Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones Sermon Questions and Answers

Why does the world reject the Christian gospel according to Lloyd-Jones?

According to Dr. Lloyd-Jones, the world rejects the Christian gospel for several key reasons:

1. People have "lost awareness of the unseen, the supernatural and the eternal." They believe everything is within their understanding and dismiss anything supernatural.

2. People fail to understand the depth of their problem: "The trouble with men is not in his head, it's in his heart. It isn't an intellectual problem. It's a moral problem."

3. People don't realize their real need. They think they just need improvement or reformation rather than radical transformation.

4. People fail to recognize their total inability to solve their fundamental problems.

5. People don't understand what the gospel actually offers them. They reduce it to mere moral teaching rather than understanding its supernatural power.

What are the four main enemies of mankind identified in the sermon?

Dr. Lloyd-Jones identifies four main enemies that confront mankind:

1. Sin - "This indwelling evil, this power greater than our minds that ever works in us."

2. Satan - "A power, an unseen power in the world, moving, manipulating, conspiring. He's an enemy of men. He's the antagonist of men. He's the adversary of men."

3. Death - "Death is described as the last enemy and death is the enemy of men." It's inevitable and cannot be avoided.

4. The Law of God - Though not originally meant to be an enemy, it becomes our enemy because we are sinners. "The law is against us. The law is something that condemns us, and the law has no mercy."

Why does Lloyd-Jones say that man cannot change himself?

Lloyd-Jones gives several reasons why man cannot change himself:

1. Human nature is fundamentally flawed and cannot be self-corrected: "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? It can't be done. It's simply impossible."

2. Man never truly knows himself: "Man is always doing this. Man's the biggest fool in the universe because he fools himself. Man is centrally and essentially dishonest."

3. Man can see faults in others but is blind to the same faults in himself (illustrated through the story of David and Nathan).

4. Man can improve outward appearances but cannot change the heart: "Yes, you can produce respectability... But that isn't to change a man. That's only to improve him, to put a better suit on him."

What does Lloyd-Jones say about modern views of human perfectibility?

Dr. Lloyd-Jones critiques the modern belief in human perfectibility:

1. "The world still believes in its own perfectibility. The so-called thinkers believe in human perfectability."

2. Modern people believe they are "superior to forefathers" and that perfectibility "is actually happening."

3. They believe knowledge is power and that education eliminates crime, yet crime rates continue to rise despite increased education.

4. Lloyd-Jones calls this view inconsistent and unrealistic: "A man who can believe in the fact that Perfectibility is already taking Place face to face with the facts and the statistics of this Modern Hour, is a man, I say, who is not a realist."

5. The modern view ignores that "there is something in this world, some influence and power, that is defeating mankind and all its best and its most zealous efforts."

What does Lloyd-Jones say the gospel offers that moral teaching alone cannot provide?

According to Lloyd-Jones, the gospel offers solutions to our deepest problems that mere moral teaching cannot:

1. A new nature: "My dear friends, here is one who took on human nature in order that he can give you a new human nature, a new birth, a new beginning, a new start, a new heart."

2. Power over Satan: "He will put his spirit into you to enable you to conquer the devil."

3. Victory over death: "He burst asunder the bonds of death. He arose triumphant of the grave. He hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel."

4. Reconciliation with God: "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself."

5. Forgiveness of sins: "His own self bear our sins in his own body on the tree."

6. Hope for failures: Unlike moral teaching which has "nothing to give to a man in the gutter," the gospel offers complete salvation "whatever the past may have been, whatever your story."