man claimed to be a prophet of Jehovah and to speak “the word of Jehovah.” But in actual fact “he deceived” those listening to him, even causing the death of at least one other prophet. (1 Kings 13:18, 24) “Whatever might have been the old prophet’s motive, he lied. Perhaps the old man had at one time been a faithful prophet of Jehovah. At this point, however, he was acting deceptively. The Scriptures strongly denounce such conduct.” – The Watchtower, August 15, 2008, page 9.

Something similar is happening in our time. However, “today, Jehovah does not inspire prophets as in the past; instead, he has commissioned a faithful slave class.” (The Watchtower, October 1, 2002, page 17) Like with the prophets of Biblical times, “the [faithful and discreet] slave’s will is Jehovah’s will” and “rebellion against the slave is rebellion against God.” (The Watchtower, June 1, 1956, page 346) But in fact “he deceived” his followers. From 1920 on, for example, he claimed “that there will be a resurrection of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and other faithful ones of old … [in] 1925,” and “those who ….accept the … [Watchtower doctrines] shall be restored to perfection of body and mind and live on the earth forever.” – Millions Now Living Will Never Die!, pages 88, 98.

This has not come true, like so many other prophecies – for example that the preaching work “would be completed in our 20th century,” or that soon after 1929 “airplanes may float without engines and men may step out of a window into the air without fear of falling.” (The Watchtower [original printed edition], January 1, 1989, page 12; The Golden Age, June 12, 1929, page 586) Above all, their “promise of a new world in which death and mourning will be no more” has not come true, not 1914, not 1925, not in the 1940s, not 1975, and not “before the generation of 1914 ‘passes away.’” – The Watchtower, November 15, 1995, page 4; October 1, 1973, page 583.

Whatever might have been the ‘faithful and discreet slave’s’ motive, he lied. Perhaps he had at one time been a faithful prophet of Jehovah. Today, however, he is acting deceptively. The Scriptures strongly denounce such conduct. Thus we should heed the following advice regarding Jehovah’s Witnesses: “Their promises and predictions of better things have failed time and again. Why let yourself be carried along with them in a steadily downward course to ultimate disaster?” – The Watchtower, February 1, 1971, page 69.

“On the mountains he has not eaten.”

(Ezekiel 18:15, NWT 1984)

Ezekiel divided his contemporaries into two groups. On the one hand he mentioned someone who “he has eaten … upon the mountains” and said with regard to him: “A detestable thing is what he has done … He positively will not keep living … He will positively be put to death.” (Ezekiel 18:11-13, NWT 1984) On the other hand he spoke of a man who “happens to be righteous and … has executed justice and righteousness; on the mountains he did not eat.” (Ezekiel 18:5, 6, NWT 1984) He said about this righteous man: “On the mountains he has not eaten … my judicial decisions he has carried out; in my statutes he has walked … He will positively keep living.” – Ezekiel 18:15-17, NWT 1984.

So whoever ‘eats upon the mountains’ will be eliminated by Jehovah. To whom does this apply today? “Jehovah’s Witnesses are … streaming to ‘the mountain of Jehovah’s house’ in ever-increasing numbers” and taking “rich spiritual feasts” there. (The Watchtower, July 15, 2002, page 25; January 15, 1985, page 28) Thus as a group they “will positively be put to death,” that is, cease to exist.

“The lion will eat straw like the bull.”

(Isaiah 11:7)

As is known, “the Bible says that in the garden of Eden the diet of the animals was vegetation.” (Happiness – How to Find It, page 188) “None of the animals in the garden of Eden were killers,” rather they “had a vegetarian diet in Eden, as did humans.” Only after Adam and Eve sinned, “the animals … began to live off one another.” (Awake!, October 8, 1982, pages 10, 11) “Further, during the Flood of Noah’s day, eight humans and ‘flying creatures and all moving animals of the ground’ were obliged to live on vegetable matter exclusively for more than a year,” proving “that animals and humans were meant to be vegetation eaters.” – Awake!, January 8, 1983, page 28.

Also in the future paradise “animals will be at peace with one another, able to be around one another without risk.” (The Watchtower, December 15, 1991, page 30) Lions “will eat straw” or other vegetarian diet, just like all other animals. Even the polar bears at the North Pole and the penguins at the South Pole will eat grass which will grow there in abundance. Spiders will create “intricate webs” in order to catch leaves flying around. (Awake!, July 8, 1972, page 5) “The cheetah finds the open grasslands ideal footing for its lightning-quick sprints. Its lean body blurs as it races across the plains in pursuit of prey” consisting of grass blades and other plants. (Awake!, February 22, 2003, page 16) Even crocodiles will eat vegetables growing underwater or in the proximity of the shore; fish will no longer eat other fish or shellfishes. Carnivorous plants like the Venus flytrap and carnivorous mushrooms like the lawyer’s wig will change their dietary habits and live on vegetarian diet.

Granted, “the earth [will] cause grass to sprout, seed-bearing plants and fruit trees,” but it remains to be seen whether it will be enough to feed all humans and animals. (Genesis 1:11) Antelopes will no longer be eaten by lions, but maybe they will starve because lions have eaten up all the grass. However, the dietary change will have more far-reaching effects. The human population is growing above average in times of peace, and the same will apply to the animal population when there is “peace among animals.” (The Watchtower, February 15, 1996, page 18) Some animals reproduce rapidly, for example, “the common brown rat … the black rat … and the house mouse” – a single female of these “can produce 2000 descendants in one year.” (Stopest) Mice and rats have many natural predators in our day, but once these have become vegetarians, a single mouse can have roughly 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 descendants within only ten years. Thus the “abundance of grain on the earth” will not persist because mice and other animals will eat it up in a minimum of time. “On the top of the mountains it will overflow,” not of food, but of mice, rats, hares, birds, and many other fast reproducing animals. (Psalm 72:16) The oxygen content of the air will also be reduced, since “phytoplankton account for half of all photosynthetic activity on Earth … [and are] responsible for much of the oxygen present in the Earth’s atmosphere,” but it will be the exclusive source of food for all sea dwellers in paradise. – Wikipedia.

In summary: “God’s restoration of Paradise on earth through Christ” will cause an extreme shortage of grass, grain, and other vegetables. (The Watchtower, September 15, 2007, page 12) Animals will reproduce without hindrance. If there would not be food shortage and lack of oxygen, earth would be covered with a meters thick layer of mice, rats, worms, and other animals after few years. Then the survivors will rightly proclaim: “The former things” – lush meadows, biodiverse forests, full pantries – “have passed away.” – Revelation 21:4.

 

“I will completely wipe out the memory of Amalek from under the heavens.”

(Exodus 17:14)

Jehovah promised that “all memory of Amalek is to be completely uprooted from the earth.” (Exodus 17:14, BBE) Was he able to keep his promise? The facts speak for themselves. The “memory of Amalek” is alive in the Bible where “Amalek” and “the Amalekites” are mentioned 57 times. And the Bible is not just any book; it is “the most widely translated and circulated book in the world.” (The Watchtower, April 1, 2002, page 29) Even back in 1959 there had been “over 2,000,000,000 copies of the entire Bible or major sections thereof … distributed in some 1,810 languages;” today there are even more copies in 2,557 languages. – “Look! I Am Making All Things New”, page 5; Scripture Language Report 2012.

“Nearly everyone on earth today has access to the entire Bible or portions of it,” and with it to “the memory of Amalek.” (The Watchtower, September 15, 2001, page 5) The Amalekites are even mentioned in Children’s books. (My Book of Bible Stories, Study Questions for story 56) True, God had promised to “completely erase any memory of the Amalekites from the earth.” (Exodus 17:14, GWT) But the millions of Google results for “Amalek” prove otherwise.

Thus the prophecy about Amalek is one of the many promises that God made but did not keep. Abraham’s offspring should own the land of Israel “until time indefinite,” David’s throne should “be firmly established forever,” the lion should “eat straw” – but so far, all worshippers of Jehovah have “died, although they did not receive the fulfillment of the promises.” (Genesis 13:15, NWT 1984; 2 Samuel 7:16; Isaiah 11:7; Hebrews 11:13) God’s promises can at best “be compared with the promises of politicians, who say that they will do one thing and finish up in doing something else.” (The Watchtower, February 1, 1979, page 6) What do we learn from this? “Bible prophecies that have … [not] been fulfilled give us the confidence that all other promises made by Jehovah God will also [not] come true.” – The Watchtower, November 1, 2004, page 32.

“There is death in the pot, o man of the true God.”

(2 Kings 4:40)

“Jesus said that upon his return he would find a ‘faithful and discreet slave’ providing spiritual food,” and as is known, “the Governing Body members [of Jehovah’s Witnesses] … today make up the faithful and discreet slave.” (The Watchtower, June 1, 1984, page 12; July 15, 2013, page 23) This “faithful and discreet slave [was] pictured by Elisha,” thus they are sometimes called “the Elisha class, the ‘faithful and discreet slave,’” for their work is equivalent to that of Elisha. – Watchtower Publications Index 1930-1985, “Elisha Work”; “Let Your Name Be Sanctified”, page 351.

Thus, it is reasonable to believe that the “Elisha class” provides the same kind of food as Elisha did. The Bible reports that in Elisha’s day “there was famine in the land,” and “today [there] is the deplorable spiritual famine.” (2 Kings 4:38; The Watchtower, May 1, 1987, page 10) Back then, Elisha made “his attendant … boil stew for the sons of the prophets.” (2 Kings 4:38) What kind of food did he provide? “As soon as they ate from the stew, they cried out: ‘There is death in the pot, o man of the true God.’ And they could not eat it.” – 2 Kings 4:40.

The same kind of food is “provided through ‘the faithful and discreet slave’” in our day. (The Watchtower, July 15, 1992, page 30) David prophetically described how someone would feel when attending a Jehovah’s Witness meeting in hope for edification: “I was hoping for sympathy, but there was none, and for comforters, but I found none. But for [spiritual] food they gave me poison.” – Psalm 69:20, 21.

“In faith all of these died, although they did not receive the fulfillment of the promises.”

(Hebrews 11:13)

In his letter to the Hebrews, the apostle Paul referred to Abraham. (Hebrews 11:8) “Because of Abraham’s great faith, Jehovah promised to give the land of Palestine to his offspring.” (The Government That Will Bring Paradise, page 5) No doubt, “Abraham demonstrated faith in Jehovah’s promises” – but “it is noteworthy that Abraham did not during his lifetime receive the inheritance of the land promised to him. He also did not see his seed become ‘like the grains of sand that are on the seashore’ … These promises went unfulfilled.” – The Watchtower, September 15, 2011, page 26.

Later, God promised Moses to bring him and his people “to a land good and spacious, a land flowing with milk and honey.” (Exodus 3:8) But “like Abraham, Moses did not experience the fulfillment of God’s promise … Moses was told: ‘From a distance you will see the land, but you will not go there.’” (The Watchtower, September 15, 2011, page 19) Centuries later, “Jesus’ disciples were still expecting an earthly reign of the Messiah.” (The Watchtower, April 15, 1981, page 15) “Even after Jesus’ death and resurrection his disciples still expected the establishment of an earthly kingdom.” – The Watchtower, May 15, 1978, page 21.

Thousands of years after these events, Charles Taze Russell promised “that the ‘battle of the great day of God Almighty’ … will end in A. D. 1914 with the complete overthrow of earth’s present rulership.” (Millennial Dawn, volume II, The Time is at Hand, 1889 printing, page 101) In 1920, after Russell’s death, Joseph F. Rutherford promised “that the old order of things, the old world, is ending and is therefore passing away, and that the new order is coming in, and that 1925 shall mark the resurrection of the faithful worthies of old and the beginning of reconstruction,” and he called this promise “positive and indisputable.” – Millions Now Living Will Never Die, page 97.

Since the resurrection of Abraham failed to materialize in 1925, Rutherford promised again in 1938 that his followers would only have to “wait a few years, until the fiery storm of Armageddon is gone.” (Face the Facts, page 50) In the following decades, “the generation that saw the start of this age of lawlessness in 1914” was the object of promises. (The Watchtower, July 1, 1980, page 4) But “in faith all of these” – Abraham, Moses, Russell and his followers, Rutherford and his followers, virtually all of the ‘generation of 1914’ – “died, although they did not receive the fulfillment of the promises.” – Hebrews 11:13.

Today Jehovah’s Witnesses look forward to another one “of these divine judgments,” and they “expect the fulfillment of it very soon.” (The Watchtower, February 1, 2000, page 8) “Accordingly … [they] expect the great tribulation to begin soon.” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1999, page 16) “With eager anticipation … [they] await that new world.” (The Watchtower, April 15, 2010, page 11) But like Abraham and Moses, like all of God’s worshippers of old, like all Jehovah’s Witnesses before them and like all “true Christians” after them, they will ‘die in faith and not receive the fulfillment of the promises.’

“What was left by the caterpillar, the locust has eaten; and what was left by the locust, the creeping, unwinged locust has eaten; and what the creeping, unwinged locust has left, the cockroach has eaten.”

(Joel 1:4, NWT 1984)

“The prophet Joel likened the work of God’s people to a series of plagues by insects … Jehovah’s people are like … swarms of insects.” (Live With Jehovah’s Day in Mind, page 172) The prophet Joel mentioned locusts and cockroaches, and “these locusts picture the anointed remnant of Christians.” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1992, page 11) But who today make up the cockroach class?

According to the aforementioned Watchtower issue, “the locust plague is succeeded by a huge plague of cavalry. How true this is today, as the few thousand remaining anointed Christians are reinforced by more than four million ‘other sheep.’” Hence the “cockroach” from Joel’s prophecy symbolizes the ‘great crowd of other sheep.’ Today “Jehovah’s anointed locusts” are “joined by … Jesus’ ‘other sheep.’” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1998, page 10) “Advancing like an army [they] enter into houses, and devour everything in their path … What a vivid portrayal of the perseverance and thoroughness of God’s people in carrying out the witnessing work in modern times!” – The Watchtower, July 15, 2008, page 4.

“The day of Jehovah … will not come.”

(2 Thessalonians 2:2, 3)

When will God’s judgment day come? Jesus Christ provided a definitive answer to this question when he said to his disciples: “The Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.” (Matthew 24:44, NIV) Hence there is no doubt that Armageddon will come when Jesus’ true disciples do not expect it. But “Jesus’ true disciples are eagerly awaiting the end” and think “that the end may come at any time.” (The Watchtower, May 1, 1999, page 20; November 15, 1998, page 18) Thus it can never come; rather “all things are continuing exactly as they were from creation’s beginning.” – 2 Peter 3:4.

“They were bowing down to the sun in the east.”

(Ezekiel 8:16)

In Ezekiel’s day there were some people “bowing down to the sun.” (Ezekiel 8:16) Jehovah God considered this “detestable,” and he sent “his executional forces” to put an end to their activities. (The Watchtower, September 15, 1988, page 13) He instructed them: “Old man, young man, virgin, little child, and women you should kill off completely … Fill the courtyards with the slain.” (Ezekiel 9:6, 7) So he clearly showed that he doesn’t take a joke when it comes to sun worship.

How could we ‘bow down to the sun’ today? Bowing down to someone means acknowledging his power. In our day there are millions of people acknowledging the sun’s power by rubbing sunscreen into their skin. Others pay tribute to the sun by wearing sunglasses. People who sunbathe regularly are not for nothing called “sun worshippers.” Sunbathing as well as the use of sunscreen and sunglasses are definitely idolatry and hence “detestable things” to God. – Ezekiel 8:15.

There are more ways to defile oneself with sun worshipping, though. A reference work says: “For instance, on July 20, 1969, when for the first time a human astronaut set foot upon the moon, who was glorified thereby, according to the way that the scientific group responsible for it named things that were involved? … The mythological sun-god. How so? Because the man-made spacecraft with which the successful moon-shot for putting Americans on our lunar satellite was made was named Apollo, Number Eleven. Phoebus Apollo was the sun-god of the ancient Greeks … namely, Nimrod … Since that first landing on the moon, further moon-shots have been made in spacecrafts of the ‘Apollo’ series. All a part of sun worship!” (“The Nations Shall Know That I Am Jehovah” – How?, page 157, 158) By showing admiration for the Apollo missions we would be guilty of sun worship accordingly. Driving a Volkswagen Apollo or using a mobile phone with Windows Phone 8 (Codename Apollo) would be something detestable to God, too.

The apostate Israelites “reintroduced sun worship and practiced it right inside the temple of Jehovah.” (“The Nations Shall Know That I Am Jehovah” – How?, page 155) So they mixed the worship of the sun with the worship of Jehovah. Something similar is happening in our day, where many people hold “sacred gatherings” for Jehovah on Sunday of all days, “the venerable day of the Sun!” (The Watchtower, June 15, 1988, page 13; Corpus Juris Civilis) Jehovah will not watch these detestable things much longer. “Soon God’s executional forces will unceremoniously dump false religion” – including all people who wear sunglasses, use sunscreen or practice the worship of Jehovah on Sunday – “into the pit of eternal extinction.” (Awake!, December 22, 1989, page 16) Let us therefore avoid “bowing down to the sun” in a transferred sense!