FOUNDATIONAL DOCTRINES PART 2

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Mar 27, 2015, 11:44:27 PM3/27/15
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                                                                                                  LESSON 5

 
 

                                                                 FOUNDATIONAL DOCTRINES OF CHRISTIAN LIFE

 
 

Jesus compared His discipleship to a tower, which would be built by paying a heavy cost. (Luke.14.28-30).Any good building built in this world must have an unshakable foundation. Similarly the real Christian life also must be founded on a good foundation. In Hebrews chapter six we can see the foundational doctrines of Christianity. They are,

1. Repentance from dead works

2. Faith

3. Baptisms

4. Laying on of hands

5. Resurrection

6. Eternal judgement.

 

Let us have a look at the second doctrine in Today’s lesson.

FAITH

 If we want to study any subject from the Bible, we are to find out where it first occurs in the Bible. Abraham believed in the Lord and He accounted it to him for righteousness. (Gen.15.6).Believed is the verbal form of belief/faith. This is the first incident in bible where we see the word faith.  The Hebrew word for ‘believed’ is ‘aw-man’ and from this word we got Amen (normally everybody recites at the end of the prayer) meaning – ‘let it be as you said’.

 

Please read Genesis15.1-6

 

Irrespective of all the material blessings, Abraham was without a child and he was grieved in his heart on this matter. Then the Word of the Lord came to him. “Look now toward heaven and count the stars if you are able to number them”. And the Lord said to him. “So shall be your descendants be”. And he believed in the Lord and He accounted it to him for righteousness.

 

This is the place where we can see the life giving faith in the Bible. Let us see the qualities of the life giving faith and analyse the above mentioned passage in bible. (Gen.15.1-6)

 

  1. Abraham had the problem of infertility in his house.(Gen.11.30)

     

  2. He was conscious of his problem, irrespective of all his worldly riches.(Gen.15.2)    

     

  3.  He looked unto the Lord in his distress. (Gen.15.3)

     

  4. Lord gave His Word of promise. (Gen.15.4-5).

     

  5. He believed it, (Gen.15.6) though humanly speaking, there was no chance of attaining it. (Rom.4.19)

     

                           6.  He did not consider his body, already dead and the deadness of Sarah’s womb, to hinder the growth of the faith. But Abraham was   
                          fully convinced that what He had promised, He was also able to perform. (Rom.4.21). 

    7.  Lord accounted this faith for his righteousness. (Gen.4.23-25). 

His faith was later demonstrated as life giving, when he offered Isaac on the altar of God. That was the act of faith in his case. (Js.2.21-24)

 

These are the qualities of the life giving faith in OT .But we are to keep in mind that, this faith could not save an individual in NT era. If Abraham’s faith can save people today many of the orthodox Jews would have received salvation. Now God has changed the dispensation and for receiving salvation, one has to believe in the death, burial and resurrection of the Lord. (Rom.10.9-10). Apostles believed in Lord Jesus as the Son of the living God and were saved as per the dispensation of the OT. (Matt.16.16, Jn.13.13-14, Jn14.17, 15.27) But when Lord appeared to the Apostles, they believed in His resurrection and He breathed on them saying ‘receive the Holy Spirit’ symbolising that now they have entered the NT salvation. After His resurrection the salvation is epicentre on the death, burial and resurrection of the Lord. If someone does not believe in the resurrection, he would be counted as an unbeliever or he is still in the sin. “If Christ is not risen your faith is futile, you are still in your sins” (Jn.20.19-23, 20.24-29, Rom.10.9-10,1Cor.15.17)

 

Now the foundational faith must inevitably be consisted of the following elements

 

1. Conviction of the need to change (Luke.15.17, Jn.5.6)

 

2. Decision of the Will to lead a new life (Repentance as detailed in the previous lesson)

 

3. Understanding the substitutional sacrifice of the Son of God. (1Cor 5.7)

 

4. Accepting the substitutional death of the Lord. (2Cor.5.21)

 

5. Making Jesus the Lord of the life –handing over of our life to His headship

 (Rom.10.9-10)

 

6. Confess it to the world. (Rom.10.9-10)

 

7. Faith must be accompanied by acts of faith. (Acts.2.41, 26.20, Gal.5.6, Titus.1.16, Js.2.14-17, 1John.3.15-18).

 

If our faith is devoid of these essential elements it will descend to the level of satanic faith. (Js.2.19).Faith is not an intellectual agreement with the truths of the Bible, but a surrendered decision to live by its principles. (Matt.4.4). Majority of the people of the Christian community are deceived by Satan. They consider the intellectual agreement of the truths of the bible as the life giving faith. This is not a faith at all as per the Biblical standards. By making this serious mistake, the majority of the so called Christian community are loosing their eternity.

 

  

If you want to provide this Bible study to anyone you like, you can directly add them  

 by going to this link

 https://groups.google.com/forum/#!managemembers/perth-fellowship/add

Nb. Please read all the scriptures from the Bible preferably NKJV. For any

clarification or doubt contact. perthfe...@gmail.com

 

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