Mentors

Calvin did not burst onto the preaching scene without intriguing role models. T. H. L. Parker reminds us before Calvin there was "a Luther, a Bernard, an Augustine-- and, above all, an Origen."22 Origen caused a far reaching change in homiletic methods. Before him the preacher had not taken a text, but spoke upon a theme which he illustrated or proved, by the quotation of certain scripture. Origen made the sermon an exposition of Scripture.23 This method strongly influenced Calvin and his homilies formed a continuous exegesis of a particular book or portion of Scripture. Farley notes that in addition to Origen, "it was perhaps the New Testament exegeses of John Chrysostom of Antioch and Constantinople that most appealed to Calvin.24

The influence of Origen's relating the sermon to a specific text gave Calvin the view of the preacher as by no means a free agent, working on his own behalf, but a minister verbi divini, the minister or servant of the word of God.25 Taken to extreme, this attitude could lead to blind biblicism, "a religion of the letter, rather that the Spirit."26

The Spirit has been promised to the church to lead her into all truth, with the Bible as the basis, the source and the criterion of preaching, because without it we would have no knowledge about Jesus Christ. And we believe that the word the Scriptures speak is the word of God Himself. "It is a high eulogy on heavenly truth, that we obtain through it a sure salvation; and this is added that we may learn to seek and love and magnify the word as a treasure that is incomparable."27

Calvin's position on the relation of the text to the sermon is summarized by Parker in this way:

"Preaching is exposition in the sense of interpreting the Scriptures to the congregation. This is no unnecessary task, for the modern man, with all his admirable civilization is as far from having the mind of Christ as the most depraved and ignorant savage. What our congregations need to know above all else, is to know what God says to them. Hence our task in the pulpit is not to set before them our own thoughts or our own experiences, however lofty they may be, but to tell them what the Bible says, and to tell it in such a way that the sermon is not a simple lesson in Biblical theology, but an application of the Gospel contained in the Bible teach the Bible. He wanted the Word of Christ to rule in the hearts of men, and change their attitudes and actions in the world in which they lived. Calvin was not timid in stepping on toes as he preached. Potter and Greengrass support this observation, stating, "Few subjects of contemporary interest escape Calvin's attention during his sermons and lectures."29 An example of Calvin's direct and confrontational application sheds light on this phenomenon:

"Women have been allowed for a long time to become increasingly audacious. And besides, speech apart, they wear such provocative clothes that it is hard to discern whether they are women or men. They appear in new dresses and trinkets, so that some new disguise is daily to be seen. They come decked out in peacock-tail fashion, so that a man cannot pass within three feet of them without feeling, as it were, a windmill sail swirling past him. Ribald songs, too, are part of their behavior."30