Today’s reading confronts one of the Church’s most persistent temptations: the desire to make the invisible God manageable through visible forms. In Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 11, Sections 1–4, John Calvin argues that every attempt to represent God visually—however sincere—inevitably corrupts His glory. Drawing from the Law, the Prophets, the Apostles, and even pagan witnesses, Calvin shows that God’s self-revelation consistently resists human imagination and demands reverent restraint. Divine appearances were never invitations to image-making but safeguards of mystery, reminders that God is spirit, not substance. Because the human heart naturally drifts toward superstition, Calvin insists that fidelity requires not creativity but obedience: we must seek God only where He has chosen to reveal Himself—by His Word, through His Spirit, without substitutes.

Readings: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 11, Sections 1–4

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Today’s reading presses us to recognize that the God revealed in Scripture is not a different God from the one made known in creation—but the same Lord, now speaking with clarity, authority, and moral demand. John Calvin shows how Scripture gathers what creation whispers and declares it plainly: God’s steadfast love, righteous judgment, and faithful rule over the world. Against the confusion of pagan religion and philosophical speculation, Scripture does not refine humanity’s guesses—it excludes them. It identifies the true God by His works, His character, and His Word, and in doing so calls us not merely to think rightly about God, but to worship Him with integrity, obedience, and trust.

Readings: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 10, Sections 1–3 Augustine, The Confessions Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

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Something is deeply wrong when people claim the Spirit of God while discarding the very Word the Spirit inspired. In today’s reading from John Calvin, we confront the perennial temptation of “spiritual” enthusiasm that substitutes private revelations for Scripture itself. Calvin argues with force and clarity that the Spirit of Christ never leads believers away from the written Word but seals that Word upon the heart. To sever Spirit from Scripture is not freedom but delusion—and it opens the door to endless deception. True illumination comes when the same Spirit who spoke through the prophets and apostles confirms their words within us, binding Word and Spirit together in an unbreakable union (Isaiah 59:21; John 16:13; 2 Timothy 3:16; 2 Corinthians 3:6).

Readings: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 9 (Sections 1–3)

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Today’s reading from John Calvin confronts one of the most persistent questions in Christian theology: why should Scripture be trusted? Calvin argues that while fulfilled prophecy, historical preservation, apostolic witness, and even the blood of martyrs all provide powerful external confirmation, none of these can create true faith on their own. Isaiah’s naming of Cyrus long before his birth, Jeremiah’s precise prophecy of the seventy-year exile, Daniel’s sweeping vision of centuries to come, the miraculous survival of the Scriptures through Antiochus’s persecution, and the unlikely authority of untrained apostles all testify that Scripture bears marks no human mind could fabricate (Isaiah 42:9; Daniel 9; 2 Kings 22:8; 2 Chronicles 34:15). Yet Calvin insists that these evidences serve only as supports, not foundations. Scripture finally persuades because it carries God’s own voice—and that voice is recognized only when the Holy Spirit seals its authority in the heart. Until then, even the strongest arguments leave faith suspended; but once the Spirit speaks inwardly, Scripture is received not as probable truth, but as the very Word of God.

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How can Scripture be shown credible to natural reason without replacing the deeper certainty given by the Spirit? Calvin carefully answers by pointing to the unmistakable marks of divine majesty woven throughout the Bible itself—its power, simplicity, harmony, and authority—qualities that surpass every human work and pierce the heart in a way no rhetoric can achieve (1 Corinthians 2:4–5). He then turns to the Old Testament, showing how the antiquity, integrity, miracles, and prophecies surrounding Moses bear public, historical witness to God’s hand, from the manna in the wilderness to the judgment on Korah, Dathan, and Abiram, and from the preservation of Israel’s law to the long-delayed fulfillment of Judah’s royal promise (Deuteronomy 32; Genesis 49; 1 Samuel 16). These evidences do not replace faith, but serve as strong confirmations once Scripture has been received reverently, showing that God has never left His Word without testimony in history, conscience, and the unfolding of redemption.

Readings:

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 8, Sections 1–7

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Today’s reading presses to the heart of one of Christianity’s most decisive claims: Scripture does not gain its authority from human approval, argument, or institutional endorsement, but from God himself through the inward testimony of the Holy Spirit. John Calvin argues that while Scripture bears unmistakable marks of divine majesty and coherence, no amount of reasoning alone can produce the certainty true faith requires. That certainty comes only when the same Spirit who spoke through the prophets and apostles seals God’s Word upon the heart. Against both skeptics who demand rational proof and religious authorities who claim to validate Scripture by decree, Calvin insists that believers rest in Scripture not by blind submission or borrowed judgment, but by a living encounter with God’s own voice—an assurance deeper than argument and firmer than opinion (Isaiah 59:21; Isaiah 43:10; Isaiah 54:13).

Readings: John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 7, Sections 4–5

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Why should Scripture be trusted as God’s Word? Calvin argues that the Bible does not receive its authority from the Church, but from God Himself, confirmed inwardly by the Holy Spirit. While the Church bears witness to Scripture, it does not stand above it; rather, the Church is built upon the Word, not the other way around (Ephesians 2:20). Calvin insists that Scripture is self-authenticating—recognized by the believer much like light is known by sight or sweetness by taste—and that resting its authority on human approval would leave troubled consciences without true assurance. Addressing a frequently misused quote from Augustine, Calvin clarifies that even Augustine grounded certainty not in ecclesial decree but in divine illumination, showing that the Spirit alone confirms the Scriptures as the very voice of God speaking to His people.

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Why isn’t creation enough to lead us to God? In this reading, Calvin argues that while the world truly displays God’s glory, human corruption turns that light into a maze rather than a path. Scripture, he says, is not an optional supplement to nature but the necessary guide that gathers our scattered impressions of God and brings them into clarity. Like spectacles correcting failing sight, the Word enables us to see the Creator rightly, not as a vague power but as the true God who reigns, speaks, and reveals Himself for salvation. Drawing from the Psalms and the words of Christ, Calvin insists that without Scripture, humanity inevitably wanders—mistaking power for divinity, worshiping what it does not know, and exchanging the living God for imagined ones (Psalm 19:1–9; Psalm 93:5; Psalm 96; Psalm 97; Psalm 99; John 4:22; 1 Timothy 6:16). Scripture alone provides the thread that leads us safely through the labyrinth of creation to the God who made it.

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