Catholicity, Orthodoxy, and Lordship
Calvin observes in his commentary on John 10:
No plague is more destructive to the Church, than when wolves ravage under the garb of shepherds.
False shepherds are everywhere. This is a further call for ministers to uphold truth. Societies, and the greater society, the Church, can only stand firm if it is unified in truth. Take truth away and the foundation crumbles.
Calvin’s observation on Psalm 148 is another description of the complete dependence of everything in heaven and on earth of God:
And, speaking of the creation, he adds what is even more worthy of observation, that he gave that law to them which remains inviolable. For many, while they grant that the world was made by God, lapse from this into the senseless notion that now the order of nature stands of itself, and that God sits idle in the heavens. The Psalmist very properly insists, therefore, that the works of God above us in the heavens were not only made by him, but even now move forward at his disposal; and that not only was a secret power communicated to them at first, but while they go through their assigned parts, their operation and ministry to their various ends is dependent upon God.
John Calvin observes:
“[I]nfants, while they nurse at their mothers’ breasts, have tongues so eloquent to preach his glory that there is no need at all of other orators.”
At Strasbourg, Calvin used the following words of absolution in his French liturgy, which he composed working from Bucer’s German model:
Let each of you confess that you are truly a sinner who must humble himself before God and believe that the heavenly Father will be gracious to you in Jesus Christ. To all who have repentance and who seek Jesus Christ for their salvation, I pronounce forgiveness in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Muir again: “Images . . . ate up pious resources that could better be spent in assisting the poor, whom Zwingli described as the true ‘image’ of God. The hope of reformers such as Zwingli was that the assets devoted to paying for religious images, endowing perpetual masses, and supplying the ritual props of the liturgy could be transformed into ‘food of the poor.’ The true pious work of the Christian shifted from fulfilling certain ritual duties to fulfilling charitable obligations. Iconoclastic reformers destroyed oil lamps that required continual feeding, forbade expensive candles, and removed crucifixes to sell the wood as lumber, the proceeds from which became alms for the poor. Rather than the consequence of an irrational destructive urge, iconoclasm can be seen as part of a vast social project that reoriented Christian work toward solving the practical problems of the community. Charity became the pious alternative for image veneration.”
Up with iconoclasm! And, while we’re at it, kudos to Zwingli!
And Calvin too, whom Muir quotes to this effect:
“When I ponder the intended use of churches, somehow or other it seems to me unworthy of their holiness for them to take on images other than those that are living and iconic, which the Lord has consecrated by his Word. I mean Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, together with other ceremonies by which our eyes must be too intensely gripped and too sharply affected to seek other images forged by human ingenuity.”
Muir says that Calvin “wanted Christians to look at one another during church services rather than at alluring images.”
I reserve a cheer from Calvin, for two reasons: First, because he goes too far in excluding visual beauty altogether; second, because he unfortunately has subsumed sacramental actions under the heading of “visible words,” icons to be seen rather than acts to be done. Still, his main point is exactly right: The living, active images are the main ones, the ones for whom and for which churches are built.
God does save us as individuals. But this does not mean that he wants us to live out our lives in isolation from a corporate involvement. We need to find our individual callings in the context of the larger calling of the Christian community to which we belong. So in order to be clear about what God wants us to do as individuals, we must also be sure to be clear about the larger mission of the covenant people of God, sustained by his sovereign grace.–Richard Mouw (pg. 69, Calvinism in the Las Vegas Airport)
Calvin writes concerning the Church:
“[B]ecause it is now our intention to discuss the visible church, let us learn from the simple title ‘mother’ how useful, indeed how necessary, it is that we should know her. For there is no other way to enter into life unless this mother conceive us in her womb, give us birth, nourish us at her breast, and lastly, unless she keep us under her care and guidance until, putting off mortal flesh, we become like the angels. Our weakness does not allow us to be dismissed from her school until we have been pupils all our lives.”
Calvin writes concerning Psalm 94:4:
As the Lord’s people had formerly to endure the heavy trial of seeing the Church subjected to this wild tyranny and misrule, we should account it no strange thing to see the Church suffering still under miserable misgovernment, or positive oppression, but should pray for help from God, who, though he connives at wickedness for a time, eventually comes to the deliverance of his children.
What we have so far said of the Sacrament abundantly shows that it was not ordained to be received only once a year—and that, too, perfunctorily, as now is the usual custom. Rather it was ordained to be frequently used among all Christians in order that they might frequently return in memory to Christ’s Passion, by such remembrance to sustain and strengthen their faith, and urge themselves to sing thanksgiving to God and to proclaim his goodness; finally, by it to nourish mutual love, and among themselves give witness to this love, and discern its bond in the unity of Christ’s body…
Luke relates in The Acts that this was the practice of the apostolic church, when he says that believers ‘…continued in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread and in prayers’ [Acts 2:42]. Thus it became the unvarying rule that no meeting of the church should take place without the Word, prayers, partaking of the Supper, and almsgiving. That this was the established order among the Corinthians also, we can safely infer from Paul [cf. 1 Cor. 11:20]. And it remained in use for many centuries after…
Plainly this custom which enjoins us to take communion once a year is a veritable invention of the devil, whoever was instrumental in introducing it…The Lord’s Table should [be] spread at least once a week for the assembly of Christians, and the promises declared in it should feed us spiritually. None is indeed to be forcibly compelled, but all are to be urged and aroused; also the inertia of indolent people is to be rebuked. All, like hungry men, should flock to such a bounteous repast. Not unjustly, then, did I complain at the outset that this custom was thrust in by the devil’s artifice, which, in prescribing one day a year, renders men slothful all the rest of the year.
– Institutes of the Christian Religion, IV.xvii, 44-46.
{HT: Jake Belder}
… that you did not come to Christ because God looked down the corridors of time and saw your free choice, rather, God in His rich mercy poured His grace upon you, so your eyes would be open to see Him and your will would be changed to love Him. –Sermon excerpt on John 10:22-30