MLJ, ecumenism, and the evangelical church

In 1966, Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones delivered an address to the National Assembly of Evangelicals which has gone down in history as a bit of a watershed. In it, Lloyd-Jones called for evangelicals to come out of their mixed denominations and to enjoy instead closer fellowship with one another. He was publicly contradicted from the Chair by John Stott, and there was perceived to be something of a parting of the ways. Since then, evangelicals (or at least, evangelicals of a certain type) have debated which of these titans was right.

The audio of MLJ's original address has recently been rediscovered and warrants a listen (despite the unfortunately not very good quality of the recording). I had a number of reflections.

1. Lloyd-Jones made predictions about the future church landscape which have not come to pass. Reflecting on the ecumenical movement, MLJ thought he saw a future in which there would be one, broad national church, in which evangelicals would continue to be a minority pressure group (as he thought they were in the historic denominations). In fact, the ecumenical movement more or less petered out, and the denominations on the whole remain, albeit diminished in size and importance. To that extent Lloyd-Jones was no prophet.

2. On the other hand, MLJ asks whether evangelicals are happy to carry on with the status quo, and suggests that those who imagine they are in with a chance of reclaiming their denominations for the orthodox faith through their influence and pressure as a little evangelical grouping are dreaming. In this respect, perhaps he was a prophet, and like all the best prophets thoroughly ignored. The dreamers are still dreaming.

3. The critiques that Lloyd-Jones makes of evangelicals remain valid today. He acknowledges that evangelicals have not been as interested in the doctrine of the church as they should have been, or as concerned for church unity as they should have been. As MLJ points out, evangelicals have often sought to work together through societies and interest groups, but not through the church. In fact, the 'institutional church' is regarded with some suspicion. To my mind this continues to be the case.

4. In the versions of the story I had always heard, the call to evangelicals to leave mixed denominations was always talked up. However, as I listen to the talk what strikes me is not the negative vision - the need to flee corrupt church groupings - but the positive one. MLJ wanted evangelical Christians who shared a commitment to the historic Christian faith to show their unity visibly by enjoying deep church fellowship. I don't see much concern for that in the here and now. If evangelicals are being asked to leave their denominations, what are they being asked to step into?

5. My overall reflection is that Lloyd-Jones shows an interest in and concern for the visible catholic church, whereas we are often content to limit our interest to our own individual congregations (and imagine we have some sort of 'spiritual' unity with other congregations that doesn't need to have visible expression). I think that is one reason why we are content not to enjoy real communion with other churches at all. Our evangelical 'fellowships' and 'alliances' become essentially badges that we can wear without requiring actual, real engagement with one another, concern for another, and mutual interest. To that extent, I prefer Lloyd-Jones' vision.

Building in the rubble

We have been preaching through the book of Nehemiah recently, and I've been really struck by how directly relevant it is for us. Nehemiah is engaged in rebuilding Jerusalem after a devastating fall. The city wall lies in ruins, and consequently the remnant living in the city "are in great trouble and disgrace." (1:3) To rebuild the wall is more than an infrastructure project; it is in a sense to rebuild the people, to restore a sense of identity and security.

To me this resonates with the situation of the church in the West in the twenty-first century. Those who are engaged in building the church - the people, of course, not the physical buildings - are not building on clear ground. In the apostle's image of the building site in 1 Corinthians 3, we are not starting with a nice clean, level site. Rather, in the post-Christian West, we are building amidst the rubble of the past. Our ancestors built much - some of it was good, some of it was less good, and now it is mostly in ruins. Not just the church, but the civilisation that sprang largely from the church's influence, is everywhere reduced to little more than rubble.

I frequently recall T.S. Eliot's words:

Thus your fathers were made
Fellow citizens of the saints, of the household of GOD, being built upon the foundation
Of apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself the chief cornerstone.
But you, have you built well, that you now sit helpless in a ruined house?

I think we have to admit we have not built well. But there is no point bemoaning that fact. We have not built well, but Christ will build his church. If we want to join in, if we want to participate in his great work, that will mean a certain amount of sifting through the rubble to work out what from the past is still usable. (There is no point, by the way, in complaining that the rubble gets in the way. If the Lord had wanted to start again, to just condemn the teetering walls that are left and move to a new site, he could have done that. But he is faithful, and more patient with us than we are with ourselves, and calls us sometimes to strengthen the things that remain rather than dash on into new and more immediately profitable endeavours). It will also mean, no doubt, some new building that recognises the new circumstances in which we build.

Many things will fall under that heading of building the church - evangelism, of course, and the numerical rebuilding of the church. But also renewal - of liturgy, of church discipline, of church government, of preaching and catechesis. And aesthetic renewal, cultural renewal - seeing the church develop into something which might again be a cornerstone of a wider culture that is blessed by the gospel. Not all this renewal will be retrieval. Some of the rubble deserves to be left on the heap, either because it was never great or because it will no longer serve in the new situation. That means fresh invention as well as discernment.

There is plenty of work to do.

And the Church must be forever building, and always decaying, and always being restored.