Thursday, March 10, 2011

Concentrating Inward Before Spreading Outward

"I am one of those who still believes that the key to the present situation is the individual local church. It is possible for a revival, if we are waiting and praying for it, to start at any moment. Before we think about planning and organizing in order to reach the outsider, let us concentrate upon our own churches. Are our own churches alive? Are our people real Christians? Are they such that in their contacts with others they are likely to win them for Christ and to awaken in their hearts a desire for spiritual things? That would be my word to you today; that instead of spreading outward, we should concentrate inward and deepen and deepen and deepen our own spiritual life, until men here and there get to the place where God can use them as leaders of the great awakening which will spread through the churches and through the land."

--D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones (speaking in 1943)