The Librarian

Friends at a circuit assembly in Brisbane, Australia. Photo shared by @jony_davis View the full article

Part of a series on: This Grammy-Award winning Jazz guitarist is another well-known Witness of Jehovah. Born and raised in Pennsylvania, where he began playing music outside a corner store at age seven, Benson’s accomplishments also include a triple platinum album (Breezin’) and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Benson enjoyed making music that is about love and romance, but without the crudeness often present in such lyrics. In this, as well as in the healthy relationship he’s maintained with his beloved wife Johnnie Lee since the 60’s, Benson is a shining example of how fame and fortune need not turn one away from serving Jehovah. Brother Benson started to study the Bible in the 1970's after his beloved cousin was tragically murdered. In an online interview, George explained how he learned the Truth: ”For me [studying with Jehovah's Witnesses] answered a lot of my questions about life and another thing about going to different churches was I got a chance to see how other people think so none of that was wasted. I had a chance to see what motivated other people so the value was still there. My mother took me to all these different places to learn about religion in general and for me the thing that I was looking for was found with the Jehovah's Witnesses. They are very demanding in that they stick to bible principles and they do not waiver from it. I like that about them more than anything else.” He was baptized in 1979.Brother Benson is now 71 years old and has been faithfully serving Jehovah for some 36 years. See also: George Benson and Friends Sing Praises to Jehovah --------------- George Benson (born March 22, 1943)[3] is a ten-time Grammy Award-winning American musician and singer-songwriter. He began his professional career at twenty-one, as a jazz guitarist. Benson uses a rest-stroke picking technique similar to that of gypsy jazz players such as Django Reinhardt.A former child prodigy, Benson first came to prominence in the 1960s, playing soul jazz with Jack McDuff and others. He then launched a successful solo career, alternating between jazz, pop, R&B singing, and scat singing. His album Breezin' was certified triple-platinum on the Billboard 200 chart in 1976.[4] His concerts were well attended through the 1980s, and still has a large following.[4] He has received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Biography Early career and personal lifeBenson was born and raised in the Hill District in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.[5][6] At the age of seven, he first played the ukulele in a corner drug store, for which he was paid a few dollars . At the age of eight, he played guitar[5] in an unlicensed nightclub on Friday and Saturday nights, but the police soon closed the club down.[citation needed] At the age of 10, he recorded his first single record, "She Makes Me Mad",[1] with RCA-Victor in New York, under the name "Little Georgie".[5]Benson attended and graduated Schenley High School.[7][8] As a youth, instead, he learned how to play straight-ahead instrumental jazz during a relationship performing for several years with organist Jack McDuff. One of his many early guitar heroes was country-jazz guitarist Hank Garland.[9][10] At the age of 21, he recorded his first album as leader, The New Boss Guitar, featuring McDuff.[3] Benson's next recording was It's Uptown with the George Benson Quartet, including Lonnie Smith on organ and Ronnie Cuber on baritone saxophone.[3] Benson followed it up with The George Benson Cookbook, also with Lonnie Smith and Ronnie Cuber on baritone and drummer Marion Booker.[3] Miles Davis employed Benson in the mid-1960s, featuring his guitar on "Paraphernalia" on his 1968 Columbia release, Miles in the Sky before going to Verve Records.Benson then signed with Creed Taylor's jazz label CTI Records, where he recorded several albums, with jazz heavyweights guesting, to some success, mainly in the jazz field. His 1974 release, Bad Benson, climbed to the top spot in the Billboard jazz chart, while the follow-ups, Good King Bad (#51 Pop album) and Benson and Farrell (with Joe Farrell), both reached the jazz top-three sellers. Benson also did a version of The Beatles's 1969 album Abbey Road called The Other Side of Abbey Road, also released in 1969, and a version of "White Rabbit", originally written and recorded by San Francisco rock group Great Society, and made famous by Jefferson Airplane.[3] Benson played on numerous sessions for other CTI artists during this time, including Freddie Hubbard and Stanley Turrentine, notably on the latter's acclaimed album Sugar.Benson is a devout Jehovah's Witness and has been married to Johnnie Lee since 1965. Citing his faith, Benson describes his music as focusing more on love and romance, rather than sexuality.[11] 1970s and 1980s By the mid- to late 1970s, as he recorded for Warner Bros. Records, a whole new audience began to discover Benson. With the 1976 release Breezin', Benson sang a lead vocal on the track "This Masquerade", which became a huge pop hit and won a Grammy Award for Record of the Year. (He had sung vocals infrequently on albums earlier in his career, notably his rendition of "Here Comes the Sun" on the Other Side of Abbey Road album.) The rest of the album is instrumental, including his rendition of the 1975 Jose Feliciano composition "Affirmation". Breezin′ was a significant album in terms of popular music history – the first jazz release to go platinum.In 1976, Benson toured with soul singer Minnie Riperton, who had been diagnosed with terminal breast cancer earlier that year. Also in 1976, George Benson appeared as a guitarist and backup vocalist on Stevie Wonder's song "Another Star" from Wonder's album Songs in the Key of Life. He also recorded the original version of "The Greatest Love of All" for the 1977 Muhammad Ali bio-pic, The Greatest, which was later covered by Whitney Houston as "Greatest Love of All".[12] During this time Benson recorded with the German conductor Claus Ogerman.[13] The live take of "On Broadway", recorded a few months later from the 1978 release Weekend in L.A., also won a Grammy. He has worked with Freddie Hubbard on a number of his albums throughout the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. He became one of Jehovah's Witnesses in 1979, where he is still active to date.The Qwest record label (a subsidiary of Warner Bros., run by Quincy Jones) released Benson's breakthrough pop album Give Me The Night, produced by Jones. Benson made it into the pop and R&B top ten with the song "Give Me the Night" (written by former Heatwave keyboardist Rod Temperton). More importantly, Quincy Jones encouraged Benson to search his roots for further vocal inspiration, and he re-discovered his love for Nat Cole, Ray Charles and Donny Hathaway in the process, influencing a string of further vocal albums into the 1990s. Despite returning to his jazz and guitar playing most recently, this theme was reflected again much later in Benson's 2000 release Absolute Benson, featuring a cover of one of Hathaway's most notable songs, "The Ghetto". Benson accumulated three other platinum LPs and two gold albums.[12] Later and current career In 1985, Benson and guitarist Chet Atkins went on the smooth jazz charts with their collaboration "Sunrise", one of two songs from the duo released on Atkins' disc Stay Tuned. In 1992, Benson appeared on Jack McDuff's Colour Me Blue album, his first appearance on a Concord album. Benson signed with Concord Records in 2005 and toured with Al Jarreau in America, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand to promote their 2006 multiple Grammy-winning album Givin' It Up.[citation needed]To commemorate the long-term relationship between Benson and Ibanez and to celebrate 30 years of collaboration on the GB Signature Models, Ibanez created the GB30TH, a very limited-edition model featuring a gold-foil finish inspired by the traditional Japanese Garahaku art form.[14] In 2009, Benson was recognized by the National Endowment of the Arts as a Jazz Master, the nation's highest honor in jazz.[15] Benson performed at the 49th issue of the Ohrid Summer Festival in Macedonia on July 25, 2009, and his tribute show to Nat King Cole An Unforgettable Tribute to Nat King Cole as part of the Istanbul International Jazz Festival in Turkey on July 27. In the fall of 2009, Benson finished recording a new album entitled Songs and Stories, with Marcus Miller, producer John Burk,[16] and session musicians David Paich and Steve Lukather.[17] As a part of the promotion for his recent Concord Music Group/Monster Music release Songs and Stories, Benson has appeared and/or performed on The Tavis Smiley Show,[18] Jimmy Kimmel Live![19] and Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.[20]Benson toured throughout 2010 in North America, Europe and the Pacific Rim, including an appearance at the Singapore Sun Festival.[21] He performed at the Java Jazz Festival March 4–6, 2011. In 2011, Benson released the album Guitar Man—revisiting his 1960s/early-1970s guitar-playing roots with a 12-song collection of covers of both jazz and pop standards overseen by producer John Burk.[22]In June 2013, Benson released his fourth album for Concord Records, Inspiration: A Tribute to Nat King Cole, which featured Wynton Marsalis, Idina Menzel, Till Brönner, and Judith Hill. In September, he returned to perform at Rock in Rio festival, in Rio de Janeiro, 35 years after his first performance at this festival, which was then the inaugural one.[23]

Public witnessing in Saskatchewan, Canada. Thanks for sharing @sassychanny View the full article

Part of a series on: Like many other highly religious Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses tend to take conservative positions on social issues. For example, three-quarters (75%) say abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, while similar shares oppose same-sex marriage and say homosexuality should be discouraged by society (76% each). Roughly three-quarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses (74%) also reject evolution, saying humans have always existed in their present form since the beginning of time. But Jehovah’s Witnesses do not commonly advocate for these beliefs in the political sphere. The denomination teaches that its members should remain politically neutral and abstain from voting or participating in “any action to change governments.” This is reflected in our polling. Three-quarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses (75%) say they are political independents who do not lean toward either major party. Half (50%) decline to answer a question about political ideology (i.e., whether they describe their political views as conservative, moderate or liberal). And most Jehovah’s Witnesses (64%), when asked if they are registered to vote, say they are not registered or decline to answer the question. Pew Research See also:

Part of a series on: Jehovah’s Witnesses are among the most racially and ethnically diverse religious groups in America. No more than four-in-ten members of the group belong to any one racial and ethnic background: 36% are white, 32% are Hispanic, 27% are black and 6% are another race or mixed race. Most Jehovah’s Witnesses – roughly two-thirds (65%) – are women, while only 35% are men. Christians worldwide are more likely to be women than men, but this gender gap is particularly large in the context of U.S. Christian groups. For instance, 54% of U.S. Catholics are women. Compared with other U.S. religious groups, Jehovah’s Witnesses tend to be less educated. A solid majority of adult Jehovah’s Witnesses (63%) have no more than a high school diploma, compared with, for example, 43% of evangelical Protestants and 37% of mainline Protestants. Previously posted data below: --------------------- Jehovah's Witnesses have an active presence in most countries, but do not form a large part of the population of any country.As of January 2014, Jehovah's Witnesses report an average of 8.2 million publishers—the term they use for members actively involved in preaching—in 113,823 congregations.[2] In 2013, these reports indicated over 1.84 billion hours spent in preaching and "Bible study" activity. Since the mid-1990s, the number of peak publishers has increased from 4.5 million to 8.2 million.[284] In the same year, they conducted "Bible studies" with over 9.2 million individuals, including those conducted by Witness parents with their children.[4][285][286] Jehovah's Witnesses estimate their current worldwide growth rate to be 2.1% per year.[2] The official published membership statistics, such as those mentioned above, include only those who submit reports for their personal ministry; official statistics do not include inactive and disfellowshipped individuals or others who might attend their meetings. As a result, only about half of those who self-identified as Jehovah's Witnesses in independent demographic studies are considered active by the faith itself.[287][288] The 2008 US Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life survey found a low retention rate among members of the religion: about 37% of people raised in the religion continued to identify themselves as Jehovah's Witnesses.[289][290]See also: Pew Religion Study data showing changes from 2007-2014INTERNAL JW COMMUNITY STATISTICS: TOTAL MISSING (average):1986 to 1995: 12%/yr.1996 to 2005: 41%/yr.Number Baptized Who Stop Publishing/Inactive(baptism minus increase):1981 to 2013: 80,000/yr.Disfellowshipped:1992: ≈1%/yr. (avg.) (Watchtower, 1992, July 1, p. 19)1985: 1.28%/yr. (Watchtower, 1986, Jan. 1, p. 13)Reinstated: 0.33%/yr. (avg.) (Watchtower, 1974, Aug. 1, p. 466; Watchtower, 1960, Dec. 1, p. 728)WORLD POPULATIONWorld Population Growth: 1.2%/yr. (240,000+ born per day)World Average Death Rate: 0.85%/yr.

South Africa Bethel Dance Party

Israel Branch @craigcarsonea thank you View the full article

Jambi, Indonesia. Thank you @violeenshte #jw #jwonly #jwfriends #jwfamily #jwpreaching #jwservice #jwpioneer #jwministry #jworg #jwglobal #jehovah #jehovahswitnesses #jeova #testemunhasdejeova #jehova #testigosdejehova #publicwitnessing #testemunhopublico #predicacionpublica #cartwitnessing View the full article

Jambi, Indonesia. Thank you @violeenshte #jw #jwonly #jwfriends #jwfamily #jwpreaching #jwservice #jwpioneer #jwministry #jworg #jwglobal #jehovah #jehovahswitnesses #jeova #testemunhasdejeova #jehova #testigosdejehova #publicwitnessing #testemunhopublico #predicacionpublica #cartwitnessing by jw_public_witnessing View the full article

Preaching in the rural territory. Jutiapa, Honduras @katrachito_keiichi thank you View the full article

Making sure they are well stocked in tracts while in service in Bauru, Brazil. Photo shared by @jonastiengo View the full article

Public witnessing at Versailles Chateau, France. Photo shared by @lojansd View the full article

Our kids doing a Bible Drama los niños de la congre, el bosque medellin, Colombia @luis_verasnow Thank you View the full article

The quokka may be the cutest animal you’ve never heard of. They’re found only in the southwestern part of Australia where there are only about 20,000 in the wild. The quokka is about the size of a cat or rabbit, with a long skinny tail that sometimes get the quokka mistaken for a rat. But once you see their big black noses and smiling mouths you won’t think quokkas look ratty at all. Quokkas are actually more closely related to Australia’s famous animal the kangaroo. Quokkas, especially the ones on Rottnest Island, aren’t afraid of people. In fact they often come right up to people or visit cafes and campsites looking for free meals. Unfortunately human food doesn’t agree with quokkas so there are rules against feeding them. The best food for a quokka is plants – they actually get most of their water from eating leaves and grasses, which helps them survive Australia’s often very dry weather. A quokka can even go months without drinking water. The main reason for the quokka’s extreme cuteness is its face, with that little smile that makes them seem super-happy. That may just be the way the quokka’s mouth is shaped though. Quokkas also open their mouths to pant, like dogs, when they get hot, which sometimes look like the quokka is giving us a big smile. Whatever the reason it’s a smile that’s hard to resist! View the full article

Best week/life ever! Visited all 3 Bethels with Sally and Martha, Pioneer Meeting Friday, and Our Circuit Assembly yesterday. Now privileged to participate in public witnessing here in West Virginia, USA, since we don’t have our Sunday meeting today! Photo shared by @skmdoc33 View the full article

Outback witnessing in Australia, our beautiful young sisters @tuiandmark Thank you View the full article

Chiang and Nydet are studying The Good News brochure, they are Sudanese refugees living in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.They want to preach to the resurrected ones in the new system! Photo shared by @dskadiang View the full article

Preaching in Laguna Blanca, Formosa. Argentina @f_lukas774 Thank you View the full article

The state-sanctioned seizure is just the latest in a number of worrying developments to come out of increasingly hardline Turkey, which is in advanced talks with the EU over visa-free travel for its 80 million citizens. Included in the seizures are Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox churches, one of which is over 1,700 years old. They have now effectively become state property - meaning they are run by the government - in a country with a dire human rights record where about 98 percent of the population is Muslim. The order to seize the churches was made on March 25 by Erdogan's council of ministers, according to the website World Watch Monitor. They claim it was made on the grounds that authorities intend to rebuild and restore the historical centre of the city, which has been partially destroyed by 10 months of urban conflict between government forces and militants from the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK).

Sharing the good news in Guatemala. Photo shared by @kro_oseas16jw View the full article

Preaching where the need is great near Balsapamba, Ecuador. Photo shared by @mikeandlex_15 View the full article

My husband and I are ‘need-greating’ for a month with the English Congregation in Quepos, Costa Rica. Today we were privileged to be able to work the Public Witnessing Table by Manuel Antonio Park, where a brother and sister kindly let us set-up in front of their shop! Can’t wait for more great experiences while we are here! Photo shared by @tiffanys.boxes View the full article

Preaching down the river in Rio Dulce to find persons in far little towns. Since the territory is so big it takes like 2 years to be cover. We are preaching with brothers from Australia, Mexico, Japon, USA and Guatemala. Rio Dulce Guatemala, Preaching campaign. @nazirmartinez Thank you View the full article