I regard the Scripture and these great statements in it as being comparable to a great art gallery where there are famous paintings hanging on the walls. Certain people, when they visit such a place, buy a catalogue from the guide at the door, and then holding it in their hands walk round the gallery. They notice that Item number 1 is a painting by Van Dyck, let us say; and they say “Ah, that is a Van Dyck.” Then they pass on hurriedly to Item number 2, which is perhaps a portrait by Rembrandt. “Ah,” they say, “that’s a Rembrandt, a famous picture.” Then they move on to further Items in the same way. I grant that that is a possible way of viewing the treasures of an art gallery; and yet I have a feeling that when such a person has gone through every room of the gallery and has said, “Well, we have ‘done’ the National Gallery, let us now go to the Tate Gallery,” the truth is that they have never really seen either of the galleries or their treasures. It is the same in regard to the Scriptures. There are people who walk through this first chapter of this Epistle to the Ephesians in some such manner as I have described, and they feel that they have “done” it. It is surely better to stand, if necessary, for hours before this chapter which has been given to us by God Himself through His Spirit, and to gaze upon it, and to try to discover its riches both in general and in detail.
DM Lloyd-Jones
Quoted in J Meyer
Lloyd-Jones on the Christian Life
Crossway
p129
