As he defends the absolute necessity and sufficiency of Scripture, Calvin offers some critiques of anabaptist excesses in his own day (Book 1, chapter 9) which apply equally well to the current Pentecostal and charismatic obsession with receiving a direct revelation from God. "Furthermore, those who, having forsaken Scripture, imagine some way or other of reaching God, ought to be thought of as not so much gripped by error as carried away with frenzy." In my experience, it can be very difficult to talk reasonably about the sufficiency of Scripture with someone who believes he has received a direct revelation from God. The supposed reception of such has long seemed to me more a function of one's psychology than one's theology.
Calvin closes the question in this way: "[The Holy Spirit] is the Author of the Scriptures: he cannot vary and differ from himself. Hence he must ever remain just as he once revealed himself there. This is no affront to him, unless perchance we consider it honorable for him to decline or degenerate from himself."
Calvin closes the question in this way: "[The Holy Spirit] is the Author of the Scriptures: he cannot vary and differ from himself. Hence he must ever remain just as he once revealed himself there. This is no affront to him, unless perchance we consider it honorable for him to decline or degenerate from himself."
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