Laying the Foundation

Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God, Of the doctrine of baptisms, and of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. HEBREWS 6:1–2

Many Christians could not say, if asked, what the foundations of their faith are. They could name doctrines they believe, and practices they follow, but they could not say which of these the New Testament itself treats as the ground on which everything else is built. Derek Prince believed he had found the answer in two verses of the letter to the Hebrews, and a large part of his early teaching ministry was spent unfolding them. The result was the Foundation Series, first issued as a set of booklets and later gathered into a single volume under titles that included Foundations for Christian Living. For many believers in the charismatic renewal it was the first systematic Bible teaching they had ever received.

Six stones in order

Prince noticed that the writer to the Hebrews, rebuking his readers for staying immature, lists what he calls the principles of the doctrine of Christ. There are six of them: repentance from dead works, faith toward God, the doctrine of baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgement. The writer does not want his readers to stay among these things for ever. He wants them to go on. But he plainly assumes that they have been laid first, and laid properly.

For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. HEBREWS 5:12

Prince drew the obvious conclusion, and pressed it on a generation that was hungry for experience and impatient with doctrine. You cannot build the upper storeys of the Christian life on a foundation that was never laid. Many of the collapses he saw in believers and in churches, he argued, were not failures at the top of the building. They were failures at the bottom.

For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 1 CORINTHIANS 3:11

He was careful to add that the six doctrines are not a second foundation alongside Christ. They are the way the one foundation, Christ Himself, is laid in a believer’s life. Every one of them points to Him.

Repentance and faith

The first two stones belong together, and Prince taught that they must come in this order. Repentance comes before faith. It is not a feeling of regret, nor a promise to do better, but a decision: a change of mind that issues in a turning round. The word, he pointed out, describes a man walking one way who turns and walks the other. Repentance from dead works means turning away from every attempt, religious or irreligious, to live independently of God — including the respectable attempt to earn His favour by good behaviour.

Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. ACTS 20:21

He believed much modern evangelism had skipped this step. People were invited to believe without being called to repent, and the result was a great many professions that did not last. Faith without repentance, he argued, is faith in a Saviour one has not needed. Faith toward God, the second stone, is then the trusting of oneself wholly to Christ and to what God has said about Him. Chapter six of this book is given to his teaching on faith.

Baptisms and the laying on of hands

The third stone is plural: the doctrine of baptisms. Prince took this to include Christian baptism in water, which he taught should be by immersion and follow repentance and faith, and the baptism in the Holy Spirit, which he held to be a distinct experience promised to every believer. He also discussed John’s baptism, as a preparatory baptism of repentance, to show how the New Testament distinguishes them. Chapter seven of this book returns to the baptism in the Spirit.

Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. ROMANS 6:4

The fourth stone surprises most modern readers. Why, among the elements of the faith, should the laying on of hands appear at all? Prince answered by showing how often it occurs in the New Testament: for healing, for the imparting of the Spirit, for commissioning to service, for the recognition of gifts.

Neglect not the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbytery. 1 TIMOTHY 4:14

He saw it as a means by which God transmits blessing and authority through members of the Body. It is a reminder that the Christian life is not purely private. God works through people. That is a point well taken. It also needs a caution, and Prince’s own story supplies it. Wherever a practice conveys authority from one person to another, it can be abused, and the Shepherding Movement showed how quickly a proper respect for spiritual oversight can turn into control. Scripture itself counsels restraint: Lay hands suddenly on no man (1 Timothy 5:22).

Resurrection and judgement

The last two stones look forward, and Prince insisted they belong to the foundation, not to the attic. A Christian who does not believe in the resurrection of the body and the judgement of God does not have an incomplete faith; he has a different faith. The resurrection of Christ is the pledge of ours.

But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. 1 CORINTHIANS 15:20

And judgement is certain. Prince distinguished between the judgement of believers, which concerns not their salvation but their reward, and the final judgement of all mankind. He did not soften either.

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. 2 CORINTHIANS 5:10

He argued that these doctrines are foundational because they give weight to everything else. A believer who knows he will stand before Christ lives differently from one who does not. The resurrection turns suffering into seed. Judgement turns every day into something that counts.

Why it still matters

Some of Prince’s particular conclusions under these headings will not be shared by every reader. Christians who baptise infants will read his treatment of baptism differently. Those who do not hold a distinct baptism in the Spirit will weigh chapter seven with care. That is proper. But his central point stands, and many churches need it. The foundations of the faith are not things to be assumed. They are things to be taught — plainly, deliberately and early.

Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock. MATTHEW 7:24

The storms come to every house. The only question is what the house is standing on.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Write down the six foundations of Hebrews 6:1–2. Beside each, write one sentence saying what you believe about it and why.

2. Which of the six have you never been taught? Find the passages on it and study them this month.

3. Examine your own conversion. Did it include a real turning from the old direction of your life? If not, repent now, specifically.

4. If you are responsible for new believers, ask what they are being taught in their first year, and whether it includes these foundations.

5. Spend time this week meditating on the judgement seat of Christ. Ask what in your present life you would wish different in its light.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, You are the only foundation, and I want my life built on You and on nothing else.

Where I have built quickly and carelessly, show me. Where I have skipped repentance, bring me to it. Where my faith has rested on feelings instead of on Your Word, settle it on the rock.

Teach me the first things, so that I may go on to maturity without fear of collapse.

And let me live every day in the light of the resurrection and of the day when I shall stand before You. Amen.