The ministry of the word, I say, is like a looking-glass For the angels have no need of preaching, or other inferior helps, nor of sacraments, for they enjoy a vision of God of another kind; and God does not give them a view of his face merely in a mirror, but openly manifests himself as present with them. We, who have not as yet reached that great height, behold the image of God as it is presented before us in the word, in the sacraments, and, in fine, in the whole of the service of the Church. –John Calvin
On Wine, Calvin
We are nowhere forbidden to laugh, or to be satisfied with food…or to be delighted with music, or to drink wine…it is permissible to use wine not only for necessity, but also to make us merry.–John Calvin
John Calvin on Union with Christ in Salvation
We must now examine this question. How do we receive those benefits which the Father bestowed on his only-begotten Son–not for Christ’s own private use, but that he might enrich poor and needy men?
First, we must understand that as long as Christ remains outside of us, and we are separated from him, all that he has suffered and done for the salvation of the human race remains useless and of no value for us. Therefore, to share with us what he has received from the Father, he had to become ours and to dwell within us . . . for, as I have said, all that he possesses is nothing to us until we grow into one body with him.
It is true that we obtain this by faith. Yet since we see that not all indiscriminately embrace that communion with Christ which is offered through the gospel, reason itself teaches us to climb higher and to examine into the secret energy of the Spirit, by which we come to enjoy Christ and all his benefits.
–Institutes of the Christian Religion III “The Way in Which We Receive the Grace of Christ,” 1.1, Ford Lewis Battles, tr (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1960), p. 537.
Calvin on I Corinthians 12
I am rather inclined, however, to understand him as referring to the Supper, as he makes mention of drinking, for I haev no doubt that he intended to make an allusion to the similitude of the sign.–John Calvin on I Corinthians 12:13
Are you a Hyper-Calvinist?
In preparing for my discussion on Total Depravity at Providence Church, I have been reading through my old Professor John Frame’s Introduction to the Reformed Faith. In discussing Hyper-Calvinism he writes in a footnote:
It is hard to define hyper-Calvinism. Often I am inclined to say that a hyper-Calvinist is somebody who thinks I am not Calvinistic enough! But it is probably best to associate hyper- Calvinism with the historic tradition which is represented in our century especially by the teaching of Herman Hoeksema and the Protestant Reformed Church (emphasis mine).
Calvin, the Forerunner
From Contra Mundum, Volume I, 1955
We do not, however, believe that John Calvin settled all theological, or political, or social or economic problems. We paraphrase a great author on another subject:
It has never happened in any other case that the whole of a science was discovered, at the first attempt, even by the greatest genius; and so it is not surprising that the whole of [social science] was not discovered even by [Calvin]. His greatest handicap was that he was a forerunner; our greatest advantage is that we come after. We who are richer by four centuries of work than the founder of [Calvinism], should endeavor to work better than he . . .
Quote, Calvin on God’s Protection
…that the faithful nave no reason to be afraid, since God is always ready to deliver them, nay, is also armed with invincible power. He shows in this that the true and proper proof of our hope consists in this, that, when things are so confused, that the heavens seem as it were to fall with great violence, the earth to remove out of its place, and the mountains to be torn up from their very foundations, we nevertheless continue to preserve and maintain calmness and tranquillity of heart.–Calvin, commentary on Psalm 46
Calvin on Law and Gospel, John 10:14
Every Sunday after I give the Lord’s commission to His covenant people (this month from Acts 1:8) I tell them to live according to the commands of the gospel. This would appear to be an unthinkable dichotomy in some Reformed circles. How can one obey the gospel? Law and Grace are to be treated separately. Some would say: “Law condemns,” but “Grace Saves.” There is no obedience involved in the gospel, but only the mercy of God poured out to sinners. Some would even trace this thinking back to the Reformers. It is true that Luther viewed this distinction clearly. But for those in the Reformed side of the tradition (The Calvinian branch), we see a very different picture displayed. In preparing for my sermon on John 10 this coming Lord’s Day, I came across Calvin’s brief observation on John 10:14. He says the following:
But it means also that he utterly disregards all who do not obey the Gospel, as he repeats in the second clause, and confirms what he had formerly said, that — on the other hand — he is known by the sheep.
This may be a difficult sentence to understand, but Calvin’s point is still clear. The great shepherd disregards those who do not obey the gospel. Here we have obedience and gospel brought together.
Calvin on the breathing of the Spirit
If it be objected, that we ought not to blame the Popish bishops, when by breathing they consecrate their priests, because in those cases the word of Christ accompanies the sign, the answer is obvious. In the first place, Christ did not speak to the Apostles so as to appoint a perpetual sacrament in the Church, but intended to declare once what we said a little ago, that the Spirit proceeds from no other than from himself alone. Secondly, he never appoints men to an office without at the same time communicating strength to his ministers, and furnishing them with ability. I do not mention that in Popery the priests are ordained for a totally different, or rather a contrary purpose; namely, to murder Christ daily, while the disciples were made Apostles in order to slay men by the sword of the Gospel. Yet we ought also to believe that it is Christ alone who gives all the blessings which he represents and promises by outward signs; for he does not bid the Apostles receive the Holy Spirit from the outward breathing, but from himself. –-Calvin’s Commentary on John 20
The Betrayal of the Reformed Tradition by Andrew Sandlin
Note: My friend Daniel Ritchie quoted an extensive portion of an article written by Andrew Sandlin in 2001. The excerpt comes from an article Sandlin wrote for the National Reform Association. It is a strong repudiation of the dangerous ideas espoused by Michael Horton and others in an attempt to revise history and Lutheranize Calvinism. Sandlin shatters Horton’s two-kingdoms theory and restores the Reformed view that God’s revelation applies to all areas of life.
In repudiating large portions of the Reformed tradition, and advocating a return to the Augustinian idea of “two kingdoms,” Horton is disposing of the entire notion of Christian civilization. He is undoubtedly aware that such a notion, though a prominent feature of the Reformed tradition, is a hard sell in an increasingly pluralistic world. It was, of course, no less a hard sell in the pre-Constantinian world. The unifying principle of that world was the Roman Empire. The unifying principle today is equally the state. This is a frequent combination in history: religious pluralism and statist monism–the state, not religion, is the unifying force in all of life. Or, rather, the state as religion is the unifying force in all of life.
To imply that the state is the sphere of reason while the church is the sphere of grace is to pose a duality of authoritative sources that the Bible and much of the Reformed tradition will never permit. These Lutheranizing Calvinists are, I repeat, abandoning hope in Christian civilization. This swerves not only from Byzantine and medieval Christianity, but also Reformed Christianity, and counters with the Lutheran paradigm. What we are witnessing in Horton’s essay, as well as in other recent Reformed writings, is the Lutheranization of the Reformed church.
Unlike the Reformed tradition, the Lutheran alternative has consistently maintained the “two-kingdoms” theory. The church is the realm of grace, and the state and the wider society is the realm of nature (“natural law”). This theory is ripe for murderous but shrewd tyrants like Adolph Hitler, who take advantage of the church’s withdrawal into the four walls of the institutional church and its willingness to be seduced by a state that can convince the church of the validity of a “natural” regime.
By contrast, few sectors of the church have stood as vigorously and courageously against political tyranny as the Reformed church, because the latter has refused to limit Christ’s authority to the church but has recognized that the magistrate too is bound to submit to the law of God in the Bible. Post-Reformational Calvinists strike fear into the hearts of political tyrants because these Calvinists refuse to limit biblical authority to the church.Two-kingdom advocates, on the other hand, are ripe pickings for these tyrants.
For the Reformed church to embrace the Lutheran “two-kingdom” theory is to surrender a critical distinctive of its faith and to compromise Jesus Christ’s authority in all dimensions of life. To argue that society, including the state, is permissibly non-Christian is necessarily to argue that it is permissibly anti-Christian. The issue is not whether each member of society must be a Christian, and certainly not whether the state should force anyone to become a Christian, ideas and practices which Calvinists abhor. Rather, the issue is whether we will continue to advocate and work for Christian civilization–biblical Christianity as the unifying principle of all of life–individual, family, church, science, arts, media, education, technology, and even the state. The founder of Westminster Seminary, J. Gresham Machen, loyally carried forward this Reformed tradition when he declared: “The Christian cannot be satisfied so long as any human activity is either opposed to Christianity or out of all connection with Christianity. Christianity must pervade not merely all nations, but also all of human thought.”
This is surely not what Horton wants, but to argue for anything less is to deny the sovereignty of God and betray the Reformed tradition.