Sixteen lessons through Scripture
The Study Guides
A guided sixteen-lesson series from the foundations of biblical truth through prophecy and the final crisis — written from the historic pioneer position, in Q&A format, for any reader approaching the Scriptures fresh. A reader who begins at lesson 1 and finishes at lesson 16 has the whole biblical framework in hand.
Is the Bible the Word of God?
The foundation question — and the evidence the Bible itself, history, and fulfilled prophecy supply for its answer
Before any other question of faith can be honestly addressed, one prior question must be settled: is the book on which all the other questions depend actually the word of God, or only the word of men? This lesson walks the case — the Bible's claim about itself, the unanimity of its witnesses across forty writers and fifteen hundred years, the manuscript transmission record, the archaeological confirmation, the testimony of fulfilled prophecy, and the witness of Christ Himself — and ends with the one test by which the willing reader is invited to settle the matter personally.
Who Is the One True God?
The Father, on the testimony of Christ Himself
Asked the first commandment of all, Christ named the Shema — "The Lord our God is one Lord" — and identified the one God as the Father. This lesson walks Christ's own testimony on the identity of God, the apostolic confession of one God and one Lord (1 Cor 8:6), the unbroken witness of the Hebrew Scriptures, and the texts often read as identifying Christ with the Father. The reader is invited to do what the Bereans did: to search the Scriptures and let them settle the question.
Who Is Jesus Christ?
The only begotten Son — not adopted, not created, not metaphor
Begotten in the days of eternity before all creation, sharing the Father's name, nature, and life by right of inheritance — Christ's full divinity is grounded in His Sonship, not despite it. This lesson walks the apostolic begotten-Son framework: the Greek monogenēs and its plain meaning, Micah 5:2 and Proverbs 8:22–25 on the begetting in eternity, the begotten / created distinction, the prōtotokos question of Colossians 1:15 ("firstborn of every creature"), the pre-existence, Christ's own divine self-designations in His own voice, the begotten-vs-adopted distinction, and the foundational test of 1 John 5:11–12.
Where Did Evil Come From?
Lucifer's rebellion, the unfallen worlds, the great controversy
Evil did not begin on this earth. It began in heaven, in the heart of the highest created being, in defiance of a perfectly good Creator. This lesson walks the origin of evil from Scripture's plain testimony — Lucifer's self-exaltation (Isa 14, Ezek 28), his slander on God's character, the rebellion in heaven (Rev 12), the entry of sin to this earth (Gen 3), this earth as the one fallen world among many (Heb 1:2; Job 1:6), and the cross as the moment Satan was publicly unmasked and God's character publicly vindicated (Heb 2:14; Col 2:15). With supporting witness from Ellen White's exposition in Patriarchs and Prophets and The Desire of Ages.
What Did Christ Accomplish at the Cross?
The atonement, justification by faith, the gospel proper
The cross is not a religious symbol; it is a historical transaction. This lesson walks what was actually accomplished there in the apostles' own words — the Father's initiative and the Son's willing offering (Jn 3:16; Jn 10:17–18); substitutionary atonement (Isa 53; 1 Pet 2:24; 2 Cor 5:21); propitiation (Rom 3:24–26; 1 Jn 4:10); redemption, forgiveness, justification, reconciliation (Col 2; Eph 1; Rom 5); the public defeat of Satan and the powers (Heb 2:14; Col 2:15); justification by faith without works (Eph 2:8–9); the necessary fruit of works following faith (Eph 2:10; Jas 2); and the bridge to Christ's ongoing high-priestly ministry in the heavenly sanctuary (Heb 7–10).
Does God's Law Still Stand?
The Ten Commandments as God's standing covenant
A standard view in modern evangelicalism is that the moral law was abolished at the cross. Christ Himself answered the question in advance: "till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law." This lesson walks the moral / ceremonial distinction (Ex 20 vs. Col 2:14–17), corrects the antinomian misreading of Romans 6:14 ("not under the law, but under grace"), and recovers the apostolic frame in which faith establishes the law (Rom 3:31) and the Spirit fulfils the righteousness of the law in those who walk after the Spirit (Rom 8:3–4). With supporting witness from Ellen White on the law as the transcript of God's character. The lesson sets up the next question: which day is the Sabbath, and on what authority has the church moved it?
Which Day Is the Sabbath?
The seventh day from creation through the apostles
Sanctified at the close of creation week, kept before Sinai (Ex 16), codified at Sinai (Ex 20), kept by Christ as His settled custom (Lk 4:16), kept by the apostles every Sabbath of the book of Acts (Acts 13, 16, 17, 18), and continuing in the new earth (Isa 66:22–23): the seventh-day Sabbath is the same day from Eden onward. This lesson walks the unbroken biblical record and identifies the day in the modern week by Scripture's own internal marker — the crucifixion narrative (Lk 23:54–24:1: Friday, Saturday, Sunday). Lesson 8 then walks the post-apostolic transfer.
Who Changed the Sabbath?
Rome's own admission of the Saturday-to-Sunday transfer
The change from Saturday to Sunday is not in the Bible. It is, on Rome's own confession, the act of the Catholic Church — and Rome has named the change as her mark of authority. This lesson walks her own published admissions across six primary sources (Convert's Catechism, Doctrinal Catechism, Faith of Our Fathers, Catholic Mirror, Catholic Record, Our Sunday Visitor), the historical timeline of the change (Constantine 321; Laodicea c. 336; Justinian 538), the prophetic prediction of the change in Daniel 7:25, and Protestant admissions from the Augsburg Confession, the Baptist Manual, and the Methodist Theological Compend that the change has no biblical warrant. Closes on Christ's own teaching on tradition overriding commandment (Mk 7:7–9) and the gospel call of Rev 18:4.
What Happens When We Die?
The sleep of the dead, and the lie that opens the door to spiritualism
The first lie ever told on this earth was that death is not really death. Every subsequent doctrine of the immortal soul, of consulting the dead, of alien encounters with deceased loved ones, descends from that one statement of the serpent. Scripture's answer is the opposite — and the opposite settles the matter.
Will Hell Burn Forever?
The end of the wicked — justice and love in the same settlement
The popular doctrine of eternal conscious torment misrepresents both the justice and the love of God. Scripture's settlement is the destruction of sin, sinners, and death itself in the lake of fire — final, complete, and the end of evil rather than its perpetuation.
Has the Judgment Already Begun?
Daniel 8:14, the heavenly sanctuary, and the hour of his judgment
The longest time-prophecy of the Bible — 2,300 days — ended in 1844. The event it pointed to was the cleansing of the heavenly sanctuary and the beginning of the investigative judgment. This lesson walks the prophecy, the sanctuary, and the judgment-hour ministry that is in session now.
What Did Daniel See?
The four kingdoms, the little horn, and the everlasting kingdom
Daniel's visions traced the rise and fall of the great world powers from Babylon to the second coming, with an accuracy modern skeptics have been forced to dismiss as written after the fact. This lesson walks Daniel 2 and Daniel 7 in the historicist tradition the Protestant Reformation recovered.
What Is the Mark of the Beast?
Revelation 13, the image, and the closing test
The mark of the beast is not a microchip and not a tattoo. It is the enforced sign of the beast's authority — and Rome has, in her own published documents, named that sign. This lesson walks Revelation 13, the image of the beast, and the closing test on which the final crisis turns.
Who Is Babylon?
Revelation 17–18 and the call to come out
Revelation's final-hour Babylon is a religious-political system whose architecture Scripture describes in detail and whose identification John's contemporary readers would have understood immediately. This lesson walks the identification — and the closing call: "Come out of her, my people."
How Will Jesus Return?
The second coming personal, visible, audible, and unmistakable
No event in the future of this earth is described in Scripture with more precision than the manner of Christ's return — and no event is more thoroughly confused by modern Christianity. This lesson walks what the Bible actually says: how He returns, what every eye will see, and which counterfeits to refuse.
What Will the New Earth Be Like?
The millennium, the executive judgment, and the eternal inheritance
Scripture closes with the picture of a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness — no more death, no more sorrow, no more pain, the tabernacle of God with men. This lesson walks the millennium, the executive judgment, the desolation of the earth, and the final restoration to which the whole biblical story has been moving.