Author: Sargent, Tony
Genre: Biography, Homiletics
Tags: Ministry / Leadership
Series:
Rick Shrader‘s Review:
To me, reading Martyn Lloyd-Jones, is much like reading J. Sidlow Baxter. I enjoy his manner and his intensely sacred approach to Scripture, but I find him an interesting mix of Holiness and Reformed theology (he was fairly insistent on divine election but also believed in subsequent baptisms of the Holy Spirit). Although this book is almost entirely given to his homiletical approach, it is scattered with interesting quotations concerning various subjects. For example:
I am not afraid of being charged, as I frequently am, of trying to frighten you, for I am definitely trying to do so. If the wondrous love of God in Christ Jesus and the hope of glory is not sufficient to attract you, then, such is the value I attach to the worth of your soul, I will do my utmost to alarm you with a sight of the terrors of Hell.
Most of the book is an examination of Jones’ approach to preaching and the pulpit. He never took the pulpit lightly and seldom made small talk or used humor. He was meticulous in his exposition of a passage and often spent much time reading a dozen or more passages in support of his points. Still, his bottom line in preaching was the anointing of the Holy Spirit upon the preacher. Without that, “it is nothing better than entertainment.” ML-J said of preaching:
There is a cord of three strands which should not be broken. Without the endeavor of the preacher, the reaction of the congregation, and the enabling of the Holy Spirit, whatever might result, preaching would not!
I found the book challenging to my ministry as a teacher and preacher.