BRIEF BIOGRAPHY
Wales is a unique place in the world. Even being part of Britain, the Welsh are quick to make clear that they are not English, and emphasize speaking in their own language rather than speak in English.
Wales has a very special spiritual history, it has seen great revivals, often followed by profound spiritual depression.
Welsh History records some remarkable as Christmas Evans, Daniel Rowland, William Williams, Howell Harris, Evan Roberts ... and David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, our biography. Getting Started
David Martyn Lloyd-Jones was born on December 20, 1899, when he concluded the nineteenth century. God had a plan for this son of Henry and Magdalene Lloyd-Jones, to bring back the fires of revival that Evans, Roberts and others had experienced before. Some have said that Charles Spurgeon was the last Puritan, but time would show that they should have expected to hear the "Doctor" before making such a claim. The life of a young
Martyn was fairly quiet until January 1910 when he was 11. Until then his father had been a very successful businessman in his hometown of Llangeitho. But this year something happened that changed many things.
In the dark of night there was a fire that nearly cost the lives of Martyn and his brothers, who slept on the floor. Although the family was saved, most of the family property was lost. Henry never fully recovered from the financial setback. Almost by accident, Martyn soon found out how truly desperate the situation had become.
During his early school years, he carried this burden in his heart. As a result, he became very serious for his age, and very determined to succeed in their education and life. "It was as if he was away much of what is common to youth, and that once made him say: 'I never had an adolescence,'" said Ian Murray. Although warm-hearted, Lloyd-Jones always carry with him a reputation for austerity and severity.
Lloyd-Jones was raised in the Welsh Calvinistic Methodism. The term "Calvinist Methodism" may seem contradictory, because Methodists are Arminian - which emphasize the free will of man - and Calvinists emphasize God's sovereignty over salvation. Somehow, the Welsh Calvinistic Methodism sought the best of both positions.
Between 1914 and 1916, Lloyd-Jones went to a London primary school, then studied medicine. He made his practice at the prestigious St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and was brilliantly successful. Passed their exams so early he had to wait to graduate.
In 1921 he began working as an assistant principal of Sir Thomas Horder, one of the best doctors in those days.
At the age of 26 years, Martyn received her membership diploma of the Medical School and had a brilliant and lucrative career ahead of him. However, God had plans for it to be a physician of souls rather than bodies.
conversion and call to ministry
Gradually, through reading, his mind was drawn to the gospel of Christ. He had no dramatic crisis of conversion, but reached a point where fully committed to the gospel.
After that, when he sat in the office, listening to the symptoms of his patients, he realized that what many of them needed was not ordinary medicine, but the gospel he had discovered for himself. He could deal with the symptoms, but the worry, tension, obsessions, could only be treated by the power of conversion. He felt increasingly that the best way to use his life and talents was to preach the gospel. Martyn
soon became involved in the church of the Charing Cross Chapel. Among other things, he met Bethan Philips. Bethan attended there with his parents and two brothers. His father was a well-known ophthalmologist and Bethan was nearing graduation as a doctor at University College Hospital.
After several years of dating, Martyn and Bethan were married in 1927. After their honeymoon in Torquay, moved into their first home, a small parish house Sansfield Church in Aberavon, Wales, determined to serve in what they feel called.
The surprising move of the young specialist and his wife could not fail to attract attention, and the press came to them. Mrs. Lloyd-Jones responded to a reporter at his door with the phrase: 'No comment' and the next day was shocked to read the headline: "'My husband is a wonderful man," says Ms. Lloyd-Jones '. This couple had two daughters, Elizabeth and Hannah
Local doctors were not very happy with the newcomer. Thought he had come to show their superiority and take away their patients.
Against expectations, Martyn could not completely abandon his medical career. In south Wales, brilliant diagnostic skill was scarce. After a few years during which he was deliberately ignored by local doctors was called to a difficult case. He knew exactly the nature of the obscure illness that the patient appears to recover, and then die. Confirmed its forecast accurately, and the general practitioner said: 'I kneel to ask forgiveness for what I said about you. " After that it was difficult to handle medical calls.
A writer described the neighborhood Sansfield "contains at least 5,000 men, women and children living in most of the squalor and overcrowding." Or as someone said, was a place for "the player, the prostitute and the tax collector."
Lloyd-Jones was not a minister fresh from a liberal theological school, that accommodated his message to contemporary opinion and prejudices of his congregation. The words of his first inspired sermon from 2 Timothy 1:7 illustrate what his convictions: "Our ... churches are crowded with people, almost all of which take the Lord's Supper without hesitation, but ... Do you imagine for a moment that all these people believe that Christ died for them? Well then, you say, why are members of the church, why they pretend to believe? The answer is that they are afraid of being honest with themselves ... I feel much more shame for all eternity for those occasions when I said I believed in Christ when in fact they were not ...».
That was too much for some who left the congregation. But instead, slowly at first, was growing the number of those who were captivated by the truth, the working class of South Wales. The message brought them and the power of the Holy Spirit converted them. There were no dramatic appeals, only a young minister with a clear message of God's justice and love, which brought a hard case after another to repentance and conversion.
The church grew with the steady stream of conversions. Christians were notorious drinkers glorious, and workers and women came to the Bible classes he and his wife headed.
For those who are accustomed to biblical preaching can be difficult to understand the shock that caused this young preacher. First, he was not theologically trained (at least not recognized forms). Instead of preaching from a lectionary or otherwise pre-prepared, Lloyd-Jones was primarily a preacher of the Bible. From the beginning, he sought to give a verse by verse understanding of the Word of God. Perhaps this reflected his own personal life that included reading the entire Bible every year. Just read his posts on Romans or Ephesians to understand how deep was his affection for the Word and obedience to it.
not doubt that his reading of the Puritans had a profound influence on him. The Puritans have often been caricatured, but Lloyd-Jones actually read them. Read the entire Christian Directory Richard Baxter and the many volumes of John Owen. From their point of view, the Puritans differed from other streams organized in several important points.
First, accentuated the spiritual nature of worship on the forms and outer rituals. Second, emphasizing the gathered body of Christ over the individual, thus making the church discipline necessary and healthy for the cause of Christ. Finally, they believed in the direct application of the Word for the soul of each person. The spirit of Puritanism, Lloyd-Jones believed, could be traced to William Tyndale to John Owen and Charles Spurgeon. It was this spirit of the centrality of the Word of God that led to the new preacher in Wales.
As his sermons were known, the presence of Lloyd-Jones was more and more requested. Many other preachers began to find in him a model of what should be the ministry of the pulpit. He went to preach to Canada and America and was often invited to speak at several meetings in Britain.
was in the cold and foggy night of November 28, 1935 Lloyd-Jones preached to a gathering at the Albert Hall in London. During his speech, "the Doctor" explained the biblical problems he saw in many of the most common forms of evangelism and church growth. He said: "Can many of the methods of evangelism that were introduced some forty or fifty years really justified by the Word of God? When I read about the work of the great evangelists in the Bible, I see that they were not primarily concerned with the results, they were busy proclaiming the word of truth. They stopped him growth They were primarily concerned that people were put face to face with the truth itself. " Arrival at Westminster
One of the listeners that night was a 72 year old man, G. Campbell Morgan, pastor of Westminster Chapel, perhaps the most famous preacher of the time. It is said that the old pastor told Lloyd-Jones: "No one but you could have taken on such a night!". After hearing Lloyd-Jones, Campbell Morgan wanted him as his colleague and successor in 1938. But it was not easy, because he handled other options as Attractions like that. In the end, prevailed called the Chapel of Westminster, and Lloyd-Jones family with their daughters, Elizabeth and Anne, settled permanently in London in April 1939.
The association of Morgan and Lloyd-Jones was a worthy example of how Christians can work together, even if they differ in minor respects. G. Campbell Morgan was an Arminian, and a statement of the Bible, though famous, did not address the great doctrines of the Reformation. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, however, was in the tradition of Spurgeon, Whitefield, the Puritans and the Reformers. But both men respected each position and talents of the other, and their partnership, until Campbell Morgan died was peaceful and inspiring the work of Christ in London.
When the storm clouds of World War II and threatened, Lloyd-Jones assumed the full pastorate of Westminster Chapel.
During the war years, Londoners endured for months the endless night raids by German bombers. Because Westminster Chapel was situated very close to Buckingham Palace and other important government buildings, was in constant danger of being destroyed. The congregation was in a constant state of financial and emotional crisis. However, the services continued almost normally. In 1944, a flying bomb exploded on the Guards' Chapel, about few yards away, covering the preacher and the congregation of white powder. A member of the congregation opened its eyes after the bang, saw everyone covered in white and believed that it should be in heaven! Westminster
was also rapidly approaching its own internal crisis. Some of the "old guard" did not want a lot of the young Calvinist who had shared the pulpit with his revered Dr. Morgan. It is a testament to the power of the Word of God and the humble spirit of Lloyd-Jones that the church not only survived, but ultimately unsuccessful. After the war, the congregation grew rapidly. In 1947, the balconies were open from 1948 until 1968 when he retired, had an average of about 1,500 attendees on Sunday morning and 2,000 at night.
In early 1953, the Bible study on Friday night began in the main chapel. That's when Lloyd-Jones began his monumental speech on the book of Romans. Just as the work of Martin Luther on Romans and Galatians subsequently influenced the Puritans, this great work on Romans has influenced the current generation of believers. Just as he started, he would continue ministering to his people with the Word of God instead of his own personality.
In its approach to the work of the pulpit, Lloyd-Jones worked firmemente a través de un libro de la Biblia, tomando un versículo o parte de un versículo a la vez, mostrando lo que enseñaba, cómo eso se ajustaba a la enseñanza sobre el asunto en otra parte de la Biblia, cómo la enseñanza entera era pertinente a los problemas de nuestro propio día y cómo la posición cristiana contrastaba con las ideas actualmente en boga.
Él se ponía a sí mismo en un segundo plano, e intentaba mostrar a su congregación la mente y la Palabra de Dios, permitiendo que el mensaje de la Biblia hablara por sí mismo. Sus predicaciones explicativas apuntaron a permitir a Dios hablar tan directamente como era posible al hombre en el banco con el pleno peso de la autoridad divina. Other
Despite the hardships of war, Lloyd-Jones was involved in the founding of three major institutions. The first was the creation of a library large Evangelical Christian works, which soon exceeded 20,000 volumes. So a new generation of believers came to the writings of Bunyan, Baxter, Owens and others.
The second institution that Lloyd-Jones helped create was the Westminster Fellowship. The book The Puritans, is a compilation of the annual messages of Lloyd-Jones to this group.
And third, was to support the Inter-University Fellowship (IVF), under whose auspices was held every December the Puritan Conference. There was a strong feeling for the need to return to the theological foundations of the Protestant tradition, the period when a hundred years after the Reformation, its theological implications had worked. Were read and discussed documents and Lloyd-Jones conducted the meetings with skill and authority. The publisher
Banner of Truth and Evangelical Magazine magazine born, with the help and encouragement from Martyn Lloyd-Jones, also strongly supported the work of the Evangelical Library. A pastoral level, he led monthly meetings of ministers fraternal since the early 40's, where pastors discussed all the problems facing within the church and its surroundings. Here its always vast experience, his profound wisdom and common sense helped many young ministers seemingly unique and insoluble difficulties.
In the summer of 1947 the doctor made another visit to the United States and was received warmly. At the request of Carl FH Henry, he spoke at Wheaton College. Were issued five messages he gave. They Lloyd-Jones shared his idea about the kind of preaching that the world really needs. Disputes
A strong character and strong leadership can not avoid controversy. Believing, as he did in the power of the Holy Spirit to convince and convert, he deeply opposed to the tradition that had grown from Moody's mass meetings with soft music and emotional appeals for conversion. He also opposed the arbitrary connections between names based on pragmatism rather than doctrine. Nothing will cause more problems for Lloyd-Jones that his firm belief in the need for adherence to certain fundamental doctrines.
end of the war, while many gathered to hear the doctor, other religious leaders were beginning to ignore. When a publication in 1946 collected the names of the "Pulpit Giants," including men and Weatherhead, the name of Martyn Lloyd-Jones was ignored.
In the early 1950's, much had changed in the spiritual landscape of England. In 1952, Arthur W. Pink died in relative obscurity on an island in Scotland. At that time few would have guessed that his writings would one day be published and read by believers around the world.
Around 1959, Lloyd-Jones noted that there was a resurgence of interest in the doctrines of grace and teachings of the Puritans in the church. However, those which occurred in this return were not his own generation. The real interest was among the younger ministers and believers. This new generation of leaders from the pulpit was the immutable truths the word of God in a way that no previous generation did. Some accused Lloyd-Jones of theological ignorance at best and at worst, of spiritual arrogance. The truth is that he often admonished his young learners to transform the discussion on Calvinism and Arminianism in a matter of controversy. In fact, he publicly expressed his belief that AW Pink should have had a longer-term spirit and conciliatory in his effort to return people to the truth.
The most serious controversy came in their relations with the Church of England. Martyn Lloyd-Jones was a firm believer in evangelical unity. He did not believe that the sectarian barriers should separate those who had a true faith in common. But when the liberal ecumenical movement became more and more concessions to the currents of worldly opinion, he supported the exodus from those names.
One of the great passions of Martyn Lloyd-Jones was the return to the combination of the doctrine of the Calvinists and the enthusiasm of the Methodists. In the 60's, he was eager for the emphasis on sound doctrine recently recovered does not become an arid doctrinal hardness. To neutralize this threat, he began to emphasize the importance of experience. He talked a lot about the need for experimental knowledge the Holy Spirit, full of conviction by the Spirit, and the truth that God deals immediately and directly with their children - often illustrating these things with the history of the church.
Unlike much of the teaching that would arise during the Charismatic Renewal of the 60's, Lloyd-Jones emphasized several features of true revival. First, he proclaimed that God is sovereign and there is therefore no formula for revival. God moves in different ways at different times. Secondly, he insisted that the church needed a revival, not more people entered the church, but that God would return to His place just in the lives and thoughts of people.
As the problem of unity of the church, his ideas on what is now known as 'Christian psychology' proved to be profound and prophetic. He was not at all impressed with the marriage of biblical preaching and secular psychology.
A collection of sermons on the subject in "Spiritual Depression: Causes and Cures', first published in 1965. The work points to the sufficiency of Christ in the believer's life and concludes with these words: "I do the best I can, but he controls the supply and power, He gives. He is the heavenly physician and He knows every variation in my condition. He sees my complexion. He feels my pulse. He knows ... everything. 'So,' says Paul, 'and therefore I can do everything through him who I was constantly being infused strength' ... He knows us better than we know ourselves, and our need, so will our supply. "
In the early 60's, the doctor began a series on the Gospel of John. His intention in them was not a verse by verse exposition as usual, but a search of the essential meaning of certainty and fullness of the Holy Spirit.
early 1968 at its 68 th year, Lloyd-Jones had major surgery and, although fully recovered, he decided that after 30 years in Westminster was time to retire as a minister.
His ministry had been blessed by God. There had been a steady stream of conversions, many remarkable and, above all, a wide variety of people from all walks of life had been taught the breadth and depth of Christian doctrine. At the Chapel were soldiers from the nearby Wellington Barracks headquarters, workers in hotels and restaurants in the West, nurses in large hospitals, actors and actresses from west-end theaters, major and minor civil servants of Whitehall, and unemployed chronically from the Salvation Army hostel.
The chapel was always full of students, especially foreigners, among whom was the now President Moi of Kenya. China attended church in the morning and many Plymouth Brethren in the afternoon. When the Exclusive Brethren were divided, many who lived in London came to Westminster Chapel. And there, of course, many professionals, teachers, lawyers, accountants, and perhaps more than some of those who had some mental deficiency.
People from all walks came to him later in the sacristy, where he would spend hours listening patiently and wisely advising. One of them has written: 'I have a lovely memory of going to him in a deep personal need, still very afraid of his formidable public manner. His gentleness and goodness attractive, combined with a simple and straight advice, won my heart. His brilliance as a preacher's brain and make him worthy of respect and admiration that other more gentle side, which met in private, makes you love him. "
In 1977 he talked about the difference in the method of Paul to help Christians and what was popularized under the name of counseling. His conviction was that much of what was really going spiritual and psychological. Lloyd-Jones saw the pulpit as the real focus 'Christian counseling. " That does not mean he was uninterested in their people and their problems. Nothing could be further from that. He occupied many hours of personal advice and biblical direction. Activities
end the 12 years after his retirement he continued with the Conference of Westminster and devoted much time to give advice to other ministers, answering letters and talking endlessly on the phone. Free from the rigid routine of Sundays at Westminster, he was then able to engage in external commitments which he had taken as a minister, mostly occupying the weekends at small and remote causes he loved to animate. He traveled back to Europe and the United States, but declined further and repeated invitations to other countries.
Lloyd-Jones had a very happy home every Christmas he was open to church members who had no other place to go. In his retirement he used to encourage their grandchildren to an argument. They were like young pups going for an old lion, venturing where no one else would dare, turned back by a grunt, but then jump back.
In 1979, the disease returned, and had to cancel all his engagements. He still longed to preach again. He had seen many men go after they had have stopped. In the spring of 1980 could start again, but a visit to the Hospital in May revealed that his illness demanded a harsher treatment that would prevent him from preaching. Between the grueling sessions at the hospital, he faced with courage and dignity, continued to work on his manuscripts and giving advice to ministers, but at Christmas he was too weak for this. In the end, however, was able to spend time with his biographer (his former assistant, Ian Murray).
the end of February 1981, with great peace and confident hope, he believed that his earthly work was done. He told his immediate family: 'Do not pray for healing, do not try to detain the glory. "
On March 1, the Lord's Day, he went to the glory of which had so often preached to meet the Saviour whom he had so faithfully proclaimed.
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