05 November 2011

Bavinck on Calvin

Men sometimes speak as if Calvin knew of nothing else to preach but the decree of predestination with its two parts of election and reprobation. The truth is that no preacher of the gospel has ever surpassed Calvin in the free, generous proclamation of the grace and love of God. He was so far from putting predestination to the front, that in the Institutes the subject does not receive treatment until the third book, after the completion of the discussion of the life of faith. It is entirely lacking in the Confessio of 1536.
--Herman Bavinck, Calvin and Common Grace (New York: Westminster, 1909), 18

No comments: