It's a privilege to be here, I want to thank
Dr. John MacArthur and the ministry at Grace To You which has had a significant influence
on my life over the years, for the opportunity to be able to minister at this conference. I think in many ways I have been shaped in
how to preach by listening to the radio, listening to Grace to You, and listening to John MacArthur
in the formative years of my ministry as a young man coming out of seminary at 10:30
there in Little Rock, Arkansas, listening to Grace to You day after day after day, listening
how the Word of God is opened up by Dr. MacArthur, his explanation, cross references, word studies,
historical back ground, the implication of the text, the outlining of the passage, the
introductions, etc. I am very much a product of Grace to You and
I'm so thankful for its extended ministry around the world. I was searching for a text from which to speak
at this conference. I will also speak tomorrow night. And I emailed the staff at Grace to You and
said, "Give me some help. Give me some direction as to what you think
would most hit the target. I've only got two silver bullets to fire at
this conference, I don't have any just to fire up into the sky and waste and not hit
a target. Well what two silver bullets would you have
me fire such that you who have come to this conference would be most helped?" And for the message for this afternoon, it
came back, "Would I speak on Calvin's Critique of the Charismatic Calvinists?" Calvin's critique, what would John Calvin
have to say about the present-day Calvinist who are open but cautious, or who do fully
embrace the Charismatic Movement to one degree or another and yet are Calvinistic? Those of us who are Reformed in our theology,
are enormously grateful for the revival of Reformed Theology that has swept through the
body of Christ over these last years. In fact, Time Magazine, a couple of years
ago, posted the top ten ideas that are changing the world right now. And high on that list it was shocking to see
the New Calvinism that even the world has to acknowledge that there is a resurgence
of Calvinistic Reformed theology that is taking place. In fact, Dr. MacArthur has said, "If you're
not reformed right now, you are basically irrelevant." I would add to that, "You're wrong." But there has been a ground swell and it has
been spread far and wide to this Reformed resurgence to mainline denominations, to independent
churches, to Baptist churches, and there's been a host of gifted teachers who have led
this parade. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, J.I. Packer, James Montgomery
Boice, R.C. Sproul, John Piper and our host for this conference,
John MacArthur has really, these men have been standard bearers in this line of godly
men and this generation and we all have been under the influence of these men, if not all
of these men. And highly visible ministries have carried
this torch of Reformed truth from Grace to You, to Ligonier Ministries, Desiring God,
Nine Marks. And then other publishing houses, the Banner
of Truth, Crossway, Presbyterian and Reformed, Reformation Heritage, Reformation Trust. And the result has been a phenomenon in our
days that has been identified as young, restless and reformed. In fact, there is a book that is entitled
Young Restless and Reformed , and this generation is now young people in their twenties and
in their thirties, they are wide-eyed to a Calvinistic world view and to a Reformed theology
proper, and soteriology, and Christology, and pneumatology. And, however, with this resurgence, there
has come a strange merging of two streams into one river. One stream is the flow of historic, biblical
Calvinism and the other is an unexpected tributary, that of Calvinistic theology in spiritual
experience. And the result is a new high bred, a strange
high-bred known as the Charismatic Calvinist that holds strong reformed soteriology in
one hand, but Calvinistic experiences and worship styles in the other hands. And this one surging river now has a swift
current that has pulled in from far and wide an entire generation of many people who are
now Reformed but speaking in tongues, having prophetic utterances, claiming new revelations,
having supposedly words of knowledge and miraculous healings. The leader of one popular Reformed ministry,
writes, "I start...I start getting prophetic dreams. God is showing me the future. A gift of discernment kind of comes to the
fore for me, not all the time, but I can see someone and I just know their story. Upon occasion when I get up to preach, I can
see just like a screen in front of me and I see someone get raped, or abused, and then
I will track them down and say, 'Look, I've had this vision, let me tell you about it.'" He claims it's all true. These theological positions of merging Reformed
Theology with Charismatic theology have gone virtually ignored and unaddressed within the
Reformed community. And we have welcomed these men without fully
addressing their position regarding the Holy Spirit. I believe that there is none better to address
these Charismatic Calvinists than John Calvin himself. So what I want to do is I want to first begin
with the crisis that Calvin faced because Calvin faced a Charismatic crisis in his own
day of people who were claiming to have dreams and visions and speaking new revelations. And then I want to see how Calvin addressed
it in his own day from his own commentaries from his institutes but also a treatise that
he wrote, the treatise against the Libertines. So let's begin with the crisis Calvin faced. There's nothing new under the sun, and the
crisis that we are facing this day that has already been outlined by Dr. MacArthur is
a crisis much like what John Calvin and the Reformers faced in the sixteenth century. As the leading Reformer, whatever faced the
church, confronted John Calvin because John Calvin was the chief Reformer. He had the dominant voice. People looked to Calvin for his addressing
issues. And so in his own Geneva ministry, Calvin
faced the Charismatic issue with two separate groups. One is the Anabaptists, the other is the Libertines. And I want to talk just for a second about
these two groups. The Anabaptist is a complex, wide, divergence
of many different sub-groups. Some of them very good. As some of them would hold to truths just
like you and I hold to that the church should be comprised of regenerated believers in Jesus
Christ, that there should be a separation between church and state, that baptism is
for believers, adult baptism. They got many things right but they got many
things wrong as well. And there were elements of the Anabaptist
group that began to drift into an inner word and an inner witness of the Holy Spirit, and
they began to seek dreams and visions and ecstatic experiences and private revelations,
emotional accesses, mystical encounters, prophetic manifestations, physical contortions and miraculous
accounts. And John Calvin would have to address this
in his own day. And then there were the Libertines. The Libertines were perhaps under the umbrella,
the broad umbrella of the Anabaptists but as their name indicates, the Libertines were
antinomians. They abused any Christian liberty, suffice
to say for the most part, I would venture to say they were unconverted and did not know
the Lord. But they removed all restrictions from what
is right and wrong and Calvin called them a sec ton, or 100 times more dangerous than
the Roman Catholic Church itself. They were led by fleshly impulses and new
revelations. They believe the Holy Spirit is addressing,
or is adding new revelation to the Scripture. And they grew discontent with the Bible itself
and with the simplicity of the gospel. And so because of their setting aside the
Scripture, and wanting to follow the inner impulses that they believed was the Holy Spirit,
they lived in blatant antinomianism which simply means they were against the law or
any commandments of God that would regulate their Christian life. They lived in immorality, to put it bluntly. They lived in open licentiousness. And they withdrew distinctions between good
and bad. They were known for their...their vulgarities. They were known for their crassness, for their
crudeness, for their earthiness, for their...for their profanity. They gloried in being raw in their so-called
Christianity. Some of their leaders among the Libertines
dressed in torn robes and wanted a grunge look. I feel like I just stepped on something. It was kind of a hyper, spiritual, medieval
reach back look. They wanted an easy moral path, without having
to fight against sin, without having to resist temptation, without having to pursue holiness. And John Calvin was just the man to begin
to speak to this particular issue. The other Reformers, they're in Switzerland,
began to write to...I almost said MacArthur...to, yeah, well him, too, "Charismatic Chaos, the
1536 edition...no, they began to write to John Calvin and Calvin was just the man. I know when you're laughing with me and when
you're laughing at me, okay? How are we going to have a relationship when
you're...all right. It was Benjamin Breckenridge Warfield who
identified Calvin as quote: "The theologian of the Holy Spirit," close quote. For all of our thinking about Calvin of election
and predestination and the eternal decree of God and the death of Christ, he is known
most as "The Theologian of the Holy Spirit." And Warfield, the great Princetonian scholar
said, "It is probably that Calvin's greatest contribution to theological science lies in
the rich development in which he was the first to give to the doctrine of the work of the
Holy Spirit." At the institutes, referring to his magnum
opus , the institutes of the Christian religion, Warfield writes, "The institutes is just a
treatise on the work of God the Holy Spirit and making God scathingly known to sinful
man." And so, what may surprise us is the Charismatic
crisis and chaos today is nothing new and it was prevalent in abuses and accesses in
the sixteenth century, as we will talk about tomorrow night, also in the seventeenth century
with the Puritans with what they were confronted with. So John Calvin was not silent on the abuse
of the ministry of the Holy Spirit. Many of today's Reformed leaders who are open
to Charismatic practices would do well to sit at the feet of Calvin and to be taught
by him. I want to now come to the correction that
Calvin issued. Towering over the centuries of church history,
John Calvin stands as THE one most imminent figure of monumental importance. He was so strong that Philipp Melanchthon
called him simply THE theologian, meaning he was THE theologian God gave to the church. He was a theological genius behind the Reformation. Philip Shaff(?) writes, "Calvin was an exegetical
genius of the first order. His commentaries are unsurpassed for originality,
depth, perspicuity, soundness and permanent value. Calvin was the king of the commentators." John Murray, former professor and president
of Westminster Seminary succinctly stated, "Calvin was the exegete, he was THE exegete
of the Reformation and in the first rank of biblical exegetes of all time." Now what would be John Calvin's critique of
this new high-bred, the Charismatic Calvinist? What I want to do is walk through his commentaries
with you, and I want to walk through his institutes. And I want to look at his treatise to the
Libertines, and the screen is down behind me and it...I came to the realization it would
be more helpful to you if I could put some of these quotes visually up before you as
I read them. But I want to address these one issue at a
time. I want to begin with the office of Apostle. In Calvin's commentaries on Matthew 10 and
verse 1, Calvin very clearly states that the office of Apostle was a temporary office,
restricted to the first century. It is not a perpetual or continual office. Now some of the claims being made today by
Calvinistic Charismatics is that they are Apostles and that they continue in an Apostleship
and that simply is not true. God gave the Apostles to the church in order
that they would be the foundation for the church, that the church would be built upon
them, but you only lay the foundation one time in a building project, and that is at
the very beginning. And the entire rest of the edifice rests upon
that foundation. You don't re-lay the foundation at the second
floor and then the third floor, and then the fifth floor, and then put another foundation
for the roof. No, it's only laid one time, at the beginning. And Calvin understood that and that was the
role of the Apostle. And he understood that God gave the gift of
miracles to the Apostles to authenticate them as unique messengers from God who were bringing
revelation directly from God and that they had authority over the church by virtue of
this revelation that they were bringing. That's why Paul begins his letters, "Paul,
an Apostle of Christ Jesus," so that they will know that what is recorded in this letter
has divine apostolic authority over all churches in all places in all times. So Calvin...thank you for that one clap...(laughter)...no,
no, no, no, no. I know when you're just making up, okay? Okay. That was one of my students wanting a better
grade. So Matthew 10, verse 1, John Calvin...I want
you to hear this in Calvin's own words. I trust it's being or will be put up, maybe
you'll have a word of knowledge here in a moment and all right, I'm going to read it
anyway. "The calling of the apostles is here described
to us, it is proper to observe, however, that Jesus is not as He...does not speak of perpetual
Apostleship but only of temporary preaching." And then he goes on to describe the place
of miracles as seals upon the doctrine of the Apostles. So Calvin early on in his Harmony of the Gospels
, and by the way, he died preaching a harmony of the gospels, was convinced that the Apostle,
the office thereof, was restricted to the first century and he will argue, therefore
miracles are restricted to the first century as validations of the new message that they
are bringing. Now Calvin would address the receiving of
the Holy Spirit in Acts 2, and verse 38, in his commentaries. He writes, "We do not receive it...referring
to the gift of the Spirit...we do not receive it that we may speak with tongues, that we
may be prophets, that we may cure the sick, that we may work miracles. Yet it is given us for a better use that we
may believe with the heart and a righteousness and that our tongues may be framed unto true
confession. His argument is, we have not received the
baptism of the Holy Spirit, the gift of the Holy Spirit, to speak in tongues, we have
been given it that the one tongue we have will confess that Jesus is Lord. (Amen-applause) And so he lays his case. We come to the gift of miracles which he believes
is a ceased gift and from the outset of Calvin's public ministry, he believed that the gift
of miracles had ceased during the apostolic age. In his Institutes, the 1536 edition, and I
mention that edition. There were five versions of Calvin's Institutes
the last being 1559. His 1536 was his first edition and what is
interesting is, he has only been a Christian for no more than two years. He is 26 years old and he writes his Magnum
Opus , he was a giant walking the land. And as he writes in his first Institutes , he
writes those miraculous powers and manifest workings which were dispensed by the laying
on of hands have ceased. He was a cessationist. And they have rightly lasted only for a time,
for it was fitting that the new preaching of the gospel and the new Kingdom of Christ
should be illuminated and magnified by unheard of and extraordinary miracles. When the Lord ceased from these, he did not
utterly forsake His church, but declared that the magnificence of His Kingdom and the dignity
of His Word had been excellently enough disclosed. So, like a rocket ship being launched off
the launching pad, and then it drops the bottom engine and goes through space more effortlessly,
he is arguing that the gift of miracles and these extraordinary sign gifts were a part
of the rocket launch of the church in the first century. But once it cleared the earth's atmosphere,
it dropped that engine and now there's the primacy of the written Word of God and the
centrality of the preaching of that written Word. That's at the beginning of Calvin's ministry. We fast forward to the end to his last version,
or edition of the Institutes in his prefacatory address, which means his preface at the beginning,
he wrote five years before his death. He writes, "In demanding miracles of us,"
referring to Rome, and referring to other aberrant groups, fringe groups, "they act
dishonestly, for we're not forging some new gospel, but are retaining that very gospel
whose truth all the miracles that Jesus Christ and His disciples ever wrought serve to conform." Now understand Calvin's thinking on this. These miracles accompanied the unveiling of
the Musterion that Dr. Sproul spoke of, the unveiling of the mystery
of Christ. And once that was made known, there was no
further need for miracles to confirm the uniqueness of this revelation. And what Calvin will argue, if you expect
me to perform miracles or any of the Reformers to be in the healing ministry or the speaking
in tongues ministry, we would have to come up with an entirely new gospel. We would have to have an entirely new revelation
from God otherwise there will be no spectacular display because we have the same old message. And that same old message is the power of
God unto salvation in the gospel of Jesus Christ. Calvin said, "They allege miracles...in the
last sentence...which can disturb a mind otherwise at rest." They are so foolish and ridiculous, so vain
and false. He comes in his commentaries to Mark 16 and
verse 17, that portion at the end of Mark's gospel that most of us do not believe were
a part of the original text of Scripture and Calvin did not have the advantage that we
now have, 500 years later, of greater textual criticism, but what is important is what Calvin
has to say about the issues that are found in Mark 16 and verse 17 which reads, "These
signs will accompany those who have believed they will speak with new tongues." This is what Calvin says in explaining that. Although Christ does not expressly say whether
He intends this gift, referring to miracle working, to be temporary or to remain perpetually
in His church, yet it is more probably that miracles were promised only for a time in
order to give luster to the gospel while it is new...while it was new and in a state of
obscurity. I think that the true design for which miracles
were appointed was that nothing which was necessary for providing the doctrine of the
gospel should be wanting at its commencement. Notice his words. They're all talking about at the beginning,
at the commencement, only for a while, only for a time. He understood that they were bestowed by the
Holy Spirit on the church only at the commencement of the building of the church. At the end of his quote, "Yet those who came
after them that they might not follow it to be suppose that they were entirely destitute
of miracles were led by foolish aberrance or ambition to forge for themselves miracles
which had no reality. Calvin is saying the claims that they are
making for miracles have no reality to them whatsoever, that they are just foolishness. He goes on to say in this same text in Mark
16 and verse 17, "Thus...referring to these who are claiming among the Anabaptists, among
the Libertines, that they could perform miracles...thus was the door open for the impostors of Satan." In other words, a door is swung open for all
kinds of counterfeit doctrines and counterfeit experiences. Not only that delusions might be substituted
for truth, but that under the pretense of miracles, the simple might be led astray from
the true faith. It is silly. That which is advanced by those who object
to our doctrine, that it wants the aid of miracles. Calvin just writes it off as silliness. And he would say to those Reformed leaders
today who are dabbling in Charismatic experiences and doctrine, he would say to them, "You are
opening Pandora's Box for your church and for those who are following your ministry. And so oftentimes a leader will go running
up to the edge of a cliff and stop and those who are following will just keep on running
over the edge of the cliff to their destruction. And Calvin is sending a sobering warning that
the door of Satan's delusions are open as you are distracting people from the truth
and they are now being caught up in that which is not authored by the Holy Spirit. In Acts 14 and verse 3, Calvin gives very
specific teaching on this. Acts 14:3 says, "The Lord was granting that
signs and wonders be done by their hands. In Calvin's commentary, Calvin says, "The
Lord gave witness to the gospel in miracles for it shows the true use of miracles." He says that's the true use. It was to bring validation and authentication
to the message that was being brought by the apostolic messengers. He says, "Unless they be drawn unto abuse
and corruption, God does never suffer them to be separated from His Word." Now that's a key sentence and he will develop
it more fully in just a moment, but here is Calvin's brilliant theological mind at work. Calvin says that the Word of God, the written
Word of God, and the Spirit of God can never be separated. What the Holy Spirit is doing in the world,
He is always doing it in mutual bond with the written Word of God. You will never have the Holy Spirit over here
doing a work independent of the written Word of God. The Holy Spirit...(applause)...the Holy Spirit
who is the author of the Word of God, the Holy Spirit who is the teacher of the Word
of God is the one who works in perfect partnership with the very word that He Himself has authored. And so Calvin says, "Unless they be drawn
unto abuse and corruption, God does never suffer them to be separated from His Word,"
and the "them" refers to the miraculous works of the Holy Spirit in Acts 14. For if miracles were wrought at any time without
His Word, first it was very seldom, second, very small fruit. Benjamin Warfield, just to quote him one other
time, says, "It is reasonable to ask miracles...says Calvin...or to find them where there is no
new gospel. By as much as the one gospel suffices for
all lands and all peoples and all times." What Warfield is saying, Calvin understood
that what God confirmed in the first century in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria and then
in the Gentile world as Dr. Sproul so wonderfully laid out for us, it
is sufficient now for all times, all lands, all places and all generations. The gospel does not need to be re...re validated. Concerning speaking in tongues, Calvin states
very clearly that the gift of tongues has ceased in the first century. Writing in his commentary on Acts 10 and verse
44, Calvin writes, "The gift of tongues and other such like things are ceased long ago
in the church. But the Spirit of understanding and of regeneration
is a force and shall always be a force." What he is saying is that the Holy Spirit
in the first century gave the gift of tongues, that has long since ceased, but the Holy Spirit
is still at work in the world through the new birth. And now Calvin gives his greatest attention
to the issue of receiving new revelation, of receiving prophecies. And in Isaiah 30 verse 1 in his commentaries,
Calvin writes, "Let it be observed that two things are here connected...the Word and the
Spirit of God...in opposition to the fanatics who aim at oracles and hidden revelations--that
means private...private revelations without the Word, referring to the written Word." What Calvin is saying, God has joined together
the Spirit and the Word, the fanatics, referring to the Anabaptists and the Libertines, they
separate the Spirit and the Word and, in fact, they elevate the Spirit above the Word. In fact, I've been in churches where if the
pastor gets into the pulpit and says, "Take your Bibles and turn with me to Matthew, Mark,
Luke or John," the people are almost yawning. But if he gets in the pulpit and says, "You
know, as I was driving to church today, God spoke to me," there can't be enough mole skins
open and people want to write it down. And Calvin says no, that is not how God works
in His church and in this world, in this hour of redemptive history. And his commentary on Acts 21 verse 9, the
same issue of revelations, Calvin says, "By this means--referring to revelatory prophecy...let
me make this footnote. Calvin understands prophecy in two levels,
as John MacArthur does, that there is foretelling, and there is forth telling. Forth telling would be the gift of preaching,
proclaiming what is already been revealed in Scripture, but foretelling is receiving
new revelation. Now Calvin says, "By this means--referring
to revelatory prophecy--the Lord meant to beautify the first beginnings of the gospel,
when he raised up men and women to foretell things to come. Prophecies had now almost ceased, referring
to the end of the Old Testament economy, 400 years before the coming of Christ. Prophecies had now almost ceased many years
among the Jews to the end, they might be more attentive and desirous to hear the new voice
of the gospel, it--revelatory prophecy--should last but for a short time. That's a reference to the first century. Lest the faithful should always wait for some
farther thing. In other words, if you tell people revelation
is still being given, they're going to be discontent with Romans and the gospel of John,
they want what is new. And Calvin is saying if it's new, it's not
true. Calvin goes on to say, "It is revelatory prophecy
should last but for a short time lest the faithful should always wait for some farther
thing, or lest the curious wits might have occasion given to seek or invent some new
thing every now and then, for we know that when that ability and skill was taken away,
there was not withstanding many brain-sick fellows who did boast that they were prophets." Calvin says that's what they are. They're just brain sick. God, by taking away prophecies, he means new
revelation, did testify that the end in perfection was present in Christ. That's a very insightful sentence because
what Calvin is arguing is that the fullness of revelation that God has for His church
came in and through the Lord Jesus Christ and the disciples whom He sent out to be His
Apostles and the fullness of what God wants us to know has now been given to us. And we know have the faith once and for all
delivered to the saints. In Romans 12 and verse 6, as he continues
to write on this, prophecy at this day in the Christian church is hardly anything else
than the right understanding of Scripture and the peculiar faculty of explaining it. That's the forth-telling, the gift of preaching,
to understand the Scripture and to explain it. Inasmuch as all the ancient prophecies and
all the oracles of God have been completed in Christ and in His gospel. He sees Christ, the revelation that came through
Christ and His Apostles as the consummation of revelation that God has for His church. And it does not appear that Paul intended
here to mention those miraculous graces by which Christ had first rendered illustrious
His gospel, but on the contrary, we find that He refers only to ordinary gifts such as were
to continual perpetuate. So he's saying, ordinary spiritual gifts like
helps and administration and teaching and mercy and things like that, those will continue
throughout the church, the church age. But not these miraculous gifts. He will say the same in Hebrews 1 verses 1
and 2, "When God speaks at the last times He intimates that there is no longer any reason
to expect any new revelation. For it was not a Word in part that Christ
brought but the final conclusion." He is saying, "If you expect new revelation
from God, you are saying that what Jesus brought was only a partial message, that there is
something lacking in the teaching of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what Jesus commanded His Apostles to teach
all nations that there were holes in that message that now need to be filled up." That would be the only conclusion to which
you could come. And Calvin says no. There was the full revelation given in His
Son who came as the greatest prophet, the greatest expositor who spoke all the words
that the Father gave Him to speak and He taught them to His disciples and He commissioned
them out and there is nothing else to be said. When we come to Calvin's Institutes under
this same subject, in book 1 chapter 9, section 1, Calvin has a section that he calls, "The
fanatics wrongly appeal to the Holy Spirit." And Calvin calls them spiritual light weights,
those who having forsaken Scripture. And the reason they forsake Scripture is because
all they want is for God to tell me what I need to know. They don't want to study, they don't want
to dig it out. They don't want to exposit the Word of God
and put their mind to it and be diligent to present themselves unto God as a workman who
does not be ashamed. They're not willing to put in the heavy lifting. They simply want God to just zap them and
give them what needs to be said. Those who have forsaken Scripture imagine
some way or other of reaching God ought to be thought of not so much gripped by error
as being carried away with frenzy, for of light certain giddy men, referring to the
Libertines, and giddy men are just those who do not take God and His Word seriously, have
arisen, who have great haughtiness. And the reason they have haughtiness is they
will not put themselves under the perfection of the Word of God, they want to be out from
under the Word of God so that they can say and do their own thing. Exalting the teaching office of the Spirit,
they despise all reading and laugh at the simplicity of those who as they express it
still followed the dead in killing letter. Two sections later in this same part of his
institutes, is really the most significant quote that Calvin has on this subject. It's a section entitled, "Word and Spirit
belong inseparably together." If you take anything from what Calvin is saying,
take this. By a kind of mutual bond, the Lord has joined
together the certainty of His Word and of His Spirit so that the perfect religion of
the Word may abide in our minds when the Spirit shines and that we in turn may embrace the
Spirit with no fear of being deceived, when we recognize Him in His own image, namely
in the Word. He is saying that God sent the Spirit to conform...to
confirm His Word by miracles and to produce the written Word within us and God has nothing
further to say. In book 2 he says, "This, however, remains
certain the perfect doctrine He has brought has made an end to all prophecies," referring
to forth-telling a new revelation. All those then who are not content with the
gospel, patch it with something extraneous to it, distract from Christ's authority, it
is not lawful to go beyond the simplicity of the gospel. He is saying they go beyond the gospel. There's many other quotes and I think time
would be best served for me to come to what I want to say in conclusion. I think the point has been established. I would refer you to his treatise against
the Anabaptists, in his treaties against the Libertines in which Calvin has excoriating
words and one might ask, "Well, why can't you just leave the Libertines alone? Why do you have to make a publish issue out
of this? Why can't you just leave the Anabaptists alone?" And Calvin said, "Even a dog barks if he sees
someone assault his master." (Applause) He said, "How could I be silent
if God's truth is assailed? He had to speak out. He had to cast his influence and spread it
over the church at large so the spiritual health of the church would be preserved and
protected. Well I think you understand what Calvin had
to say, that his critique of the Charismatic abuses in his day, to summarize, in his own
words, is foolish, ridiculous, vain and false. It has no reality. It opens doors for the impostures of Satan. It substitutes truth for delusions. It leads the simple astray from the truth. It is silly. It separates the mutual bond of the Spirit
and the Word. It is deadly doting's. It invents an erroneous and wandering spirit
in people. It goes beyond the Word of God. It arouses God's wrath, he says, and provokes
him and leads people beyond the limits of Scripture to follow their own imaginations. For Calvin, a Charismatic Calvinist is an
oxymoron, is a contradiction in terms like freezer burn, jumbo shrimp, you like...dead
Live Oak, Baptist scholar (laughter) saved Methodist, sober...no, never mind. All right, let me bring this to conclusion. I want to end with convictions Calvin asserted,
and I want to leave you with three convictions. I just gave you a mass of quotations and I
probably gave you more information and more readings than you were able to take in. But I want to end this in a very simple way. What would Calvin say to this present generation? And the answer to that is the same that he
has already said to his own generation. Number one, the exclusivity of biblical authority. It all boils down to this. Understand this. Either there is only one stream of revelation
and that is the Bible, or there are two streams of revelation, that would be the Bible and
these miraculous gifts. Either it is sola scriptura , only one stream
of revelation, or there are two streams and Calvin faced it on both sides. On the one hand with the Catholics, they wanted
two streams...they wanted the written Word of God and they wanted their church tradition
and ecclesiastical councils and Papal authority. The Catholics had two streams of revelation
on one side, they Charismatics had two streams of revelation on the other side, there is
the written Word of God and the gift of prophecy, and speaking in tongues, and word of knowledge,
and, and, and, and. And Calvin said, "No, there is only one stream
of revelation for his church through the church age, after the first century, and it is sola
scriptura , it is the written Word of God. (applause) Calvin asserted, "We ought to a stain that
substantial Word, the source of all revelations. It is the highest value to ask nothing beyond
the Word of God. God begets and multiplies His church only
by the means of His written Word. That's the first thing Calvin would say today
to the Charismatic Calvinists. There are not two streams of revelation. There is only one and it is the written Word
of God. Second, he would say to this generation, the
priority of biblical preaching. Calvin understood to whatever extent one looks
to two streams of revelation. There is a diminishing of the pulpit. Calvin believed that only one stream of revelation,
the Bible, mandates biblical preaching. However he discerned that two streams deludes
biblical preaching. Two streams of revelation...that is one's
position, it waters down biblical preaching. It washes away biblical preaching. It erodes biblical preaching. It submerges biblical preaching. There will only be the priority of biblical,
expository preaching in the fullest sense when one is committed that there is only one
stream by which revelation is coming to us and it is in the written Word of God. And third, and finally, Calvin would say to
this present generation of Charismatic Calvinists, he would say to them the unity of Spirit and
Word. We've already talked about this. But Calvin was convinced that only one stream
of revelation which is the Bible, joins together the Spirit and the Word in their tightest
bond and in their most powerful working in the world. Two streams of revelation severs and separates
Word from Spirit and Spirit from Word. Two streams of revelation divides and distances
the Word from the Spirit and the Spirit from the Word. It drives a wedge between them. But the Spirit is at work only where the written
Word of God is being taught, is being preached, is being counseled, it is being shared, is
being disseminated, the Spirit works through the written Word. This is what John Calvin has said and continues
to speak through his written Word. I do believe that Calvin towers over church
history as the most substantial theologian that has been given to the church, its most
powerful influence and we would do well to hear from our older brother. I will let John Calvin have the final word. "Let the pastors boldly dare all things by
the written Word of God by which they are constituted administrators. Let them constrain all the power, glory and
excellence of the world to give place to and to obey the divine majesty of this Word. Let them enjoin everyone by it, from the highest
to the lowest. Let them edify the body of Christ. Let them devastate Satan's reign. Let them pasture the sheep. Let them kill the wolves, instruct and exhort
the rebellious. Let them bind and loose, let them thunder,
let them lightning, but let them do all things in accordance to the Word of God. (Applause) If we are to see a new Reformation
in this day, if we are to see this resurgence of reformed truth that has now begun in these
last decades, continue to expand its borders and push out its fences into greater influence
in the church and in the world, we must be exclusively committed to the written Word
of God. (Applause) Amen. Let us close in a word of prayer. Our Father in heaven, how we thank You for
this treasure of Your written Word that You have given to us. We thank You for the full record of it from
Genesis to Revelation, the 66 books of the canon of Scripture breathed out by You through
human authors some 40-plus human authors on three different continents in three different
languages from all walks of life, and yet You so perfectly presided over this entire
process that there is one body of truth, that there is one way of salvation, that there
is one plan for the ages, that there is one standard for morality, that there are no contradictions
in Your Word, that it is the pure, unvarnished, unadulterated truth to us and to all who hear
it. I pray that You would set a flame our one
tongue that we might confess Christ, preach Christ, exalt Christ and magnify Christ in
this world. And I pray, God, that You would continue the
work that You have begun in these days. We pray this in the name of Jesus Christ,
our sovereign Lord and Savior. Amen.
