About Jehovah's Witnesses - the Godhood of Jesus

We appreciate the zeal of the Witnesses, but not their scholarship. We tend not to argue doctrine for that reason. Instead we tell of the love of the Father, the forgiveness and mercy He has available. 

The Witnesses really don't understand anything except the rules and the conformity to their church. That's why this part of the Gospel really cuts through the fog of deception, much more than winning a theological argument.

Nevertheless, we ran across a verse that brought the witnesses to mind, and it is a theological issue. Here's the verse:

Acts 20:28 NIV ...has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.

Now, the reason this caught our eye is likely pretty obvious to anyone acquainted with the Witness's beliefs. They believe Jesus was created, that He's not co-eternal part of the trinity. So what would the Witnesses do with this verse in their own translation of the Bible, the New World Translation? Well, here it is:

Acts 20:28 NWT  ...has appointed you overseers, to shepherd the congregation of God, which he purchased with the blood of his own Son.

The change is fairly subtle. A couple of minor variations in word choice and word order - all pretty conventional, except the addition of a single particular word, "son." This is how the NWT avoids the conflict with their doctrine. But there's a problem. The interlinear Greek reads:

etheto [has set] episkopous [overseers] poimainein [to shepherd] tēn [the] ekklēsian [church] tou [of] Theou [God] hēn [which] periepoiēsato [He purchased] dia [with] tou [the] haimatos [blood] tou [the] idiou [own]

Notice that "son" (Greek, huios) does not appear in the Greek text. The word is added by the Witnesses.

God's blood is in view here. God the son. There's only one God who shed His blood for our sake. Jesus.