The John Calvin Podcast

For the Anabaptists, the Platonic dualism between matter and spirit was mapped onto the New Testament contrast between the flesh and the Spirit.4 Everything external, ordered, ordinary, structured, and official was “man-made,” as opposed to the internal, spontaneous, extraordinary, informal, and individual testimony of the Spirit within. So when Immanuel Kant said that the revelation we can really trust is that which is inside us—reason and “the moral law within”—he was not following Luther but the “spirit” of enthusiasm. When he extolled “true religion”—namely, duty to the universal law we know deep down—over against “ecclesiastical faiths” with their particular creeds, miraculous claims, doctrines, and rituals, he was basically following the script of the Gnostics and the Radical medieval sects that led to the early Anabaptists. The enthusiast in all of us does not want to hear an external word, confirmed by external sacraments, submitting to the external discipline of a visible church. We want to be autonomous, extending our domain from the little throne of our own free will, works, reason, and subjective experience. Apart from God’s conquering grace, we will never allow ourselves to be told who we are by God in his law and gospel.

"What if I'm not one of the elect?" @AdrielTweets answers a common anxiety around unconditional election.

The wait is finally over! The first message from the Credo Conference 2025 is now available at CredoMag.com. Don’t miss @mike_reeves's opening message where he says the doctrine in the Nicene creed binds us together in Christ. Watch here: youtube.com/watch?v=arIPKIg0…

Herman Bavinck’s 11-step proposal for restoring the diaconate and empowering mercy ministry: 1. That the diaconal office be honored more than it has been up until now as an independent organ of the priestly mercy of Christ. 2. That love and mercy be recognized and practiced as the most outstanding
Christian virtues. 3. That deacons be instructed to persuade all the members of the church, particularly the wealthier ones, in the name of Christ, to practice mercy and to warn and guard them against the sin of covetousness, which is a root of all evil. 4. That the diaconate stimulate, regulate, and guide—not kill—the practice of private benevolence. 5. That in large churches the bearers of this office avail themselves, if necessary, of the assistance of deaconesses in the same way the two other offices employ catechists and pastoral visitors of the sick. 6. That they distribute their gifts, in Christ’s name, as taken from the tables of the Lord on which they have been deposited by the congregation and given to Christ himself (Matt. 25:40). 7. That they extend their help to all the poor, the sick, the strangers, the prisoners, [those with intellectual disabilities], the mentally ill, the widows and orphans, in a word, to all the wretched and needy who exist in the church and are either completely of partly deprived of help from other sources, and that by word and deed they seek to relieve their suffering. 8. That the ministry of mercy be given a much larger place on the agenda of all ecclesiastical assemblies than has been the case up until now. 9. That, along with ministers and elders, deacons be delegated to the major assemblies of the churches and be given a vote in all matters pertaining to the ministry of mercy. 10. That at these assemblies the ministry of mercy be organized in terms of general principles, bearing in mind the difference in congregational circumstances; that for general needs it be undertaken communally and expanded by asking the local church to assist other churches and further by assisting poor and oppressed fellow believers abroad. 11. That this diaconal work be maintained as an independent ministry and not absorbed in or fused with the work of inner mission or state welfare, which bear a very different character. H. Bavinck, RD 4:428-429

📢New episode available now📢 Really enjoyed chatting with the super interesting Sam Ha @neulsaem @MeeterCenter for the John Calvin Podcast. Listen here 🎧player.captivate.fm/episode/…