Introduction

Will you to the utmost of your power maintain the Laws of God and the true profession of the Gospel? Will you to the utmost of your power maintain in the United Kingdom the Protestant Reformed Religion established by law?¹

With these words, Queen Elizabeth II was entrusted with the responsibility for preserving the Church and the Gospel within the boundaries of her domain. But what do those words mean – “the Protestant Reformed Religion”?

We looked at what it means to be a protestant last week, and religion seems fairly straightforward, but what does it mean to be reformed?

No, it’s not like being a “reformed prisoner” or a “reformed alcoholic”.

Instead, the word ‘reformed’ in this context has to do with being an heir of the teachings of John Calvin.

John Calvin

When Gerard Calvin and his wife Jeanne became parents of a little boy in northern France in 1509, they could not have known that he was destined to become one of the truly great men of all time. They named him Jean. In French his name is Jean Calvin; in the Latinized form, Joannes Calvinus; but we know him as John Calvin.

John Calvin was born July 10, 1509 in Noyon in Picardy, 60 miles northeast of Paris. Upon reaching his teenage years, he began formal studies towards becoming a Roman Catholic priest. He studied theology at Paris from 1523 to 1528, and did quite well. But he became increasingly disillusioned with the corrupt Catholicism of the day, and decided to study law instead. So he transferred to Orleans and Bourges for studies towards becoming a lawyer (1528 to 1532).

But his heart was still restless, until at last it found its rest in God through true conversion in 1533. He left Roman Catholicism forever. But these were dangerous days for those who left Rome. Heavy persecution dogged the French Protestants, and Calvin himself was imprisoned for a short time from 1534 to 1535. So he decided to leave France.

His goal was to move to Basel, Switzerland, and take up a quiet and secluded life of study and writing. It was never to be. Passing through Geneva, he met the leader of, the Swiss French Reformation, Guillaume Farel, who was immediately so impressed with young Calvin that he cautioned him with God’s punishment if he did not stay in Geneva to preach and teach. Calvin stayed.

In 1536 Calvin published the first edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion. It was immediately hailed throughout Europe as the finest systematic theology by a Protestant Reformer. It was to be his literary masterpiece and he later edited and expanded it several times through his lifetime.

Calvin and Farel immediately began the reformation of the church in Geneva. They proposed a confession and oath for the city and its citizenry. All citizens were required to take the oath of faith or leave Geneva. Virtually all Genevans accepted. But when in 1538 Calvin called for the church to have authority to fence the Lord’s Table by excommunicating all those living in public sin, both he and Farel were exiled by the City Council.

So Calvin went to Strassbourg in southern Germany near France. There he pastored the French-speaking congregation and lectured in the theological academy. He became a close friend of Martin Bucer, who would have a profound influence on Calvin’s theology. Calvin would stay in Strassbourg for 3 years until the Geneva City Council changed its mind and agreed that Calvin and Farel were right after all. Yet it would be nearly 20 years until the church formally had the right to excommunicate citizens living in known sin.

It was in Strassbourg that Calvin met his wife. Actually, Bucer and Farel had twice tried to match Calvin with a prospective wife, unsuccessfully. A certain Anabaptist had converted to Reformed thinking under Calvin’s theology, but he soon caught and died of the Plague. Some time later, his widow would become Mrs. John Calvin. Her name was Idelette de Bure. She brought 2 children with her, a teenage boy and a young girl. John and Idelette had only one child themselves, but he died shortly afterwards. Idelette herself was constantly in ill health, and she died in 1549 after only 9 years of marriage. Calvin never remarried. And he too was in continual ill health.

From 1541 Calvin spent almost all of his life in Geneva. In addition to his preaching and teaching duties he organized a school system for the children of Geneva, a system of charity for the poor and elderly; Calvin even designed the public sewer system of Geneva when the City Council couldn’t agree on a plan.

One of his main goals was a truly godly society. He viewed the Church and State on equal levels – separate in some areas, related in others. Before Calvin, Geneva was notorious throughout Europe for its profligacy; after Calvin, it became one of the godliest cities the world has ever known. Calvin’s theology of the godly society gave rise to the modern ideas of the democratic republic, the Free Enterprise economic system popularly called Capitalism, and the Protestant Work Ethic. They were put into practice in Geneva. The plan worked.

In 1555, Geneva became the refuge of Protestant refugees from all around Europe, particularly Great Britain. These English and Scottish leaders sat under Calvin’s teaching and brought that theology back with them when they returned to solidify the English and Scottish Reformations. Another major milestone in Calvin’s life was the establishment of the Academy of Geneva in 1559, which later became the University of Geneva. But for all this, his main calling was to be a pastor and a theologian.

The ‘Five Points’ of Calvinism

Whilst he never formulated them in these words, John Calvin’s most famous teachings are traditionally remembered using the mnemonic TULIP: Total Depravity; Unconditional Election; Limited Atonement; Irresistible Grace; and Perseverance of the Saints.

Total Depravity

Man, by his fall into a state of sin, has wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good accompanying salvation: so as, a natural man, being altogether averse from that good, and dead in sin, is not able, by his own strength, to convert himself, or to prepare himself thereunto.²

Total depravity is the fallen state of man as a result of original sin. The doctrine of total depravity teaches that people are by nature not inclined to love God with their whole heart, mind, or strength, as he requires, but rather all are inclined to serve their own interests over those of their neighbor and to reject the rule of God. Even religion and philanthropy are destructive to the extent that these originate from a human imagination, passions, and will.

Therefore, in Reformed Theology, God must predestine individuals for salvation since man is incapable of choosing God.

Total depravity does not mean, however, that people are as evil as possible. As Wayne Grudem points out:

Scripture is not denying that unbelievers can do good in human society in some senses. But it is denying that they can do any spiritual good or be good in terms of a relationship with God. Apart from the work of Christ in our lives, we are like all other unbelievers who are “darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart” (Eph. 4:18).³

This may seem like a harsh call, but Calvin nevertheless taught optimism concerning God’s love for what he has made and God’s ability to accomplish the ultimate good that he intends for his creation. In particular, in the process of salvation, it is argued that God overcomes man’s inability with his divine grace and enables men and women to choose to follow him. After all, “with man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”⁴ And this brings us to the idea of election.

For further reading, see:

• Genesis 6:5: “The LORD saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.”
• Psalms 51:5: “Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.”
• Jeremiah 13:23: “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil.”
• Mark 7:21-23: “For from within, out of men’s hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evil things come from inside and make a man ‘unclean’.”
• John 3:19: “This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved the darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil.”
• John 6:64-65: “[Jesus said,] ‘Yet there are some of you who do not believe.’ (For Jesus had known from the beginning which of them did not believe, and who would betray him.) He went on to say, ‘This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.'”
• John 8:34: “Jesus replied, ‘I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.'”
• Romans 3:10-11: “There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one understands, no one who seeks God.”
• Romans 8:6-8: “The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. Those controlled by the sinful nature cannot please God.”
• 1 Corinthians 2:14: “The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned.”
• Ephesians 2:1-3: “As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath.”

Unconditional Election

As Scripture, then, clearly shows, we say that God once established by his eternal and unchangeable plan those whom he long before determined once for all to receive into salvation, and those whom, on the other hand, he would devote to destruction.⁵

In Protestant theology, election is considered to be one aspect of predestination in which God selects certain individuals to be saved. Those elected receive mercy, while those not elected, the reprobate, receive justice.

In Calvinism, this election is called “unconditional” because his choice to save someone does not hinge on anything inherent in the person or on any act that the person performs or belief that the person exercises. Indeed the influence of sin has so inhibited our ability to act righteously that no one is willing or able to come to or follow God apart from God first regenerating the person’s heart to give them the ability to love him. Hence, God’s choice in election is and can only be based solely on God’s own independent and sovereign will and not upon the foreseen actions of man.

The Reformed position is frequently contrasted with the Arminian doctrine of conditional election in which God’s eternal choice to save a person is conditioned on God’s certain foreknowledge of future events, namely, that certain individuals would exercise faith and trust in response to God’s offer of salvation.

For more:

• John 15:16: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit – fruit that will last.”
• Romans 9:15-16: “For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.’ It does not, therefore, depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy.”
• Ephesians 1:4-5: “For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will.”
• 2 Timothy 1:9: “[God] has saved us and called us to a holy life – not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace.”

Limited Atonement

The doctrine of the limited scope (or extent) of the atonement is intimately tied up with the doctrine of the nature of the atonement. It also has much to do with the general Calvinist scheme of predestination. Calvinists advocate the satisfaction theory (also known as punishment theory) of the atonement, which developed in the writings of Anselm of Canterbury and Thomas Aquinas. In brief, the Calvinistic refinement of this theory states that the atonement of Christ literally pays the penalty incurred by the sins of men — that is, Christ receives the wrath of God for specific sins and thereby cancels the judgment they had incurred. Since, Calvinists argue, it would be unjust for God to pay the penalty for men’s sins and then still condemn them for those sins, all those whose sins were propitiated must necessarily be saved.

The Calvinist view of predestination teaches that God chose a group of people, who would not and could not choose him, to be saved apart from their works or their cooperation, and those people are compelled by God’s irresistible grace to accept the offer of the salvation achieved in the atonement of Christ. Since in this scheme God knows precisely who the elect are, Christ needn’t atone for sins other than those of the elect.

The Calvinist atonement is thus called definite because it certainly secures the salvation of those for whom Christ died, and it is called limited in its extent because it effects salvation for the elect only. Calvinists do not believe the power of the atonement is limited in any way, which is to say that no sin is too great to be expiated by Christ’s sacrifice, in their view.

On a practical level, this doctrine is not emphasized in Calvinist churches except in comparison to other salvific schemes, and when it is taught, the primary use of this and the other doctrines of predestination is the assurance of believers. To that end, they apply this doctrine especially to try to strengthen the belief that “Christ died for me,” as in the words of St. Paul, “I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me“⁶. In fact, contrary to what one might expect on the basis of this doctrine, Calvinists believe they can freely and sincerely offer salvation to everyone on God’s behalf since they themselves do not know which people are counted among the elect and since they see themselves as God’s instruments in bringing about the salvation of other members of the elect.

The classic Bible passage cited to prove a limited extent to the atonement is the tenth chapter of the Gospel of John in which Jesus uses Ancient Near Eastern shepherding practices as a metaphor for his relationship to his followers. A shepherd of those times would call his sheep from a mix of flocks, and his sheep would hearken to his voice and follow, while the sheep of other flocks would ignore any but their own shepherd’s voice (John 10:1-5). In that context, Jesus says, “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me,…and I lay down my life for the sheep” (vv. 14-15), and he tells the Pharisees that they “do not believe because [they] are not [his] sheep” (v. 26). He continues, “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand.” (vv. 27-28). Since Calvinists and nearly all Christians believe that not all have eternal life with God, Calvinists conclude that either Jesus was wrong in saying that he would lose none of his sheep (a conclusion they reject) or that Jesus must not have died for everyone.

Irresistible Grace

According to Calvinism, those who obtain salvation do so, not by their own “free” will, but because of the sovereign discriminating grace of God. That is, men yield to grace, not finally because their consciences were more tender or their faith more tenacious than that of other men. Rather, the willingness and ability to do God’s will, are evidence of God’s own faithfulness to save men from the power and the penalty of sin, and since man is so corrupt that he will not decide and cannot be wooed to follow after God, God must powerfully intervene. In short, Calvinism argues that regeneration must precede faith.

Calvin says of this intervention that “it is not violent, so as to compel men by external force; but still it is a powerful impulse of the Holy Spirit, which makes men willing who formerly were unwilling and reluctant,”⁷ and John Gill says that “this act of drawing is an act of power, yet not of force.

See, for example:

• John 6:37,39: “All that the Father gives me will come to me…. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up on the last day.”
• John 6:44–45: “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him…. Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.”
• John 6:65: “[N]o one can come to me unless the Father has enabled him.”

Perseverance of the Saints

The perseverance of the saints means that all those who are truly born again will be kept by God’s power and will persevere as Christians until the end of their lives, and that only those who persevere until the end have been truly born again.

The Reformed tradition has consistently seen the doctrine of perseverance as a natural consequence to its general scheme of predestination in which God has chosen some men and women for salvation and has cleared them of their guilty status by atoning for their sins through Jesus’ sacrifice. According to these Calvinists, God has irresistibly drawn the elect to put their faith in himself for salvation by regenerating their hearts and convincing them of their need. Therefore, they continue, since God has made satisfaction for the sins of the elect, they can no longer be condemned for them, and through the help of the Holy Spirit, they must necessarily persevere as Christians and in the end be saved.

Traditional Calvinists also believe that all who are born again and justified before God necessarily and inexorably proceed to sanctification. Indeed, failure to proceed to sanctification in their view is evidence that the person in question was not one of the elect to begin with. The suggestion is that after God has regenerated someone, the person’s will cannot reverse its course. It is argued that God has changed that person in ways that are outside of his or her own ability to alter fundamentally, and he or she will therefore persevere in the faith.

On a practical level, Calvinists do not claim to know who is elect and who is not, and the only guide they have are the verbal testimony and good works (or “fruit”) of each individual. Any who “fall away” (that is, do not persevere unto death) must not have been truly converted to begin with, though Calvinists don’t claim to know with certainty who did and who did not persevere.

• John 6:37-40: “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away. For I have come down from heaven not to do my will but to do the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose none of all that he has given me, but raise them up at the last day. For my Father’s will is that everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.”
• John 10:28-29: “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one can snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand.”
• Romans 5:9-10: “Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!”
• Romans 8:31-39: “What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:
  “For your sake we face death all day long;
  we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”
  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
• Romans 11:29: “[F]or God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable.”
• 1 Corinthians 1:4-9: “I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way – in all your speaking and in all your knowledge – because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful.”
• Ephesians 1:13-14:”And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession – to the praise of his glory.”
• Philippians 1:6: “[B]eing confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus.”
• 1 Peter 1:5: “[The elect] are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time.”
• Jude 24: “[God] is able to keep you from falling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy.”

The Lord’s Supper

The Roman Catholic Church of Calvin’s day (and indeed to this day) had 7 ‘sacraments’ – that is, rites, first implemented by Jesus, which are sacred. They were: baptism; confirmation; the eucharist (what we would call communion or the Lord’s Supper); confession; ordination; anointing of the sick (for those who are terminally ill, you may have heard this referred to as ‘last rites’); and marriage.

Martin Luther, John Calvin and other reformers argued that there was only biblical evidence for 2 of these – baptism and the Lord’s Supper. However, they were by no means in total agreement about what these actually meant. Luther and Calvin, for example, disagreed about what happens when we take communion: Luther believed that, whilst not actually being Christ’s body and blood (as Catholics believe), the bread and the wine by which we celebrate the Lord’s Supper somehow mystically link us to his body and blood, allowing us to participate in his death and thus in his life; Calvin, on the other hand, argued that the bread and the wine were rather a symbol, giving a visible sign of the fact that Christ himself was truly present. This latter view is the one that is held in the Anglican Church:

The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is Faith.⁸

Conclusion

Few men other than the Lord Jesus himself have had a more significant impact on Christian thinking than John Calvin. His influence can be felt every time we take communion. His understanding of God’s Sovereignty was a precious gift to a church infatuated with its own sense of control; it reminds us that the world exists around God, not God around the world. Some of his teachings are hard to understand or accept – yet they ring true with Scripture over and over again.

And that is why I am a reformed Christian.

Endnotes

1. Archbishop of Canterbury to Queen Elizabeth II at her coronation, 1953
2. Westminster Confession of Faith
3. Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (IVP, 1994) p. 497.
4. Matthew 19:26
5. Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion III.xxi.7.
6. Gal. 2:20, emphasis added
7. Calvin, Commentary on John’s Gospel 6:44.
8. Article 28 of the Thirty-nine Articles of Religion.