He Humbly Served
Jehovah
“IT’S NOT so much where you serve but whom you serve
that is truly important.”John Booth was fond of saying those words, and he lived
by them. His life course on earth, which ended on Monday, January 8, 1996, left
no question as to whom he chose to serve.
As a young man back in 1921, John Booth was
searching for purpose in life. He taught Sunday school at the Dutch Reformed
Church, but he resisted the idea of training to become a minister because he
felt that clergymen led selfish lives. When he saw a flier for a talk entitled
“Millions Now Living Will Never Die,” he wasted no time in sending away for the
literature it advertised. Captivated by what he had read, he was soon bicycling
15 miles [24 km] to meetings of the Bible Students, as Jehovah’s
Witnesses were then known. He was baptized in 1923 and began preaching from door
to door in the region of Wallkill, New York, where his family had a dairy farm.
Brother Booth entered the full-time ministry in
April 1928. He preached in his home territory and in the rural South, trading
Bible literature for food and lodging. He had to brave such hazards as
gun-brandishing owners of illegal alcohol stills, one of whom shot and wounded
John Booth’s pioneer partner. In 1935, Brother Booth was appointed a traveling
overseer and began visiting congregations and smaller groups around the country.
He organized assemblies and helped the brothers and sisters to persevere
despite opposition. Standing up to angry mobs, taking a stand in court, and
suffering imprisonment all became common occurrences for Brother Booth. “It
would take a book to give details of those exciting times,” he once wrote.
In 1941, Joseph F. Rutherford, then president of the
Watch Tower Society, assigned Brother Booth to work at Kingdom Farm, near
Ithaca, New York. There he served faithfully for 28 years. His love of the ministry
undimmed, he was delighted over the years to associate with thousands of
students of the Watchtower Bible School of Gilead for training missionaries,
which was situated there at Kingdom Farm until 1961. In 1970, Brother Booth was
asked to serve at Watchtower Farms in Wallkill, New York, and so found himself
in the same area where he had begun pioneering some 45 years earlier.
In 1974, Brother Booth was appointed a member of the
Governing Body of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Brooklyn, New York. He served faithfully
in that capacity until his death at 93 years of age. John Booth was beloved for
his profoundly humble and kind Christian personality. Until his health and
strength failed him, he was faithfully preaching from door to door and on the
city streets.
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Jehovah ***