{"id":3248,"date":"2008-09-15T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-09-15T01:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/adrianwarnock.com\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and-the-word\/"},"modified":"2017-09-16T18:24:14","modified_gmt":"2017-09-16T17:24:14","slug":"mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/","title":{"rendered":"MLJ MONDAY – Reason, Understanding, and the Word"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do<\/em> when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit are genuinely from God. This week I am sharing his view on the positive ways of testing and examining these gifts. My paraphrase of his tests is as follows:<\/p>\n

1. We should use our human reasoning and understanding.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s interesting to see his stress on wisdom, led, of course, by the Scriptures, but the use of our brains nonetheless. It\u2019s a sad indictment on much of the charismatic church, where Christians have often been encouraged to hang their brains on a hook on the way into church. To MLJ, the use of this reason is enabled and enlightened by the Spirit. He says, \u201cIt happens like this: the Holy Spirit enlightens the understanding. He does not make us Christians apart from the understanding. What he does is to lift the understanding up to a higher level. There is nothing wrong with reason except that it is governed by a sinful disposition, and that is why it can never bring us into Christianity or into the kingdom. But the Spirit can lift up the mind and the reason. A man is never saved against his reason and his understanding\u2014never! What happens is that his understanding and his reason are enabled to see the truth which he formerly rejected.\u201d<\/p>\n

2. We should test by comparing what is being said with the Bible.<\/strong><\/p>\n

MLJ made the excellent point that if the end result of any movement is to move away from what the Bible says, or even to study it less, that movement is clearly in error.<\/p>\n

Here is a direct quote from him on this subject: <\/p>\n

\u201c. . . the answer is not to commit intellectual suicide, nor to stop thinking, nor deliberately to let yourself go and abandon the powers that God has given you. The answer is to trust yourself to the illumination and the guidance of the Spirit. . . .<\/p>\n

\"Dr.<\/a>It is to me one of the most wonderful aspects of this truth\u2014how at one and the same time you can be gripped and lifted up by the Spirit and still be in control. But that is the glory of Christianity, that is what differentiates it from everything that is false and spurious. So I argue that the first thing we have to do is to use our reason and understanding, the very powers that God has given us. Indeed I want to put this as a positive assertion, that it is the very central glory of the Christian salvation that takes up the whole man. It takes up his mind, his heart, and his will.<\/p>\n

. . . These, then, are the two main principles involved in testing the spirits. We must use our minds and our understanding, and must never \u2018let ourselves go\u2019. We must not abandon ourselves for in doing so we lose the ability to be critical, to evaluate, to prove, and to control. Above all, we must apply the Scriptures. We have the Spirit in us, our mind is enlightened, and we have the Scriptures. We must put these things together. Nothing is more dangerous than to put a wedge between the word and the Spirit, to emphasize either one at the expense of the other. It is the Spirit and the word, the Spirit upon the word, and the Spirit in us as we read the word.\u201d<\/p>\n

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Joy Unspeakable<\/i>, (Eastbourne UK: Kingsway Communications, 1995) 199, 201, 205.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit are genuinely from God. This week I am sharing his view on the positive ways of testing and examining these gifts. My paraphrase of his tests is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1268,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[242,262,81,128],"tags":[536],"class_list":["post-3248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-discernment","category-gifts-of-holy-spirit","category-martyn-lloyd-jones","category-revival","tag-revival"],"yoast_head":"\nMLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"MLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Adrian Warnock\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/adrianwarnockpage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-09-15T01:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-09-16T17:24:14+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/files\/2008\/09\/Martyn-Lloyd-Jones-2-734811.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Adrian Warnock\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@adrianwarnock\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Adrian Warnock\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/\",\"name\":\"MLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2008-09-15T01:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-09-16T17:24:14+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/4dc7481b9baa3553d9a7698715084eaa\"},\"description\":\"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"MLJ MONDAY – Reason, Understanding, and the Word\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/\",\"name\":\"Adrian Warnock\",\"description\":\"Patheos Evangelical\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/4dc7481b9baa3553d9a7698715084eaa\",\"name\":\"Adrian Warnock\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e5ff2076e287d1578e3b13fc015d78be?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e5ff2076e287d1578e3b13fc015d78be?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Adrian Warnock\"},\"description\":\"The resurrection of Jesus changes everything. Just not all at once. Healing takes time. Compassion and patience sustain us over a lifetime of change. These are the themes I explore in my books and in the articles I have written for Patheos since 2003. My writing draws on my scientific training as a doctor and psychiatrist, my work in the UK's National Health Service and the pharmaceutical industry, alongside more than twenty-five years as a member of a growing church where I served on the leadership team offering pastoral care. My perspective has also been shaped by chronic illness since 2017, when I developed life-threatening pneumonia that caused lasting damage to my body, triggered several further conditions, and uncovered a diagnosis of blood cancer. This was successfully treated, although doctors expect it to return in the future. Out of these experiences I founded Blood Cancer Uncensored, an online patient-led support community. I am the author of the Transformed by Jesus: Spiritual Renewal series of books, which ask: \u2192 What does Jesus\u2019 resurrection mean for you? Raised With Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything https:\/\/mybook.to\/raisedwithchrist \u2192 Why is change so difficult? What causes the resistance? The Traitor Within: Understanding and Healing Our Deceitful Hearts https:\/\/mybook.to\/traitorwithin \u2192 \\u2028Why is change so slow? How does grace lead us over a lifetime? Amazing Grace: How Faith Grows in the Human Heart https:\/\/mybook.to\/amazinggrace \u2192 \\u2028\\u2028How do you become a Christian? How can you know if you really are one? Hope Reborn: How to Become a Christian and Live for Jesus https:\/\/mybook.to\/hope-reborn These books bring together medical, psychological, social, and faith-based insights, advocating for a biopsychosocial\u2013spiritual model of wellbeing. My qualifications and training reflect this integrated background: \u2192 British MB BS medical degree (equivalent to an MD in the USA) \u2192 Postgraduate qualifications in Psychiatry (MRCPsych) and Pharmaceutical Medicine (MFFM, DipPharmMed) \u2192 Theological training courses run by Newfrontiers\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/adrianwarnockpage\/\",\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/adrianwarnock\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/author\/awarnock\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"MLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word","description":"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"MLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word","og_description":"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/","og_site_name":"Adrian Warnock","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/adrianwarnockpage\/","article_published_time":"2008-09-15T01:00:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-09-16T17:24:14+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/wp.patheos.com.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/files\/2008\/09\/Martyn-Lloyd-Jones-2-734811.jpg"}],"author":"Adrian Warnock","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@adrianwarnock","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Adrian Warnock","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/","name":"MLJ MONDAY - Reason, Understanding, and the Word","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-09-15T01:00:00+00:00","dateModified":"2017-09-16T17:24:14+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/4dc7481b9baa3553d9a7698715084eaa"},"description":"Last Monday I shared some of the things that Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones believed we should not do when weighing whether what appear to be gifts of the Spirit","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/2008\/09\/mlj-monday-reason-understanding-and\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"MLJ MONDAY – Reason, Understanding, and the Word"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/","name":"Adrian Warnock","description":"Patheos Evangelical","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/4dc7481b9baa3553d9a7698715084eaa","name":"Adrian Warnock","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e5ff2076e287d1578e3b13fc015d78be?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e5ff2076e287d1578e3b13fc015d78be?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Adrian Warnock"},"description":"The resurrection of Jesus changes everything. Just not all at once. Healing takes time. Compassion and patience sustain us over a lifetime of change. These are the themes I explore in my books and in the articles I have written for Patheos since 2003. My writing draws on my scientific training as a doctor and psychiatrist, my work in the UK's National Health Service and the pharmaceutical industry, alongside more than twenty-five years as a member of a growing church where I served on the leadership team offering pastoral care. My perspective has also been shaped by chronic illness since 2017, when I developed life-threatening pneumonia that caused lasting damage to my body, triggered several further conditions, and uncovered a diagnosis of blood cancer. This was successfully treated, although doctors expect it to return in the future. Out of these experiences I founded Blood Cancer Uncensored, an online patient-led support community. I am the author of the Transformed by Jesus: Spiritual Renewal series of books, which ask: \u2192 What does Jesus\u2019 resurrection mean for you? Raised With Christ: How the Resurrection Changes Everything https:\/\/mybook.to\/raisedwithchrist \u2192 Why is change so difficult? What causes the resistance? The Traitor Within: Understanding and Healing Our Deceitful Hearts https:\/\/mybook.to\/traitorwithin \u2192 \u2028Why is change so slow? How does grace lead us over a lifetime? Amazing Grace: How Faith Grows in the Human Heart https:\/\/mybook.to\/amazinggrace \u2192 \u2028\u2028How do you become a Christian? How can you know if you really are one? Hope Reborn: How to Become a Christian and Live for Jesus https:\/\/mybook.to\/hope-reborn These books bring together medical, psychological, social, and faith-based insights, advocating for a biopsychosocial\u2013spiritual model of wellbeing. My qualifications and training reflect this integrated background: \u2192 British MB BS medical degree (equivalent to an MD in the USA) \u2192 Postgraduate qualifications in Psychiatry (MRCPsych) and Pharmaceutical Medicine (MFFM, DipPharmMed) \u2192 Theological training courses run by Newfrontiers","sameAs":["http:\/\/patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/adrianwarnockpage\/","https:\/\/twitter.com\/adrianwarnock"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/author\/awarnock\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1268"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/adrianwarnock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}