When I studied with Jehovah’s Witnesses in 1972, they shocked me by telling me that neither King David nor John the Baptist went to heaven when they died.

That was their way of silencing me and turning me into a passive student of the Watchtower’s two class salvation teaching that only Jesus and 144,000 Christians will ever go to heaven.

You’ll need to wait until they make these claims in order to discuss them.

When they tell you those things, don’t show surprise like I did.

Instead, take it in stride and model good Bible study techniques by examining the contexts of their proof texts.

Let the Witnesses be the teachers and ask them to explain the contexts of the passages to you.

When you do give your opinion, make clear exactly what you do and don’t believe so there’s no misunderstanding.

The Watchtower has a number of arguments to convince you that in Bible times, only Jesus went to heaven.

 “King David didn’t go to heaven.”

 Jehovah’s Witnesses often say, “Even King David didn’t go to heaven.”

They use as a proof text part of Acts 2:34: “For David did not ascend to the heavens …”

They’ll say, “See, the Bible plainly states right there that King David didn’t go to heaven.”

Ask them stone-in-the-shoe questions:

  • What is the context of that passage? 
  • What topic was Peter discussing?

Establish that Peter was making the point that when David wrote in Psalm 16:10 that God would not let his holy one corrupt and “see decay,” he wasn’t talking about himself at all.

David’s body did corrupt and decay when he died, and his tomb was still there.

Rather, David was prophesying about the resurrection and ascension to heaven of the Messiah, Jesus Christ.

It was Jesus’ body that didn’t see corruption and decay.

Peter used that prophecy in Psalm 16 to show his fellow Jews that King David himself had prophesied Jesus’ resurrection.

You can add:

  • It seems to me that Peter was focusing on what David was prophesying would happen to the Messiah’s body. 
  • David hasn’t been resurrected even now, so Peter wasn’t talking about whether David would eventually end up in heaven or on earth after his own resurrection.

If they ask, “Do you believe King David is in heaven now?” the best way to answer is to say:

  • Yes, in spirit form awaiting his bodily resurrection, which will take place some time in the future.

“John the Baptist didn’t go to heaven.”

Jehovah’s Witnesses also use as a proof text Jesus’ comment in Matthew 11:11 that “he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater” than John the Baptist.

That proves, they say, that John the Baptist didn’t go to heaven.

You can say:

  • Actually, all it demonstrates to me is that John the Baptist wasn’t in heaven when Jesus made that statement. In fact, John was still alive and in prison (Matthew 11:2).

“No man had ascended into heaven but Jesus.”

Sometimes Witnesses will point out Jesus’ statement to Nicodemus in John 3:13: “Moreover, no man has ascended into heaven but the one who descended from heaven, the Son of man.”

To Jehovah’s Witnesses, that proves that everyone in the Old Testament was part of an earthly class who would never go to heaven.

You can make the stone-in-the-shoe comment:

  • I don’t believe Jesus wasn’t discussing the resurrection of the dead or where people would be located in eternity.

Ask them to look at the immediate context of verse 13 by asking one of them to read aloud John 3:11-13:

Most truly I say to you, what we know we speak, and what we have seen we bear witness to, but you do not receive the witness we give. If I have told you earthly things and you still do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things? Moreover, no man has ascended into heaven but the one who descended from heaven, the Son of man.

You can comment:

  • It seems to me that Jesus’ point is that, although the Pharisees had difficulty accepting his testimony, in fact he knew what he was talking about.
  • The Pharisees didn’t accept what Jesus told them about earthly things, such as their need for a spiritual transformation by means of being born again.
  • Such truths were comparatively easy to understand.
  • How would they accept what he said about heavenly things, deep truths that went beyond human experience?
  • No human being had ever ascended to heaven and returned to explain such things.
  • Their only reliable source of information regarding such matters was Jesus himself, the one who came down from heaven.

Summary

 Jehovah’s Witnesses aren’t likely to agree with you.

However, what you have done with your stone-in-the-shoe comments and questions is to model proper methods of contextual Bible interpretation.

Pray that God will develop in them the habit of reading the entire context of verses the Watchtower cites to see if they really teach what the Watchtower claims they do.

 

 

 

 

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