A Sunday Morning Service with Lloyd-Jones

Iain Murray’s account of a service at Westminster Chapel under the ministry of David Martyn Lloyd-Jones is quite different from what many, if not most, Evangelical churches experience today. On March 21, 1957, a British Weekly articled commented, “Westminster Chapel is a church which thrives without making any visible effort to achieve success – or so it would seem at first sight. It is well filled every Sunday, morning and evening, although its activities are not widely advertised, and although the form of service makes no concessions to modern tastes. . . ” What would a service in 1950s England that made no concessions to modern tastes look like?

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones

Lloyd-Jones arrived at the church around 10:30 and stayed in his vestry until the service began at 11. He was frequently visited by the deacons or those wanting counsel in that half-hour, but made sure he went over the hymns he had selected for the organist the prior day. Around 10:50 the organist quietly began playing hymns and stopped, when at 11, Lloyd-Jones and the deacons climbed the stairs of the rostrum to take their places. The church then began singing the doxology. Immediately after, the minister led the congregation in a short prayer of thanksgiving to God the Father and concluded with the Lord’s Prayer. The first hymn, one which made objective statements about God, followed.

The first hymn was followed by reading of Scripture, read distinctly and clearly for all to hear. Murray records how one member was deeply impacted by the public reading of Scripture: “At times, passages of Scripture which I had never really understood sprang to life and became full of meaning just as he was singing.”

The second hymn followed the Scripture reading and was a metrical psalm. Then the high point in the early part of the service came – the main prayer. Dr. Lloyd-Jones led this prayer, which lasted 10-15 minutes in length. He never used any personal pronouns, always plurals, because he was leading the congregation in prayer. His prayers were extemporaneous, as he believed that true prayer was given by God, but that didn’t mean the minister should not prepare himself spiritually to lead the congregation in prayer.

After the main prayer came the announcements, which Westminster Chapel kept to the barest minimum. Murray writes that Lloyd-Jones believed, “The idea that the minister should smile benignly at the people, or make them ‘feel welcome’ with some words of social greeting, was foreign to his whole conception of the grandeur of Christian worship. . . A minister in a church is not like a man inviting people into his home; he is not in charge here. He is just a servant himself.” After announcements came the offertory prayer and then a third hymn which focused either on the message of the sermon of invoked the aid of God to prepare the people’s heart to hear his Word. This time before the sermon lasted around 35 minutes.

The Doctor would then stand and preach a 40-50 minute expositional sermon. For a sampling of sermons, click here. At the end of the sermon came the benediction, often from Jude 24, 25.

Murray reflects on the spiritual impact of these services for the congregation. First, the service was filled with silence. Lloyd-Jones actually took steps to insure that the service was filled with solemnity despite the fact that children 3 and older stayed throughout the service and sermon. The deliberateness to have a quiet service pointed to the high point of the preaching of God’s Word.

Second, public worship was led with the lack of informal comments between prayers and hymns. Though a few times Lloyd-Jones would stop the hymn in between verses and warn the congregation about merely singing the tune to the neglect of meditating on the words.

Murray is right, a service at Westminster Chapel certainly sounds different than most of our Evangelical services. In pointing out the two notable features of solemnity and lack of informality, Murray touches on two areas of our services which often get neglected. The high point in the early part of the service – the main prayer, or pastoral prayer – is not expected by most today. Would are modern sensibilities find the idea of a 10-15 minute prayer during the service too long (or boring)?

In making the preaching of the Word the main event in the service, Lloyd-Jones’ ministry put itself within the stream of the Reformed tradition which made the proclamation of God’s Word the focal point in the church gathering. But would most Evangelicals today be able to listen to 40-50 minute sermons which expound doctrinal truths? Let’s hope that this generation of preachers can find value in the spirit of how Lloyd-Jones’ conducted church services and that our congregations will grow in understanding of the importance of deliberately led services.