Hello kjw47,
My mother left my dad and I when I was 18 months old to become a photographer with the Canadian Air Forces. She later left the Military and become a Jehovah's witness. It was not until I was 21 years old that I found out where she lived. So I called her and we decided that she would meet in Calgary Alberta, where I lived, and that we would travel from there to Indio California, where she lived.
At the time, I had rejected the Roman Catholicism form of Christianity in which I had been raised, and although I had heard the Gospel from Evangelical Christians, I was living by the world's standards.
One thing however stood out for me from the couple of weeks spent travelling with my mother around 1972. She told me that the end of the world was to take place in 1974.
In 1974, I happened to be in Cyprus, serving with a peace keeping contingent of the Canadian Armed Forces. A war broke out between the Turkish and the Greek living on the island. Two Canadians soldiers died in that conflic, several were hurt. I honestly thought I would not survive the experience. In fact, I was thinking that the Jehovah's Witnesses prophecy about the end of the world in 1974 was happening right around me. So, it was not only in the 19th century that the Jehovah's witnesses predicted ends of the world. I am a living witness to it.
Later, in 1977, I decided to repent from my sin, to ask Christ's forgiveness, and to turn my life over to Him, to serve Him, to obey Him, and to live as best I could for Him, keeping away from that which the Word of God forbid, while obeying what it commanded... Which I did, quite imperfectly, of course, and I still do.
It was not until some 20 years later that I met my mother again, as she had travelled from California, where she still lived, to Quebec City, where I now had moved back and was living. She came for her mother's funeral. She did not know I had become a Christian, so at first she tried to convince me that God existed, which I readily agreed to of course. But when it came to define who Christ was, we could not come to any form of agreement whatsoever.
Now, I happen to have before my eyes, a paper edition of the New World Translation of the Holy Scritures, rendered from the Original Languages by the New World Bible Translation Comittee, revised 1970 C.E. You see, kjw47, after I became a Christian, I figured that if I ever met my mother again, I had better be ready to share my faith with her from her own Bible translation so she would believe what I had to say, especially about who Jesus Christ really was.
So, allow me to quote a passage from the New World Translation, John 20:26-31: «Well, eight days later his disciples were again indoors, and Thomas with them. Jesus came, although the doors were locked, and he stood in their midst and said: "May you have peace." Next he said to Thomas: "Put your finger here, and see my hands, and take your hand and stick it into my side, and stop being unbelieving but become believing." In answer, Thomas said to him: "My Lord and my God!" Jesus said to him: "Because you have seen me have you believed? Happy are those who do not see and yet believe"».
Please note that Jesus did not rebuke Thomas for calling Him "My Lord and my God", but commended Him for having at last believed.
Now, please allow me to quote Esaiah 40:3, again from the same New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures: «Listen! Someone is calling out in the wilderness: "Clear up the way of Jehovah, you people! Make the highway for our God through the desert plain straight"». Now compare this with John 1:23, still quoting from the New World Translation: «He [John the Baptist] said: "I am the voice of someone crying out in the wilderness, 'Make the way of Jehovah straight,' just as Isaih the prophet said"».
John the Baptist was preparing the way for Jehovah. John the Baptist was preparing the way for Jesus Christ.
Now, please, try to open yourself up to the fact that even if you read only the New World Translation of the Bible, there are many verses that come in conflict with what your JW teachers have led you to believe.
I must run now, because my wife whom I love and who loves me wants me to spend a little time with her.
My heart goes to you as the one of other forum members who have also expressed the same.
God bless...