The quality of the sermon audio is a little subpar....just a tad....but in a way it proves that the listener really desires to learn. The Martyn Lloyd-Jones Trust has regularly....almost every week....been releasing a 'newly found sermon'....and this is the latest. You can listen to it by going to mljtrust.org....clicking on sermons....and then newly found sermons. It is at the bottom of a short list and is titled....The True Nature Of The Christian church, Part Two.
This is a very special and very distinctive sermon by Martyn Lloyd-Jones. It isn't a mere description of what the church should be....but a piercing examination of what the church is today. I experienced this in my own life as for many years....maybe even decades....I recoiled from what has become our habit to only talk of things of the Lord on either Sundays....(please notice that I didn't write....the Lords' Day....for that concept has become foreign to us today)....on Sundays....and really not even then....but rather at a weekly Bible study. We tend to meet once a week to talk about the Lord.....and we have come to believe that that is normal and pleasing to God. Well....that is what Martyn Lloyd-Jones addresses in this sermon.
He is using the biblical example of the early church as his evidence. They didn't get together once a week....or every once in a while....and talk about politics....for they wanted and desired and actually panted for conversation on their Savior and their salvation....with others who felt exactly the same way that they did.
In my own case I feel as though I'm am often the odd one out....always trying to interject something into the conversation of our shared faith....but only able to continue this for maybe five minutes or so before I feel that I've taken this talk as far as I can. What I experienced for many decades while I was working is that Christians would engage me in conversation about our faith when I would bring it up....which was often....but they hardly if ever brought it up on their own!
I'm going to pause here and publish this post....and listen to the sermon again. I don't....nor do I ever want to do this while recommending sermons....give a step by step description. I want to give only enough to encourage and motivate the reader to become a listener for themselves. And I have a tendency....maybe it's not the best tendency....to want to get these new posts out to visitors to these posts as soon as I can....for there will be regular readers checking in in the morning....which is right now as I type....but will not come back until tomorrow morning. I may though add more here after listening to Martyn Lloyd-Jones again.
Addendum: There is an immanency around us today....and the difficulties that are ahead. We do not have the luxury to for example say...."I'll order that book and get it in a week....when we can go to a bookstore and purchase it that day"....or say...."I'll give my friend the book that he desperately needs next weekend when I see him at church"....when we can get it to him today with a little effort. I will add here that when a pastor announces that he will start preaching on a specific book of the bible....and continue on it for maybe a year....that he then is in danger of having taken the Holy Spirit out of feeding the flock....for a year. This world and culture is in flux....and pastors need to be on their knees every day seeking guidance from God on what and where to preach from...the very next Lord's day!
Note: Two years ago our pastor peached for a year from Revelation....and this year he preached from Luke....(he is still not finished.) Both of those worked out well....but then with Revelation and Luke....you are dealing throughout with an ongoing conflict that can address the world that we live in today. All I am saying is that the pastor has to be careful not to inhibit the preaching on what we....the flock....need to hear on a weekly and changing basis.
I did listen to the sermon again and I highly recommend that you sit down and listen to it. We do not get fed like this in America....not on a regular basis anyway....but then....Martyn Lloyd-Jones....as was Spurgeon.... was a special gift to the overall church. It's an understatement....but it would do pastors good to go back and learn from these men!
