We are deeply indebted to the following URL in providing this Beveridge-version of Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion. We personally prefer the McNeill-version from the Christian Classics. We are limited by what is available online.
http://www.reformed.org/books/index.html
Book I.2.1-2. This entire work, front to back, starts and ends with reverence, awe, respect, love, fear of the LORD coupled with confidence, rest, and assurance. Calvins’ expository work in the Scriptures is reflected throughout this magnum opus theologicorum. The Christian Institutes abound with strong and quiet assurance of and rest in God’s redemptive promises.
Frivolous worship, meandering pastoral prayers (non-Anglican), contemporary praise music often with yelling, and much of modernity must and will melt when these matters are perceived, God’s holiness and awesome majesty.
Re: meandering pastoral prayers, we heard this week of a conservative Presbyterian Pastor whose prayer was near twenty-minutes long. Of course, people wondered where he was going, as perhaps the minister was wondering when he started and when he finished. Some thought he'd ended the prayer and started the sermon. Of course, there was no Common Prayer, to wit, congregational prayer. Leave that to the professionals.
Calvin must be read slowly. His last paragraph in I.2.1-2 is “priceless.”
“Such is pure and genuine religion, namely, confidence in God coupled with serious fear - fear, which both includes in it willing reverence, and brings along with it such legitimate worship as is prescribed by the law. And it ought to be more carefully considered that all men promiscuously do homage to God, but very few truly reverence him. On all hands there is abundance of ostentatious ceremonies, but sincerity of heart is rare.” [emphasis added]
There is a quiet, pious, deep awe that runs deeply in Calvin’s soul while combined with exquisite expository skills of Scripture and an attendantly magnificent intellect.
Had Calvin not been subdued by the Gospel, like Christ taming St. Paul’s lawlessness, Calvin could have been a most resolute enemy of Christ and His Gospel. He once described himself as a very "obstinate Papist." Had he not been anchored to God’s Word and Sacrament as means of grace, as revivalists are not, one could sense that Calvin might have been a mystic or gnostic like “evangelicals” today.
We wish to caution any reader who would mistakenly believe that Calvin opposed set forms of prayer or liturgy. We apply this to Presbyterians and all others who despise or dislike liturgical prayers and charismatics who oppugn written hymns and think the Church started in 1907 with Azuza Street enthusiasts. On the issue of "set forms" for prayer, neither Presbyterians, Baptists or anyone else can claim Calvin.
Speaking of a Presbyterian, John Knox's behaviours and contentions with Bishop Cox during the Reformation in Frankfurt, Germany, during the Marian exilic period, over the 1552 BCP was most ill-advised and puerile. Courageous, yes, but Knox needed to be reigned in; fortunately, Anglicans did not yield to a rash hot-head. Calvin did not oppose forms and liturgy (Calvin had to advise Knox to be more moderate, may it be added; yes, Knox, like all believers are justified sinners).
What Calvin objected to in the quote above, as did the Prophets, as should we, is heartless and punctilious worship with any liturgy, any hymn or any lection/reading from God's "formatted Word." Calvin argued, as do the Scriptures for engagement of mind, heart and soul.
Of course, what we say about hymns and set prayers as forms, engaging heart and mind, we counsel the same with the “form” of the Bible.
Calvin counseled Cranmer and others to have “set forms.” This is a matter of the record.
This is extremely important to say in our times since carnival barkers—and that is not harsh, but true—today assume, advocate and preach that “forms” are repressive of spontaneity or spirituality. Numbers and “scratching where it itches” is what matters.
But if numbers matter, then join the Roman Catholic Church (1 billion) or become a Muslim (1 billion). If one plays the numbers, as has been done, then you opt for the crowd that rejected Noah's message of law and promise. Only eight survived that judgment. The Church repairs to the supreme and final authority for doctrine, reproof, and instruction in righteousness, not numbers (2 Tim.3.15-17, inter alia).
If that were to obtain regarding the “anti-formites”…if that were so, then throw out your Bibles as a form with content and words (many of them have done that, actually, under a pretext of “evangelicalism” with proof-texting, without context or depth, and in the interests of therapy, wealth and prosperity) and throw out your hymnal as a form (many of them have done that too as one observes “screen-type” and “overhead projector” worship with ditties on a third grade level, seven words, and repeated ad nauseum.
Show me one’s worship-style and content and one can easily know the view of God as well as host of other issues.
With Calvin, we get a biblical view of God that is the corrective for modernity.
Book One.
Chapter 2. What it is to know God--Tendency of this Knowledge
Sections 1-2
1. The knowledge of God the Creator defined. The substance of this knowledge, and the use to be made of it.
2. Further illustration of the use, together with a necessary reproof of vain curiosity, and refutation of the Epicureans. The character of God as it appears to the pious mind,contrasted with the absurd views of the Epicureans. Religion defined.
Section 1. Piety is requisite for the knowledge of God
By the knowledge of God, I understand that by which we not only conceive that there is some God, but also apprehend what it is for our interest, and conducive to his glory, what, in short, it is befitting to know concerning him. For, properly speaking, we cannot say that God is known where there is no religion or piety. I am not now referring to that species of knowledge by which men, in themselves lost and under curse, apprehend God as a Redeemer in Christ the Mediator. I speak only of that simple and primitive knowledge, to which the mere course of nature would have conducted us, had Adam stood upright. For although no man will now, in the present ruin of the human race, perceive God to be either a father, or the author of salvation, or propitious in any respect, until Christ interpose to make our peace; still it is one thing to perceive that God our Maker supports us by his power, rules us by his providence, fosters us by his goodness, and visits us with all kinds of blessings, and another thing to embrace the grace of reconciliation offered to us in Christ. Since, then, the Lord first appears, as well in the creation of the world as in the general doctrine of Scripture, simply as a Creator, and afterwards as a Redeemer in Christ, - a twofold knowledge of him hence arises: of these the former is now to be considered, the latter will afterwards follow in its order.
But although our mind cannot conceive of God, without rendering some worship to him, it will not, however, be sufficient simply to hold that he is the only being whom all ought to worship and adore, unless we are also persuaded that he is the fountain of all goodness, and that we must seek everything in him, and in none but him. My meaning is: we must be persuaded not only that as he once formed the world, so he sustains it by his boundless power, governs it by his wisdom, preserves it by his goodness, in particular, rules the human race with justice and judgment, bears with them in mercy, shields them by his protection; but also that not a particle of light, or wisdom, or justice, or power, or rectitude, or genuine truth, will anywhere be found, which does not flow from him, and of which he is not the cause; in this way we must learn to expect and ask all things from him, and thankfully ascribe to him whatever we receive. For this sense of the divine perfections is the proper master to teach us piety, out of which religion springs. By piety I mean that union of reverence and love to God which the knowledge of his benefits inspires. For, until men feel that they owe everything to God, that they are cherished by his paternal care, and that he is the author of all their blessings, so that nought is to be looked for away from him, they will never submit to him in voluntary obedience; nay, unless they place their entire happiness in him, they will never yield up their whole selves to him in truth and sincerity.
Section 2. Knowledge of God involves trust and reverence
Those, therefore, who, in considering this question, propose to inquire what the essence of God is, only delude us with frigid speculations, - it being much more our interest to know what kind of being God is, and what things are agreeable to his nature. For, of what use is it to join Epicurus in acknowledging some God who has cast off the care of the world, and only delights himself in ease? What avails it, in short, to know a God with whom we have nothing to do? The effect of our knowledge rather ought to be, first, to teach us reverence and fear; and, secondly, to induce us, under its guidance and teaching, to ask every good thing from him, and, when it is received, ascribe it to him. For how can the idea of God enter your mind without instantly giving rise to the thought, that since you are his workmanship, you are bound, by the very law of creation, to submit to his authority? - that your life is due to him? - that whatever you do ought to have reference to him? If so, it undoubtedly follows that your life is sadly corrupted, if it is not framed in obedience to him, since his will ought to be the law of our lives. On the other hand, your idea of his nature is not clear unless you acknowledge him to be the origin and fountain of all goodness. Hence would arise both confidence in him, and a desire of cleaving to him, did not the depravity of the human mind lead it away from the proper course of investigation.
For, first of all, the pious mind does not devise for itself any kind of God, but looks alone to the one true God; nor does it feign for him any character it pleases, but is contented to have him in the character in which he manifests himself always guarding, with the utmost diligences against transgressing his will, and wandering, with daring presumptions from the right path. He by whom God is thus known perceiving how he governs all things, confides in him as his guardian and protector, and casts himself entirely upon his faithfulness, - perceiving him to be the source of every blessing, if he is in any strait or feels any want, he instantly recurs to his protection and trusts to his aid, - persuaded that he is good and merciful, he reclines upon him with sure confidence, and doubts not that, in the divine clemency, a remedy will be provided for his every time of need, - acknowledging him as his Father and his Lords he considers himself bound to have respect to his authority in all things, to reverence his majesty aim at the advancement of his glory, and obey his commands, - regarding him as a just judge, armed with severity to punish crimes, he keeps the judgement-seat always in his view. Standing in awe of it, he curbs himself, and fears to provoke his anger. Nevertheless, he is not so terrified by an apprehension of judgement as to wish he could withdraw himself, even if the means of escape lay before him; nays he embraces him not less as the avenger of wickedness than as the rewarder of the righteous; because he perceives that it equally appertains to his glory to store up punishment for the one, and eternal life for the other. Besides, it is not the mere fear of punishment that restrains him from sin. Loving and revering God as his father, honouring and obeying him as his master, although there were no hell, he would revolt at the very idea of offending him.
Such is pure and genuine religion, namely, confidence in God coupled with serious fear - fear, which both includes in it willing reverence, and brings along with it such legitimate worship as is prescribed by the law. And it ought to be more carefully considered that all men promiscuously do homage to God, but very few truly reverence him. On all hands there is abundance of ostentatious ceremonies, but sincerity of heart is rare. [emphasis added]
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