I am not the only one saying so — they say it themselves, and with some pride: “We are not children of God, but that is not what matters,” one told me, perfectly at ease with the statement.
You can read it in their own publications. According to the theology of Jehovah’s Witnesses, only 144,000 people are children of God; the rest believe they can be only “friends.”
I have taken as my example The Watchtower of February 1, 1998, pages 18 to 23, where they write:
“For the 144,000, the blessing of the Abrahamic covenant is administered through the new covenant. As participants in this covenant, they come “under undeserved kindness” and “under law toward Christ.” (Romans 6:15; 1 Corinthians 9:21) Hence, only the 144,000 members of the Israel of God have properly partaken of the emblems during the Memorial of Jesus’ death, and only with them did Jesus make his covenant for a Kingdom. (Luke 22:19, 20, 29) Members of the great crowd are not participants in the new covenant. However, they associate with the Israel of God and live with them in their “land.” (Isaiah 66:8) So it is reasonable to say that they too come under Jehovah’s undeserved kindness and under the law toward Christ. While not participants in the new covenant, they are beneficiaries of it.”
Further along in the same magazine:
“Further, other sheep lay hold of the new covenant just as foreigners of old laid hold of the Law covenant. In what way? Not by becoming participants in it but by submitting to the laws associated with it and benefiting from its arrangements. (Compare Jeremiah 31:33, 34.) Like their anointed companions, the other sheep have Jehovah’s law written ‘in their heart.’ They deeply love and obey Jehovah’s commandments and principles. (Psalm 37:31; 119:97) Like anointed Christians, they know Jehovah. (John 17:3) What about circumcision? Some 1,500 years before the making of the new covenant, Moses urged the Israelites: “You must circumcise the foreskin of your hearts.” (Deuteronomy 10:16; Jeremiah 4:4) While compulsory fleshly circumcision passed away with the Law, both the anointed and the other sheep must “circumcise” their hearts. (Colossians 2:11) Finally, Jehovah forgives the error of the other sheep on the basis of Jesus’ shed “blood of the covenant.” (Matthew 26:28; 1 John 1:9; 2:2) God does not adopt them as spiritual sons, as he does the 144,000. But he does declare the other sheep righteous, in the sense that Abraham was declared righteous as God’s friend.—Matthew 25:46; Romans 4:2, 3; James 2:23.
For the 144,000, being declared righteous opens the way to their having the hope of ruling with Jesus in the heavenly Kingdom. (Romans 8:16, 17; Galatians 2:16) For the other sheep, being declared righteous as God’s friends allows them to embrace the hope of everlasting life in a paradise earth—either by surviving Armageddon as part of the great crowd or through the ‘resurrection of the righteous.’ (Acts 24:15) What a privilege to have such a hope and to be a friend of the Sovereign of the universe, to be “a guest in [his] tent”! (Psalm 15:1, 2) Yes, both anointed and other sheep are blessed in a wonderful way through Jesus, the Seed of Abraham.”
What Does All This Imply?
This implies that whoever believes this literally thinks that almost 99.9% of the promises of salvation found in the Scriptures do not apply to him (unless, of course, he is one of those who believes himself to be in the select group of the “anointed”).
A Jehovah’s Witness cannot find comfort when reading that Jesus says to his disciples, “In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also”[1], because for them, the number of rooms is not only limited but already filled. For them the kingdom of God can accommodate fewer people than the Maracana stadium held on that glorious day when Uruguay defeated Brazil with eleven minutes to play, in the decisive match of the 1950 World Cup.
They cannot cherish the hope of being with Jesus, much less of contemplating God face to face. “Then we shall see face to face,” says Saint Paul[2], but they think that this does not refer to them.
The same happens when they read in Scripture: “For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the spirit of adoption as sons. When we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’”[3], and they cannot even pray in the way that Jesus taught us (“Our Father…”) since they do not believe that God is their father.
If they take their own theology seriously, they must conclude that they do not belong to Christ, for Scripture on the one hand affirms that “all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God,” and they say they are not. It also says: “But you are not in the flesh; you are in the Spirit, if the Spirit of God really dwells in you. Any one who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him.”
Where Has This Interpretation of the Jehovah’s Witnesses Come From?
In some manner, Jehovah’s Witnesses have interpreted the texts of Revelation concerning the 144,000 in chapters 7 and 14 as referring to the only Jehovah’s Witnesses who will go to heaven, while the great multitude of which chapter 7 speaks refers to the rest of the people who are saved, who will end up living in a paradisiac kingdom on earth.
However, there is nothing in those texts that permits such a conclusion.
“And I heard the number of the sealed, a hundred and forty-four thousand sealed, out of every tribe of the sons of Israel, twelve thousand sealed out of the tribe of Judah, twelve thousand of the tribe of Reuben, twelve thousand of the tribe of Gad, twelve thousand of the tribe of Asher, twelve thousand of the tribe of Naphtali, twelve thousand of the tribe of Manasseh, twelve thousand of the tribe of Simeon, twelve thousand of the tribe of Levi, twelve thousand of the tribe of Issachar, twelve thousand of the tribe of Zebulun, twelve thousand of the tribe of Joseph, twelve thousand sealed out of the tribe of Benjamin. After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no man could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits upon the throne, and to the Lamb!’ And all the angels stood round the throne and round the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying, ‘Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God for ever and ever! Amen.’ Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, ‘Who are these, clothed in white robes, and whence have they come?’ I said to him, ‘Sir, you know.’ And he said to me, ‘These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve him day and night within his temple; and he who sits upon the throne will shelter them with his presence. They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; the sun shall not strike them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb in the midst of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of living water; and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.’”[4]
The first thing that stands out is that not only the 144,000 are before the throne of God, but also the angels and the whole great multitude that no one could number. The text is very explicit in saying that they “are before the throne of God, and serve him day and night within his temple; and he who sits upon the throne will shelter them with his presence,” yet Jehovah’s Witnesses persist in claiming that the great multitude will never see God, but will only “embrace the hope of everlasting life in a paradise earth.”
Nor is there anything to indicate that the 144,000 are Jehovah’s Witnesses, for the text identifies the members of the different tribes of the people of Israel. The Witnesses, in order to adapt the text to their theology, claim that it cannot be interpreted literally, since it refers to the “Israel of God” (meaning “themselves,” according to them); yet they do interpret the number 144,000 literally. This arbitrary manner of interpreting the same text as both symbolic and literal at the same time is astonishing.
Revelation 14:4 states that the 144,000 are virgins; yet the organization counts among the anointed those who were members of the earliest Christian communities, including the Apostles and even the good thief. But what distinction could there be between someone like the good thief and any Christian alive today who repents of his sins and converts? Why divide believers into two kinds of classes, excluding the vast majority from all the promises of Christ for his Church?
Despite the fact that these doctrines of Jehovah’s Witnesses are so inconsistent, the control they exercise over the members of the sect is such that it has blinded them to the point of preventing them from noticing any of this, and they believe without question everything that the members of their governing body (the “faithful and discreet slave”) tell them.
But one thing is certain: a Jehovah’s Witness is not a child of God — not even the one who believes himself to belong to the 144,000 — because he has not received a valid baptism in the name of the Most Holy Trinity. When they are baptized, not even a word is pronounced over them; they receive only a “dunking” in the water, since their rejection of the Trinity prevents them from baptizing as Jesus commanded: “In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”
Scripture is very clear that all of us can be children of God, with no exceptions:
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God… The true light that enlightens every man was coming into the world… But to ALL who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.”[5]
