John 5:25 “Truly, truly, I say to you, an hour is coming and now is, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26 For just as the Father has life in Himself, even so He gave to the Son also to have life in Himself; 27 and He gave Him authority to execute judgment, because He is the Son of Man. 28 Do not marvel at this; for an hour is coming, in which all who are in the tombs will hear His voice, 29 and will come forth; those who did the good deeds to a resurrection of life, those who committed the evil deeds to a resurrection of judgment.”
Calvin on “those who did the good deeds”:
[Jesus] points out believers by good works, as he elsewhere teaches that a tree is known by its fruit, (Matth. vii. 16; Luke vi. 44.) He praises their good works, to which they have begun to devote themselves since they were called. For the robber, to whom Christ on the cross (Luke xxiii. 42) promised life, and who had all his life been given up to crimes, expresses a desire to do good with his latest breath; but as he is born again a new man, and from being the slave of sin begins to be a servant of righteousness, the whole course of his past life is not taken into account before God. Besides, the sins themselves, on account of which believers every day subject themselves to condemnation, are not imputed to them. For without the pardon which God grants to those who believe in Him, there never was a man in the world of whom we can say that he has lived well; nor is there even a single work that will be reckoned altogether good, unless God pardon the sins which belong to it, for all are imperfect and corrupted. Those persons, therefore, are here called doers of good works whom Paul calls earnestly desirous or zealous of them, (Titus ii. 14.) But this estimate depends on the fatherly kindness of God, who by free grace approves what deserved to be rejected.
The inference which the Papists draw from those passages—that eternal life is suspended on the merits of works—may be refuted without any difficulty. For Christ does not now treat of the cause of salvation, but merely distinguishes the elect from the reprobate by their own mark; and he does so in order to invite and exhort his own people to a holy and blameless life. And indeed we do not deny that the faith which justifies us is accompanied by an earnest desire to live well and righteously; but we only maintain that our confidence cannot rest on any thing else than on the mercy of God alone.—John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries Volume XVII, Commentary on the Gospel according to John, Volume I (Baker Books, 2009), 209–210.
TrackBack URL: http://www.thirstytheologian.com/mt/mt-tb.cgi/1340
Share this post:
Posted in: Calvin’s Commentaries: John · Gospel of John · John Calvin
Link · 0 TrackBacks
← Previous · Home · Next →
Comments on this post are closed. If you have a question or comment concerning this post, feel free to email us.