Hope and Holiness (1)

by Rev. Dale Kuiper, an article in Standard Bearer, vol. 76, issue 2

“Beloved, now are we the children of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope purifies himself, even as he is pure” (I John 3:2-3).

It is an amazing fact of church history that when the Reformers battled hard against salvation by the works of the law, they did not throw away the baby with the bath water. They did not throw out the biblical doctrine of good works with the foul water of works’ righteousness. They insisted, against Rome, that salvation was by faith alone without man’s works in any sense. That they gave large and proper place to good works of thankfulness as the fruits of salvation was due to their humble submission to the Scriptures. For them, all theology, all doctrine, all matters of the Christian life were ruled by Scripture alone. They went where Scripture sent them; they emphasized what Scripture stressed. This was true of Martin Luther and this was true of John Calvin. We will restrict ourselves in this article to the teachings of John Calvin as delineated in his Institutes of the Christian Religion, especially the section entitled “The Lord of the Christian.” We will examine his teaching in connection with the return of Jesus Christ at the end of the world, and the Christian’s lively hope for that return. (All references and quotations are taken from volume 1 of the Institutes, translated by John Allen [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1949.)

Hope is the expectant, certain longing that burns within the child of God for the bodily return of Jesus Christ at the end of the ages to take His church unto Himself and to make all things new. Hope is expectancy. It looks forward into the unseen future, when God’s promise is fully come; for hope that is seen is not hope, but a man hopes for what is not seen. Hope is certainty. Without a shadow of a doubt, without any fear of being put to shame, the saint is absolutely convinced, not only that Christ will return, but also of his own part in the great resurrection unto glory and life. And hope is longing. With patience we wait for it, but it is never out of our hearts and minds. We cannot wait, even as we must wait!

Every aspect of hope is based on the resurrection of our Saviour from the dead, for we read in I Peter 1:3 that we have been “begotten again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” Christ’s resurrection is a sample of our resurrection. As He was raised up the third day as our Head, so shall it be with every member of His body. His resurrection is the proof of our inheritance. God raised Him up in announcement that His justice was satisfied and the title to our inheritance secured. Christ’s resurrection is the power of the new life. When His heavenly life is given us in regeneration, we have all of Christ, including the blessed hope.

Hope is really the power of the Christian’s life as he makes his pilgrimage through this present life. Hope keeps him on the way to Zion, correcting him when he goes astray. Hope powerfully encourages him when he is weary, disappointed, and doubtful. And hope is the power that sanctifies him as long as he is in the body of this death. He who has this hope purifies himself!

Calvin grounds the life of holiness, first, in the divine admonition, “Be ye holy; for I am holy” (I Pet. 1:16). In language that breathes covenant theology, and that hints at the covenant as friendship, he sees the purpose of salvation that God might associate Himself with us. “When we hear any mention of our union with God, we should remember that holiness must be the bond of it; not that we attain communion with Him by the merit of holiness, but because it is the peculiar property of His glory not to have intercourse with iniquity and uncleanness” (p. 747). Further, because our future is to inhabit the holy city of Jerusalem which God has consecrated to Himself, this heavenly city cannot be occupied by impure inhabitants. “Lord, who shall abide in thy tabernacle? Who shall dwell in thy holy hill? He that walketh uprightly and worketh righteousness, and speaketh the truth in his heart” (Ps. 15:1-2).

Secondly, Calvin grounds the Christian’s holiness in the pattern that God has provided, that we should be conformed to the image of His Son (Rom. 6:4; 8:29). Since Christ has reconciled us to God from our degenerate, fallen state, we should exhibit His character in our lives. He argues that since God has revealed Himself to us as Father, since Christ has purified us in His blood, since the Spirit has dedicated us as temples to God, it would be the basest ingratitude on our part if we did not “exert our most strenuous efforts to preserve our bodies and souls pure and uncorrupt till the day of the Lord” (p. 748).

The French Reformer was no perfectionist. He did not insist that one who breathes anything other than the perfect gospel cannot be a Christian. He did not require evangelical perfection. For then all would be excluded from the church. “What then? Let us set before our eyes the mark, to which alone our pursuit must be directed. Let that be prescribed as the goal towards which we earnestly tend. For it is not lawful for you to make such a compromise with God, as to undertake a part of the duties prescribed to you in His word, and to omit part of them at your pleasure” (p. 749).

Encouraging us always to strive, reminding us that growth in sanctification comes with small, daily steps, he holds before us the victory that is ours when Christ returns. “Til we have arrived at a perfection of goodness, which indeed we seek and pursue as long as we live, and shall then attain, when divested of all corporeal infirmity, we shall be admitted by God into complete communion with Him” (p. 750).

Holiness involves the Christian in a twofold, simultaneous action: separating himself from sin and dedicating himself to God, or fleeing from sin and fleeing to God. Calvin finds a large part of holiness, therefore, in self-denial. He discovers the principle of the Christian life in Romans 12:1-2, that we are to present our bodies as living sacrifices to God, by not being conformed to the world, but by being renewed in our minds. And he shows the reasonableness of this kind of service since we are not our own but the Lord’s. In language that anticipates the Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 1, he writes, “We are not our own; therefore neither our reason nor our will should predominate in our deliberations and actions. We are not our own; therefore let us, as far as possible, forget ourselves and all things that are ours. We are not our own; therefore let us not propose it as our end, to seek what may be expedient for us according to the flesh. On the contrary, we are God’s; to Him, therefore, let us live and die. We are God’s; towards Him, therefore, as our only legitimate end, let every part of our lives be directed. O, how great a proficiency has that man made, who, having been taught that he is not his own, has taken the sovereignty and government of himself from his own reason, to surrender it to God” (pp. 751-752)!