I had the great joy recently of re-reading Martyn Lloyd Jones sermon on one of my favorite verses, Romans 6:17. It is his sermon “Mind, Heart, Will” in the book Spiritual Depression.
But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.
Lloyd-Jones takes that verse and gives an exposition in two main points.
- The gospel message is great and whole, taking in the whole of life.
- The gospel message must be received by the whole person, mind, heart and will.
These twin truths are definitive for me. They get right at the heart of what I believe about ministry. Here are a few quotes:
Lop-sided Christians are generally produced by preachers whose doctrine lacks balance, or rotundity, or wholeness.
The gospel is not something partial or piecemeal: it takes in the whole of life, the whole of history, the whole world. It tells us about creation and the final judgment and everything in between. It is a complete, whole view of life, and many are unhappy in the Christian life because they have never realized that this way of life caters for the whole of man’s life and covers every eventuality in his experience.
The gospel is such that the whole man must be involved in it and by it.
We must always put these things in right order, and it is the Truth first. It is doctrine first, it is the standard of teaching first. We are not concerned simply to attract people emotionally or in the realm of the will, we are concerned to preach the Word. It is Truth first.
So Paul puts his mighty argument and demonstration and from this I draw my final conclusion, that . . . we must always realize, when we talk to others, that the heart is never to be approached directly. I go further, the will is never to be approached directly either. This is a most important principle to bear in mind both in personal dealings and in preaching. The heart is always to be influenced through the understanding–the mind, then the heart, then the will.
