After Calvin's expulsion from Geneva (1538), , the archbishop of Carpentras (in southern France, near Avignon, about as far from Geneva as Strasbourg was, but in the other direction) wrote to the Genevan people in an effort to persuade them to return to Roman Catholicism. Sadoleto's letter is notable in that it frankly acknowledged the abuses and corruption most frequently attacked by Protestants and other reformers. He argued that nevertheless authentic Christian faith was still best sought under the cloak of Holy Mother Church. In spite of having expelled Calvin from the town, the Genevans nonetheless requested that Calvin respond to Sadoleto's tract, and soon afterwards the city government ordered that the response be printed and publicized. Calvin's "Reply ," a powerful defense of the need for reform, sought to explain that Protestant reform was not simply a response to abuses in the church but to a rejection of the very heart of Catholic faith and practice.
A third purpose of it is to raise the mind from any vulgar, common, base contentments. You look on these things, and are carried away with common trivial objects, as the poor disciples when they came to the temple; they stood wondering at the stones. What wondrous stones! What a great building is here! (Mark 13:1) So shallow-minded men, when they see any earthly excellency, they stand gazing. Alas, says Christ, do you wonder at these things? In the same way the prophet here raises up the minds of men to look on an object fit to be looked on, 'Behold my servant,' &c. He intends that the Holy Ghost would have them from this saving object, Christ, to receive satisfaction to their souls in every way. Are you dejected? Here is comfort. Are you sinful? Here is righteousness. Are you led away with present contentments? Here you have honours, and pleasures, and all in Christ Jesus. You have a right to common pleasures that others have, and besides them you have claim to others that are everlasting pleasures that shall never fail, so that there is nothing that is dejecting and abasing in man, but there is comfort for it in Christ Jesus; he is a salve for every sore, a remedy for every malady; therefore, 'Behold my servant.'
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And then, it is a name of office, as well as of base condition. There are ordinary servants and extraordinary, as great kings have their servants of state. Despite his abasement, Christ was a servant of state, he was an ambassador sent from the great God; a prophet, a priest, and a king, as we shall see afterwards; an extraordinary servant, to do a work of service that all the angels in heaven, and all the men on the earth joined together, could not perform. This great masterpiece of service was to bring God and man together again, that were at variance, as it is, 1 Peter 3:18, 'to bring us to God.' We were severed and scattered from God. His office was to gather us together again, to bring us all to one head again, to bring us to himself, and so to God, to reconcile us, as the Scripture phrase is, Col. 1:20. Now, it being the greatest work and service that over was, it required the greatest servant; for no creature in the world could perform it. All the angels of heaven would have sunk under this service. They could never have given satisfaction to divine justice; for the angels themselves, when they sinned, could not recover themselves, but sunk under their own sin eternally. Thus we see how Christ is God's servant, who set him apart, and chose him to this service.
Let us not abuse ourselves, as the world commonly does, concerning Christ. They think God is merciful, and Christ is a Saviour. It is true, but what has he wrought in thee by his Spirit? Hast thou the Spirit of Christ? Or 'else thou art none of his,' Rom. 8:9. Wherever Christ is, he goes with his Spirit to teach us to apply what Christ has done for us, and to fit us to be like him. Therefore, let those that live in any sins against conscience, think it a diabolical illusion to think God and Christ is merciful. Aye, but where is the work of the Spirit? All the hope thou hast is only that thou art not in hell as yet, [only] for the time to come; but for the present I dare not say thou hast anything to do with Christ, when there is nothing of the Spirit in thee. The Spirit of Christ conforms the spouse to be like the husband, and the members to be like the head. Therefore, beg of Christ that he would anoint himself king in our hearts, and prophet and priest in our hearts, to do that that he did, to know his will as a prophet, to rule in us as a king, and to stir up prayers in us as a priest, to do in some proportion that that he does, though it be in never so little a measure, for we receive it in measure, but Christ beyond measure. We must labour for so much as may manifest to us the truth of our estate in Christ, that we are not dead but living branches.
But how or by what means does Christ give his Spirit to us? This Spirit that is so necessary for us, it is given by the ministry of the gospel, which is the ministry of the Spirit. 'Received ye the Holy Ghost by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith preached?' Gal. 3:2. When the love of God in Christ, and the benefits by Christ, are laid open in the preaching of the gospel to us, God gives his holy Spirit, the Spirit of Christ. Now God in Christ would save us by a triumphant and abundant love and mercy, and the Spirit of God never goes but where there is a magnifying of the love and mercy of God in Christ; therefore the ministry of the gospel, which only discovers the amity and love of God to mankind, being now reconciled in Christ, it is accompanied with the Spirit, to assure us of our part and portion in those benefits, for the Spirit is the fruit of God's love as well as Christ. Christ is the first gift, and the Spirit is the second, therefore that part of the word that reveals God's exceeding love to mankind, leaving angels when they were fallen, in their cursed estate, and yet giving his Son to become man, and 'a curse for us:' the revealing of this love and mercy of God, and of his Son Christ to us, is joined with the Spirit. For by the Spirit we see our cursed estate without the love and mercy of God in Christ, and likewise we are convinced of the love of God in Christ, and thereupon we love God in return, and trust to his mercy, and out of love to him perform all cheerful obedience. Whatsoever we do else, if it be not stirred by the Spirit, apprehending the love of God in Christ, it is but morality. A man shall never go to heaven except by such a disposition and frame and temper of soul as is wrought by the Holy Ghost, persuading the soul first of the love and favour of God in Christ. What are all our performances if they be not out of love to God? And how shall we love God except we be persuaded that he loves us first? Therefore the gospel breeds love in us to God, and has the Spirit together with it, working a blessed frame of sanctification, whereby we are disposed to every good duty. Therefore if we would have the Spirit of God, let us attend upon the sweet promises of salvation, upon the doctrine of Christ; for together with the knowledge of these things, the Holy Ghost slides and insinuates and infuses himself into our souls.
What is the reason that former times were called dark times (and so they were), the times of popery a dark age? Christ was veiled, the gospel was veiled, there was no preaching of salvation by Christ alone, people were sent to stocks and stones, and to saints, and instead of the word, they were sent to legends and such things. Christ was obscured, thereupon they were dark ages. Those ages wherein the Spirit of God is most, is where Christ is most preached, and people are best always where there is most Spirit; and they are most joyful and comfortable and holy, where Christ is truly laid open to the hearts of people. The preaching of mere morality, if men be not careful to open Christ, to know how salvation is wrought by Christ, and how all good comes by Christ, it will never make a man perfectly good and fit him for heaven. It may make a man reform many abuses, like a philosopher, which has its reward and respect amongst men, but nothing to give comfort at the hour of death and the day of judgment. Only that whereby the Spirit is conveyed, is the knowledge and preaching of Christ in his state and offices.
And let us commit the fame and credit of what we are or do to God. He will take care of that. Let us take care to be and to do as we should, and then for noise and report, let it be good or ill as God will send it. We know ofttimes it falls out that that which is precious in man's eye is abominable in God's. If we seek to be in the mouths of men, to dwell in the talk and speech of men, God will abhor us, and at the hour of death it will not comfort us what men speak or know of us, but sound comfort must be from our own conscience and the judgment of God. Therefore, let us labour to be good in secret. Christians should be as minerals, rich in the depth of the earth. That which is least seen is his riches. We should have our treasure deep. For the disclosure of it we should be ready when we are called to it, and for all other accidental things, let them fall out as God in his wisdom sees good. So let us look through good report and bad report to heaven; let us do the duties that are pleasing to God and our own conscience, and God will be careful enough to get us applause. Was it not sufficient for Abel, that though there was no great notice taken what faith he had, and how good a man he was, yet that God knew it and revealed it? God sees our sincerity and the truth of our hearts, and the graces of our inward man, he sees all these, and he values us by these, as he did Abel. As for outward things there may be a great deal of deceit in them, and the more a man grows in grace, the less he cares for them. As much reputation as is fit for a man will follow him in being and doing what he should. God will look to that. Therefore we should not set up sails to our own meditations, that unless we be carried with the wind of applause, to be becalmed and not go a whit forward; but we should be carried with the Spirit of God and with a holy desire to serve God, and our brethren, and to do all the good we can, and never care for the speeches of the world, as St Paul says of himself: 'I care not what ye judge of me, I care not what the world judgeth, I care not for man's judgment,' I Cor. 4:3. This is man's day. We should, from the example of Christ, labour to subdue this infirmity which we are sick of naturally. Christ concealed himself till he saw a fitter time. We shall have glory enough, and be known enough to devils, to angels, and men ere long. Therefore, as Christ lived a hidden life, that is, he was not known what he was, that so he might work our salvation, so let us be content to be hidden men. A true Christian is hidden to the world till the time of manifestation comes. When the time came, Christ then gloriously revealed what he was; so it shall be revealed what we are. In the mean time, let us be careful to do our duty that may please the Spirit of God, and satisfy our own conscience, and leave all the rest to God. Let us meditate, in the fear of God, upon these directions for the guidance of our lives in this particular. 2ff7e9595c
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