Generate index with synopsis of blog posts

My client would like his blog post to be reflected in an index format, sorted in decending order by date, that will show the first few lines of the post and a link to the full post.

For example:

9/5/12 Blog title 1
first few lines of the post show here followed by a read more link that points to the full post

9/4/12 Blog title 2
first few lines of the post show here followed by a read more link that points to the full post

Is there a plugin that will accomplish this?

I’ve searched the plug in directory with no luck.

Thanks in advance for any help you may offer.