"I soon found, however, that my telling the story had excited a great deal of prejudice against me among professors of religion, and was the cause of great persecution , which continued to increase; and though I was an obscure boy, only between fourteen and fifteen years of age, and my circumstances in life such as to make a boy of no consequence in the world, yet men of high standing would take notice sufficient to excite the public mind against me, and create a bitter persecution; and this was common among all the sects—all united to persecute me." —Joseph Smith History 1:22 Not every negative thing that happens to someone from another person is persecution. Sometimes people will believe that they are being persecuted for the sake of godliness, or holiness by what they teach and say. Regarding Joseph Smith, for instance, a rock in a hat told Joseph Smith to supposedly tell Martin Harris what God told ...
When Jehovah’s Witnesses come to your door, they will often show you a very bland video from their website, that almost never has anything to do with what you will soon discuss. I have written about the Jehovah’s Witness Training Videos , and what you can expect, almost verbatim, if you go in a direction discussing exactly who Jesus is. Continuing such a discussion as addressed in the link above, if you mention John 1:1-3, they will immediately take you to Colossians 1:15, where the Bible discusses Jesus being the “ firstborn of all creation .” The problem is, Jehovah’s Witnesses take the word, firstborn , completely out of its context here. They use and equivocate the word “firstborn” as if it means “ born first ” in every single context. But this is easy to disprove. In Exodus 4:21-23 we find our first example: The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I...