Much to Think About

Martyn Lloyd Jones and Romans 6

I just finished reviewing my read of Martyn Lloyd Jones’s book Romans 6 – The New Man. It is by far the best treatise on Romans 6 I have every read, and an easy read to boot.

This is a must read for those desiring not only forgiveness of sin but deliverance from the power of sin. The simple approach Mr. Jones takes in revealing our union with Christ will no doubt set us on the path of God focus rather than self discovery (probing and analyzing of ones sins). This results in service to the Savior rather than rather than paralyses through analysis of sin.

Martyn Lloyd Jones was a medical doctor who in 1927 became the minister of a Welsh Presbyterian Church. In 1938 he moved to London and shared the ministry of Westminster Chapel in Buckingham Gate with Dr. G. Campbell Morgan who retired then in 1943. Mr. Jones continued in this ministry until 1968 when the call of God led him in a wider preaching and writing ministry up until his death in 1981.

I have listed a number of quotes from his book that give the flavor of how he handles this great Christian doctrine of union with Christ which is bedrock for any understanding and experience of biblical sanctification.

UNION WITH CHRIST
There is nothing, perhaps, in the whole range and realm of doctrine which, if properly understood, give greater assurance, greater comfort, and greater hope that this doctrine of our union with Christ. P30

Christians are not merely forgiven because of what Christ has done for us, we have been united to Christ, we are joined to Christ, we are indeed ‘in Christ’ – ‘in Christ Jesus’. P115

You are no longer in Adam, you are in Christ; and if you are in Him, what is true of Him is true of you. You realize it progressively, but it is true now. P40

A Christian is a person who has undergone a great change p206

SANCTIFICATION
Christians are to remind ourselves of who and what we are. We are ‘children of the Heavenly King’. We are members of the household of God’. We are the children of God. It is only as we remember this, and live accordingly, proud of our name and of our calling, that we shall not only live the righteous life, but we shall be advancing ‘unto holiness.’ Our hearts will become cleaner and cleaner and cleaner, and purer and purer, and so will our lives.” P269

Concerning holiness and sanctification – we must never start with ourselves and our problems. We are all so subjective, we are always thinking about ourselves, examining ourselves, and feeling our spiritual pulse. That is the wrong approach p176

The New Testament method and way of sanctification, therefore, is to get us to realize our position and standing, and to act accordingly. ….. It does not tell us what we can become. No, no, its message is ‘Be what you are.’ P262

“The New Testament pattern of teaching and preaching about sanctification is to bring us to realize that we have been set free, that we have become enslaved unto God. Stop feeling your spiritual pulse, and commiserating with yourself. Stop waiting for some marvelous deliverance that will put everything right without you doing anything at all. We read, ‘The truth shall make you free’; and the truth that makes you free is the realization of who you are and what you are.” P295

We must just take the bare Word of God, believe it, submit to it, and act upon it. P121

SIN
We are no longer in the territory of sin, we are no longer under the governing power of sin; sin no longer controls us, sin no longer controls our destiny. P22

The first thing that is absolutely essential to our being delivered from sin and to our realizing that we are not to continue in sin, is that we should realize the truth about ourselves (in Christ)… p112
We are dead indeed unto sin, to its realm, its rule, its reign, its power. I may be conscience of its activity in my body but I am not under its dominion. P130

“Every Christian by definition has already been set free from sin.” P290

“Sin in the Christian is no longer our master, it is just a nuisance.” P291
“When the Christian sins, he sins because he has just been foolish enough to listen to a voice to which he does not need to listen at all.” P291

CHRIST FOCUS VS. SELF FOCUS
What the New Testament tells you to do always, in the first instance, is to forget yourself altogether – to forget all your problems, your temptations, your difficulties, everything else; to forget yourself and look at the Lord Jesus Christ. P98

You do not need a hospital, or a clinic, you need this instruction, this information, this command, ‘Reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God, through Jesus Christ out Lord’. P189

The main trouble with the Christian Church today is that she is too much like a clinic, too much like a hospital; that is why the great world is going to hell outside! We are all suffering…. Feeling our own pulses and talking about ourselves, and our moods and subjective states (our sins). ……. Forget yourself and your temporary troubles and ills for the moment:” fight in the army. It is not a clinic you need; you must realize that we are in a barracks, and that we are involved in a mighty campaign. P174

“… if we thought of God and our relationship to Him, and our consequent duty, instead of thinking so much about ourselves and our problems, our moods and states, our temptations and battles and difficulties, our whole attitude and practice would be changed.” P293

“Do not talk so much about the weakness of the flesh, or about the strength of temptation. Realize who and what we are (in Christ), realize that your very body is the temple of the Holy Ghost.” P294

EVANGELIZATION / WORSHIP & THE WHOLE COUNSEL OF GOD
I argue, therefore, that we are not evangelizing truly unless we present this truth (Union with Christ) – that in salvation we are not merely forgiven and not only justified; the doctrine of salvation includes the basic truth that we were in Adam but are now in Christ, that we are taken out of that one position and put into another. That is primitive evangelism, that is one of the basic elements in the presentation of the gospel; and therefore if we do not give it due emphasis we are not evangelizing truly. P38

It is almost impossible to find hymns that bring out this great doctrine of our union with Christ, and our position in Him. We are so subjective that we miss this glorious truth, this objective truth, this great thing that has happened outside us – our position. P44

If we do not interpret this phrase (Rom 6:2) in such away as to expose ourselves the charge of antinomianism, we are not expounding it correctly. P18

God is Faithful

Recently Colene set us to the task of cleaning out our attic. That’s twelve years of accumulation of STUFF from this house and STUFF carried over from 13 years in Ahwatukee. The next hour I spent crouched in the attic handing down countless boxes. Thirty one of the boxes were costumes from our KONOS Homeschool days. This represented 60% of the STUFF in the attic. However during this process I discovered a long lost box of Lewis relative family photos. These pictures go back over 80 years, included a number of pictures of my mother and myself as a young child. Wow what a find. I could hardly wait to pour over the photos and documents.

An hour into the photos and papers I came across one well worn 5 x 9 manila envelop. It turned out that this envelope was populated by my mother. It contained a number of items important to her. There were two letters: one from Aunt Stella, and one written by me a few years after my salvation in 1972. There was a 5th grade award for mom’s perfect attendance that year, and a junior high promotion certificate.

In addition, there was her marriage certificate, a romantic telegram from my father, newspaper clippings of my teen golf and bowling exploits, a curl cut from my head at the age of three and my discharge paper from the hospital after my birth. The name on the discharge paper was Boy Lewis. Mom told me stories that my dad wanted to initially name me Breck after the shampoo dad sold. This would have been a tough name to carry especially after Rush Limbaugh’s relentless parody of John Edwards as the “Breck Girl.”

But of all the items in the envelope, Aunt Stella’s letter would prove to be a god sent shedding light on a nagging fear about my mother.

Aunt Stella and her husband Raleigh were saved in the 30’s under the ministry of Amy Semple McPherson. Aunt Stella had the heart of an evangelist. Anyone who spent more than a minute with her would be warmly and tactfully introduced to the Savior.

Over the years after becoming a Christian I constantly shared with my family. I was deeply burdened for all of them. It wasn’t unusual for me to spend hours in fervent tearful prayers on their behalf. I led Grandma Lewis and my dad to the Lord. However, even though I was close to my mother she would prove to be the hardest to win.

I constantly witnessed to her, I took her to church, Gospel Echoes. I took her to Kathryn Kuhlman crusades. Mom was even miraculously healed of cancer while awaiting surgery. The hospital staff apologized to her when her pre surgery x-rays did not show the malignancy that had appeared just days before. After that point when I talked with her about the love of Jesus she would weep.

My mother’s would not be so fortunate with her next hospital stay several years later. While in the hospital with a liver condition she slipped and hit her head and lost consciousness. In her catatonic state I talked, shared and prayed with her. After several heroic surgeries by the best surgeons at St Joseph’s Hospital mom passed on. Adding to the grief of losing mom was the nagging doubt about her eternal state, a doubt that has plagued me these 24 years since her passing.

I don’t know why I began reading Stella’s letter to mom the other night. However while reading I came across this portion of text on page 2 that read “I was so happy that you accepted the Lord that morning when I was talking to you on the phone.” That night the day dawned on 24 years of questioning. Think about it, the answer was always close at hand, in the attic, right above the garage where I daily parked my car.

God is faithful. Doesn’t His Word say; it is a lamb for a household (Exodus 12:3) and Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household. (Acts 16:31)

Marvelous Justification

As marvelous, beautiful, life changing, essential, God exalting and foundational as justification by faith is, it is merely our introduction into the grace of God.

Romans 5:1 Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, (2) through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God.

Wow! No wonder Paul prays for the Ephesians “that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him” (Eph 1:17).

Since justification is the introduction it behooves us to not stop at the foot of the cross but to press on into Romans 6, & 8 and sanctification and life in the Spirit.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones in his book The New Man (an Exposition of Romans chapter 6) states, “There is nothing, perhaps, in the whole range and realm of doctrine which, if properly understood, give greater assurance, greater comfort, and greater hope that this doctrine of our union with Christ. P30

OUT OF THE MOUTH OF INFANTS AND NURSING BABIES …… and Jack Nicklaus

On the subject of the age integration it is amazing that even the world of sports can get the drift before the church.

Jack Nicklaus had the following observation

“Sports today are not a pretty thing. There are problems more off the field than on the field week after week after week. I don't think we've had that [in golf, because] I think it's the nature of the sport and the way the kids grow up. Kids are forced to be involved with adults at an early age. To go play a golf course, you have to mix in with older people. You have to learn how to behave at an early age or they never get there.”