The first time I partook of the emblems at the memorial in my local Kingdom hall, the elderly sister sitting next to me remarked in all sincerity: “I had no idea we were so privileged!”  There you have it in a single phrase—the problem behind the JW two-class system of redemption.  The sad irony is that the Governing Body, while claiming to have done away with the clergy/laity distinctions of Christendom[i], has joined its fellow denominations in creating one of their very own, and a particularly pronounced distinction it is.

You might think I’m overstating the problem. You might say that this is a difference without a distinction—this sister’s comment notwithstanding.  Yet, in a way, the JW class distinction is greater than is currently practiced in Catholicism.  Consider the fact that, potentially, anyone can become Pope, as this video demonstrates.

This is not the case with Jehovah’s Witnesses.  According to JW theology, one must be specifically selected by God as one of an elite group of anointed before he can have any hope of rising to the top of the JW ladder.  Only those so chosen can claim to be adopted children of God.  (The rest can only call themselves “God’s friends.”[ii])  Additionally, within the Catholic Church, the clergy/laity distinction does not affect the reward each Catholic is said to receive.  Whether priest, bishop, or lay person, all good people are believed to go to heaven.  However, among Witnesses this is not the case.  The clergy/laity distinction persists after death, with the elite going to heaven to rule, while the remainder—about 99.9% of all those considered to be true and faithful Christians—having another 1,000 years of imperfection and sin to look forward to, followed by a final test, only after which they can be granted everlasting life in the fullest sense of the term.

In this, the non-anointed Jehovah’s Witness who is allegedly declared righteous by God gets the same prospect as an unrighteous resurrected one, even one who has never known the Christ.  At best, he can look forward to a “head start” in the race toward perfection over his non-Christian or false-Christian counterpart.  Apparently, this is all God’s declaration of righteousness amounts to in the case of a member of the Other Sheep.

Now it becomes clear why that dear elderly sister was moved to make her heartfelt expression about my newly acquired exalted status.

If you feel that something doesn’t feel quite right about all this, you are not alone.  Thousands of still-practicing Jehovah’s Witnesses are struggling with the question of whether they should partake of the bread and the wine at this year’s memorial.  A member of almost any of Christendom’s churches would find this struggle perplexing.  They would reason, “But didn’t our Lord Jesus command us to partake of the symbols representing his flesh and blood?  Didn’t he give us a clear, unequivocal command: “Keep doing this in remembrance of me”? (1 Co 11:24, 25)

The reason that many JWs are hesitating, afraid to obey what seems to be a simple, straightforward command, is that their minds have become confused by “artfully contrived false stories.” (2 Pe 1:16)  By a misapplication of 1 Corinthians 11:27-29, Witnesses have been led to believe that they are actually committing a sin if they partake of the emblems without having received the special notification from God that they are members of this elite group.[iii]  Is such reasoning valid?  More important, is it scriptural? God Didn’t Call Me Our Lord Jesus is a remarkable Commander-in-Chief.  He does not give us conflicting instructions nor vague directives.  If he only wanted some Christians, a tiny minority, to partake of the emblems, then he would have said so.  If partaking in error would amount to a sin, Jesus would have spelled out the criteria by which we would know whether or not to participate.

Given that, we see that he unambiguously told us to partake of the emblems signifying his flesh...