Our Lord’S Beacon: The Elementary Teachings of Christ Jesus

By William T. Atkinson

Then the Laity will become more noble in character as were the Bereans, and with maturity, combine their faith with the Word allowing them to recognize when the leaders teach in ignorance of the Word. (acts 17:11, Heb. 4:2).

Our Lords Beacon: The Elementary Teachings of Christ Jesus digs into the fundamental teachings of the doctrine of Christ Jesus. Many writings about the basics of Christianity have been published but without full knowledge of these six elementary truths, while using the meat of Gods Word, full maturity un a Christians life will never be attained. If we as Christians are stuck in the milk, in Gods eyes we are still yet infants since we are not yet acquainted with the teachings of the righteous. Furthermore, solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. One cannot use/digest solid food until one can fully digest the milk, and only if God permits it. (Heb. 5:13-14).

Is todays church truly mature? Can todays church possibly be conducting itself and understanding good and evil as an infant, using only the milk of Gods Word? Is the world influencing the church more than the church is influencing the world? Can everything in todays church be traced back to The Elementary Teachings of Christ Jesus?

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Nov 30, 2012
• ISBN: 9781475960730

William T. Atkinson

William Atkinson has been studying the Bible for over thirty-six years and graduated with a degree in lay ministry from Concordia College. He served with Peace Ministry as a biblical teacher and speaker and has been conducting a Bible study group every week from his home for the past thirty-three years. Mario Bruno realized the truth of God’s Word, the love of the Father, and the sacrifice made for the forgiveness of our sins during a profound experience during a church service at the age of ten. After being introduced to William, he learned how to dig deeper into the Scriptures and has been studying them for just over eighteen years.

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Copyright © 2012 by William T. Atkinson and Mario P. Bruno.

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ISBN: 978-1-4759-6072-3 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4759-6074-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4759-6073-0 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2012921565

iUniverse rev. date: 11/21/2012

TABLE OF CONTENTS

About the Authors / Introduction

Walk Toward Maturity

Repentance From Dead Works

Faith Towards God

Instruction About Baptisms

Laying on of Hands

Resurrection Of The Dead

Eternal Judgment

Conclusion

The following references have been directly quoted:

King James Bible (KJV)

Concordia Self-Study Bible

New International Version (NIV)

Copyright © 1986 Concordia Publishing House

St. Louis, MO 63118

The New Inductive Study Bible

New American Standard Translation (NASB)

© 2000 Precept Ministries International

Published by Harvest House Publishers

Eugene, Oregon 97402

The following have not been directly quoted, reference material only:

NIV Interlinear Greek-English New Testament

Copyright © 1976 by Zondervan Corp.

Grand Rapids, Michigan 49590

The Interlinear Bible

Hebrew-Greek-English

By: Jay P. Green Sr.

Second Edition ©1986

Published by

Sovereign Grace Publishers

Lafayette, Indiana 47903 U.S.A.

ISBN: 1-878442-82-1

Other study Materials used:

Strongest NIV Exhaustive Concordance

Copyright © 1999, 1990 by Zondervan Corp.

Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530

ISBN-10: 0-310-26285-2

ISBN-13: 978-310-26285-5

Dictionary References, quoted, in part:

Bible Student’s English-Greek Concordance

&

Greek—English Dictionary

By James Gall

Baker Book House

Grand Rapids, Michigan 49506

Paperback edition issued 1975, 1983

ISBN: 0-8010-3795-6

Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance

Copyright © 1890

First Edition Printed April 1894

34th Printing 1976

James Strong, S.T.D., LL.D.

ISBN: 0-687-40029-5

The New Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible

Copyright © 1995 by Thomas Nelson Publishers

James Strong, LLD, S.T.D

ISBN: 0-8407-2072-6

Webster’s Dictionary

Edited by John Gage Allee Ph.D

Copyright ©

1953,1955,1957,1958,1961,1962,1963,1964,1965,1966,1967,1969,1970,1974,1975,1977,1978

By Ottenheimer Publishers Inc.

Copyright © 1958 by the Literary Press

Webster’s New World Dictionary & Thesaurus

© 1988, 1991, 1994, 1996 Simon & Schuster, Inc.

© 1997-98 Accent Software International Ltd.

Fonts © 1997 Masterfont Ltd.

Mediaview Control © 1997 Inner City Software, Inc.

Stemming Engine © 1994 MCNC, Clearing House for Neworked Information Discovery and Retrieval.

All rights reserved.

This is the message heard from Him, and declared unto you, that God is Light; in Him there is no darkness whatsoever. If you say you have fellowship with Him, but you walk in darkness, you lie, and do not have the Truth. In Him is life and this life is the Light unto mankind; this Light shines in the darkness, but the darkness does not understand this Light. If you walk in the Light, as He is in the Light, you have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, cleanses you from all sin.

(I-John 1:5-7, John 1:4-5)

About the Authors / Introduction

William Atkinson has been studying the Bible for just over thirty-six years and graduated with a degree in lay ministry from Concordia College in Milwaukee WI. For three years he served with Peace Ministry as a Biblical teacher and speaker and has been conducting a weekly home Bible study group for the past thirty-three years.

Mario Bruno realized the love of the Father and the sacrifice made for the forgiveness of our sins during a profound experience in the middle of a church service at the age of ten. It was fourteen years later when he was introduced to William and they have been studying the Bible together for just over eighteen years.

Both believe whole heartedly that the entire Bible is God breathed and the inerrant Word of God Almighty, using the Bible as the final word and only truth. If asked, it would be said that their religious affiliation is simply a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ. They do not consider themselves to be of any one particular Christian establishment or denomination.

The cause for this is a culmination of many things and one of the reasons they decided to write this book. Throughout the fifty-four years of combined study they have come across some practices, ideals and beliefs within the church that are fervently adhered to, but in no way substantiated by the Word of God. The ideas and basis for many other traditions and ministries can be found in the Bible, but are so misconstrued they are outright offensive to God.

What troubled and amazed them even more, where some of the people considered to be leaders of the various churches they have visited throughout the years. Many of these leaders were, and still are, so set in their ways and locked into a particular denominational doctrine they are unwilling and unable to look deeper into the Word of God. When these leaders and even laity were asked or challenged, many different reactions were witnessed; reactions that were both expected and disturbingly unexpected.

Between the two of them they have been asked to leave some congregations, called a heretic, ignored and lied to. The most interesting however can be the one pastor who acknowledged what was being taught and practiced within his congregation was wrong, but since it had been done that way for so long, they, the congregation and the pastor, were comfortable and did not want to change. The youth pastor that believed Paul to be a male chauvinist could be called interesting, along with the pastor who strongly believed they, the authors, were wrong but in place of leading a possible lost child to the truth can instead be quoted as saying, I have no intention of opening the Bible and debating Scripture with you.

After experiencing such a vast variety of things and hearing some of the teachings within today’s church, a four year journey of intense study pertaining to the subject of this book was started. The fundamental teachings of Christianity has often been explored, written about and taught, but Our Lord’s Beacon: The Elementary Teachings of Christ Jesus is the basic teachings of the doctrine of Christ Jesus as described in the Bible. These are essential elements that every child of God should know to the fullest. It is critical for each Christian to learn and understand these principles in accordance to Scripture, because it is the foundation of their spiritual well being.

Some of the material you are about to read will be new to you, while other parts you may know full well. For some, there will be areas that may be troubling and even offensive since it will be going against what you personally have been taught and believed in for most of your Christian life. This book will step on some toes.

To say much more would just be repeating what is said in the body of this book. However, you will soon see that there is a habit of repetition. This was done deliberately, to drive across basic principles that need to be known and remembered; that have been overlooked by leadership for far too long. It is because of the author’s profound love of the Word and what they believe to be the prompting of the Holy Spirit that inspired them to share with you their journey and Scriptural recipe for complete well-being; body, soul and spirit.

Walk Toward Maturity

It is of the greatest importance for every child of God to thoroughly learn the fundamental teachings of Jesus Christ, and not only learn them, but to live their lives according to these teachings. The fundamental or elementary teachings of Jesus Christ are these:

• Repentance from dead works

• Faith towards God

• Instructions about baptisms

• Laying on of hands

• Resurrection of the dead

• Eternal judgment

(Heb.6:1-2)

The sole purpose of the fundamentals are to help you obtain more of what God has to offer you and prepare you to go further into the depth of His Word and dig into the meat of His word.

In the pages and chapters that follow, you will not only be lead through the elementary teachings listed above in great detail, but also touch on some of the areas in which today’s Christian church is having problems within those teachings. These problems are producing results in which many Christians miss out on experiencing the power and protection promised to them by God. Identifying these areas of difficulty will also explain why the Christian church is experiencing so many worldly struggles. As you will soon see, there is a tremendous amount of scripture referenced throughout, so we encourage you to have your Bible next to you as you read and let God help you walk toward maturity.

In different translations of the Bible, the words used in Heb.6:1 to define the elementary teachings are; beginning, fundamental, elementary and principle. However, the Greek word used in the original text is arche, which literally translated means chief, archaically defined as: the most valuable.

It is a life and death decision whether or not Christians walk their earthly lives in conjunction with these very teachings! Why life and death? Because the choice they make will determine whether God will allow them to learn beyond these fundamental teachings, or not.(Heb.6:1-3) For beyond these fundamental teachings lies the greatest danger of ones ability to reject the Way of God!

If you learn these teachings, and begin to walk out your earthly lives in accordance to them, God will not only allow you to learn the meat of His Word, but He will actually lead you through them. Be Warned! If you choose to learn the meat of His Word before having a good grasp on the milk, you will be doing this on your own and He will not lead you. Taking on His meat before you are ready, before He allows it, opens a door that brings forth dangers of possible spiritual death, which hold a much higher rate of percentage than if you fully know and understand the milk first. (Heb.5:11—6:3)

To understand this concept is to compare it to a child. From the moment of conception, an infant is fed with what their digestive system is capable of handling. If the correct type of food is received it can be properly used to nourish the rest of the body. This begins with milk of the mother, or a formulated combination of ingredients. Later, some solids, such as cereals, can be safely added to the milk. If the solids are added too early, the infant will reject this addition, mainly because their digestive system is not able to handle the mixture of solids as of yet. Would you ever give an infant meat and potatoes before they were able to fully digest them harmlessly and properly? The same meat and potatoes, which can some day be used to strengthen their body, and continue their growth, could at this early time in life cause them great bodily harm simply because their little mouths, throats and digestive systems are not yet mature enough to properly handle solid foods. (I-Cor.3:1-2, I-Peter.2:2)

This is why parents who truly love and cherish their children would never do such a thing. They would never intentionally place their child in danger! This is important to understand, because God loves and cherishes His children and He would never intentionally place a child of His in danger! Yet, so many of His children, who believe they are living their lives according to His Word, find themselves in dangerous places and they cannot understand why.

If you think about it though, God’s people, His children were always in danger. John the Baptist was beheaded, Jesus (His only begotten son) was whipped and crucified, Peter was crucified upside down, Paul was in prison, John boiled in oil . . . the list goes on. So to say that God would never intentionally place a child of His in danger is sure ignorance . . . isn’t it? Keep in mind; it is spiritual danger that is being spoken of here, not physical. For our concern is no