Calvin on Christ

Did all you guys catch the John Calvin “Christ Alone” article in Christianity Today (June 2009)?

“We see that our whole salvation and all its parts are comprehended in Christ.  We should therefore take care not to derive the least portion of it from anywhere else.  If we seek salvation, we are taught by the very name of Jesus that it is “of him.”  If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit, they will be found in his anointing.  If we seek strength, it lies in his dominion; if purity, in his conception; if gentleness, it appears in his birth.  For by his birth he was made like us in all respects that he might learn to feel our pain.  If we seek redemption, it lies in his passion; if acquittal, in his condemnation; if remission of the curse, in his cross; if satisfaction, in his sacrifice; if purification, in his blood; if reconciliation, in his descent into hell; if mortification of the flesh, in his tomb; if newness of life, in his resurrection; if immortality, in the same; if inheritance of all blessings, in his kingdom; if untroubled expectation of judgment, in the power given to him to judge.  In short, since a rich store of every kind of good abounds in him, let us drink our fill from this fountain, and from no other.” (emphasis mine)

2 comments

  1. The problem, of course, is that Christ is NEVER alone. In His Deity, He is one with the Father and the Holy Spirit. In His humanity, He is one with the Church, in heaven and on earth, beginning with His Mother, “the first of the Redeemed,” at His conception. “He who is saved is saved with others. He who is condemned is condemned alone.” Because we are “members of Christ,” we are “members one of another” as St. Paul writes – twice.

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