A Reader’s Guide to Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth. 2 TIMOTHY 2:15

Lloyd-Jones wrote very few books as books. Almost everything that bears his name began as preaching — Sunday sermons, Friday-evening expositions, conference addresses and lectures — taken down, edited and published, many of them after his death. There is a great deal of it, and much of it is long. The guide below is arranged to help the reader find a way in. His works remain in copyright and should be obtained from their publishers; none is reproduced in this book.

Begin here

Spiritual Depression: Its Causes and Cure (1965). His best-loved book, and the one most likely to help a struggling believer. Short chapters, each on a single cause, with the doctor’s care for diagnosis on every page. The source of chapters thirteen and fourteen of this volume.

Studies in the Sermon on the Mount. Two volumes, published at the end of the 1950s. Practical, searching and accessible, and perhaps the best introduction to his preaching. The source of chapters ten to twelve. Several of these sermons can be read on Ochorus.

The Cross. A short series on Galatians 6:14. An excellent single evening’s reading, and a good test of whether his style suits you.

The great expository series

Romans. Fourteen volumes from the Friday-evening series at Westminster Chapel, covering the epistle from the first chapter into the fourteenth. The volumes on chapters three to six — Atonement and Justification, Assurance and The New Man — are the heart of it. Demanding and rewarding.

Ephesians. Eight volumes from the Sunday-morning series. God’s Way of Reconciliation, on chapter two, is the place to start. The last volumes, on spiritual warfare, are among his most practical.

Life in Christ. His sermons on the First Epistle of John, on fellowship with God, assurance and love.

The Life of Joy and The Life of Peace. Sermons on Philippians, warm and pastoral. One of them can be read on Ochorus.

On preaching

Preaching and Preachers (1971). Lectures given in Philadelphia in 1969. Indispensable for anyone who preaches or teaches, and illuminating for anyone who listens. Strong opinions throughout; weigh them.

On the Spirit and revival

Revival. Sermons preached in 1959, the centenary of the 1859 revival. His fullest statement of what revival is and why the church should pray for it. A short address on the same subject can be read on Ochorus.

Joy Unspeakable and Prove All Things. His teaching on the baptism with the Spirit and on spiritual gifts, published after his death. Read with the cautions in chapter sixteen of this volume, and alongside John Stott’s short book on the baptism and fullness of the Holy Spirit, which argues the other side.

Doctrine and the church

Great Doctrines of the Bible. Lectures on systematic theology given on Friday evenings in the early 1950s, now usually published in one volume. Clear and orderly.

Authority. A short book on the authority of Christ, Scripture and the Spirit.

Knowing the Times. Addresses on various occasions, including material related to the controversy of 1966. Read with chapter nineteen of this volume in mind.

About Lloyd-Jones

Iain H. Murray’s two-volume biography, D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones: The First Forty Years and The Fight of Faith, is the standard life, written by a close colleague who had access to his papers. It is detailed, admiring and indispensable, though readers who disagree with Lloyd-Jones on 1966 will find its account partisan. Bethan Lloyd-Jones’s Memories of Sandfields gives a vivid picture of the early ministry. For a more critical assessment, the academic studies of his place in twentieth-century evangelicalism, such as that by John Brencher, are worth reading alongside Murray. No single account is disinterested; reading more than one is wise. The Ochorus author page carries a shorter biography.

On Ochorus

A number of his sermons can be read in the Ochorus library, among them The Salt of the Earth, The Light of the World, God or Mammon, Jesus on Prayer, The Wrath of God, The Parable of the Prodigal Son, What Is Revival?, Working Out Our Own Salvation, So Great Salvation, Full Salvation and A Living Hope of the Hereafter. They are the best place to hear his own voice.

Three counsels for reading him

Read him with the Bible open. He would have insisted on it. His method was to take a text and press it; check the text.

Read him slowly. His sermons were meant to be heard one a week, not devoured in a sitting. A single sermon read carefully and prayed over will do more good than a volume skimmed.

Read him for the diagnosis and the cure. Where he presses a controversial point, weigh it. But do not let the controversies distract you from the thing he cared about most: your own condition before God, and the remedy God has provided in Christ.

Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. 1 THESSALONIANS 5:21