A Look at the Foundational Doctrines of Hebrews 6 – Part 1 – Introduction

Heb 6:1 Wherefore leaving the doctrine of the first principles of Christ, let us press on unto perfection; not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, 2 of the teaching of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. 3 And this will we do, if God permit.

 

In the next few posts I would like to look at Hebrews 6:1-3 and study the foundational doctrines of Christ. It is important that we know these doctrines and move on from them. Some commentators see these doctrines as Jewish ceremonies that were to be moved away from and some versions of Scripture influenced by this translate baptisms as washings (ie. ceremonial ablutions), but this cannot be the case for two very good reasons.

1. The elemental doctrines are not said to be of the Jews but of Christ. Christ did not come to put new wine into the old wineskins of Jewish tradition, but rather to raise up new wineskins for His new wine. Christ never gave any doctrine of ceremonial ablutions, He did however preach a Baptism of Repentance and also promised a later Baptism of the Holy Spirit and fire to His disciples who had already received water baptism from John (some of them were John's disciples previous to their calling by Christ, and since they baptized others I conclude that they must have all been baptized themselves – see John 4:1-2). More will be written on this in later posts.
   
2. The first two foundational or elementary doctrines listed are repentance and faith towards God which are not elementary to the Old Covenant, but are of essential and basic import to the New Covenant as can be seen in Acts 2:38, 1 Thess. 1:9, and Acts 20:21. These two doctrines of repentance and faith were and are the first doctrines proclaimed to unbelievers and result in their conversion. They are only dimly seen in the Old Testament and were virtually unknown in Israel before John the Baptist and Christ began their ministries.
   

Thus these doctrines are doctrines we should know as believers, but they are not doctrines of maturity but of infancy and we should advance from them. This is done in the same way a child learns to move around. Usually they begin by crawling, but as they get stronger they learn to stand and walk, they still crawl, but as their skill improves they begin to prefer the better mode of locomotion. The ability to crawl is not lost, even adults can do that if need arises, but we do not find it comfortable anymore. In the same way we need to progress in our Christian maturity beyond these elementary doctrines. The doctrines are not bad, they are essential for the first stage of Christian development and without them we will lack the skills needed to advance. To remain in them and make no progress is, however, a great tragedy. 2 Peter 1:5-11 gives believers things which should spring from and add onto their faith and warns of the consequences of their lack, but also shows the stability and reward which will accompany their acquisition. God desires us to grow up to the full stature of Christ (Eph. 4:13). This is only possible if our diet includes the meat of God's Word as well as the milk of these elementary truths. Hebrews contains many warnings of apostasy because the Jewish believers in not progressing in their walk were in great danger of it. In the Christian walk the saying non progredi est regredi is very true if we do not advance we will go back.

Before we can go on from these doctrines we must first learn them so in the next post we will look at the first doctrine which is repentance from dead works.