Well said Blondie, the main JW error is to believe it possible to EARN salvation. I asked my JW friend what the Apostle Paul considered to be apostasy or stumbling? How can a free gift be earned?
Romans 9:30-32
?What shall we say then? That gentiles that did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is a righteousness that is by faith; but that ....... ?who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law. Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone.?
Below is an intro to a sermon I found on the web about this, let me know if anyone wants a copy of the full sermon.
GOD'S GRACE IN JUSTIFYING THE SINNER
A Sermon by
Robert Traill
Galatians 2:21 - "I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain."
The scope of the apostle Paul in this epistle, is to reprove the church that he writes to, for a great and sudden apostasy from that faith of the gospel that they were planted in: the apostle Paul himself was one of the main planters amongst them; and quickly after his removal from them false brethren crept in amongst them, and perverted them from the simplicity that was in Christ: their great error lay here, in mixing the works of the law with the righteousness of Christ, in the grand point of the justification of a sinner before God. Throughout this epistle the apostle argues strongly against this error: they had not renounced the doctrine of Christ; they did not deny justification by faith in him; but they thought that the works of the law were to be added to their faith in Christ, in order to their justification.