Calvin and his silence about overcoming
sins. ---John
Calvin was a lawyer and his mind was thinking how to politically survived as a
religion in Catholic persecution times. Even today, Calvinists think that if
they push themselves to be elected in the government, they can bring in their
Calvinist friends to “take over” worldly power and create a “kingdom of God” on
earth. Help the Lord to Second Come. So to speak. ---Catholics
were stressing works like buying alms or letters of forgiveness from the
priests in order to forgive your sins. Without these actions and receiving the
Lord’s Supper from the hand of the priest, people were lost. ---No,
said the Reformers, and Calvin, justification in heaven is guaranteed on what
Christ did in heaven for us in our behalf not by the Catholic created system of
vicarius filii dei = substitute of the Son of God. By the way, 50 years after Calvin, Helvig
Andreas in 1610 discovered that vicarius filli dei counted in Latin up to 600
plus 60 plus 6! But modern Calvinists are just like Lutherans, silent about
this and search for the Antichrist in Nero and Trajan and Antiochus Epiphanes,
all decoys. So the vicarius filii dei system of religion or Catholicism of
Calvin’s day was making money with salvation. ---Both
religions, Catholics and Protestants tried to overcome sins or get salvation.
Both had ideas. ---But
somehow, even if Calvin did not say it exactly so, his followers understood
“once saved always saved”. My Calvinistic relatives used to talk that way with
my parents while they were arguing why the Law must still be kept. ---So
Calvin did not want to know anything more than this message of Justification
only by Christ. ---What
about Sabbath? No. What about adult baptism instead of infant baptism? No. Shut
the mouth. ---That
is why pastors started arguing in the Lutheran church with Johannes
Oecolampadius in Basel in 1523 about Infant Baptism. And he failed the test. ---They
say he was very spiritual, more than Calvin, Thomas Myers in 1853 wrote about
the two in his commentaries on Calvin. But he failed the test on infant
baptism. ---So
Jakobus Arminius argued with Calvinists about their suppression of the freedom
of the will and the role of will in our actions. Calvinists were furious. ---What
about sanctification and the role of the Holy Spirit in our lives and the
freedom to choose for God? It was a difficult one for the Reformers to swallow.
---Lutheranism
went back to Catholicism two years after Luther died in 1546. In 1548 they
signed a law the Catholic government that they will accept some Catholic
practices in the Lutheran church for the sake of peace. ---So
John Wesley focused on this aspect of overcoming in the gospel. Sanctification
people call it. The importance to kick habits. ---Once
saved always saved, no. Said Wesley. ---Then
came Ellen White. Justification is by Jesus only but after that, she said in
Testimonies 5 pages 630-631 that we have to cooperate with the divine, with God
to remove offensive things from our lives. ---Blessed
are they that overcome, said the Holy Spirit on behalf of Jesus the Great
Overcomer and Example of our lives in Revelation to the seven churches. He
repeated the same message to all seven periods. ---Including
the digital orientated “sleeping” Laodiceans or the digimodernists. Us. ---“God
can work with his (you and me) efforts in seeking perfection of character”. ---Do
not mention that word again! Says Korean society. Only Korean society?
Everywhere. Because of tongue in the cheek “little foxes in the vineyard of God”.
Do not want to let go on some small biblical wrong thing. ---Like
Calvin also. Thus the silence to overcoming and scooping up of texts from the
Bible to fortify his claim that it is not necessary. Is you pastor dodging the
overcoming messages of Jesus to us with the help of the able Holy Spirit He
gave to us? ---You
better tell the pastor to preach both sides of the coin of the gospel Jesus
gave us: Jesus our Substitute and Jesus our Example. ---When?
Now today.