JOHN CALVIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 32, 6 August 1936, Page 27

JOHN CALVIN

COMMEMORATION SERVICE

The four, hundredth anniversary! of the settlement of John Calvin in Geneva was "celebrated :by the Presbytery of Wellington, last night by a service bf commemoration the Kelburn Presbyterian Church;:* The- Kelburn Churc,h was selected because.it •■ is similar in plan to Calvin's Church at Geiiieya.;;■ The f service was conducted by ihe'' Moderator" of' the Presbytery, the Rev. D. M. HercUs, the ,Rev. J. S. Murray, and the Rev. J. R. Blanchard. The sermon was preached by the Rev. J. R. Blanchard, who said" that the Reformation flowed in. three streams—the Lutheran, the Anglican, and the Reformed Church, which had taken root in many lands. In the Reformed, Church grew up the Presbyterian form of ecclesiastical constitution. It might be said that the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand owed more to John Knox than to Calvin, but Calvin was Knox's master. Knox accepted the call to Europe at the call of Calvin,. and Knox was in constant touch with', Calvin. Therefore the Presbyterian Church, whose more immediate ecclesiastical ancestry was Scottish, commemoratedl Calvin. Some of the eternal truths of Calvin were dwelt upon by the preacher, who said that one was the sovereignty of God, God was the Eternal Judge and Lawgiver. Calvin taught definitely that the Church existed as the result of a creative act of God, and was necessary to the true Christian life. Calvin succeeded because he was the most Christian man of his generation. Mr. Blanchard said that there was in Calvin a voice declaring that which could save Europe today. It was not that it called us to go back 400 years, but that it called us to look to see once more contained in Calvin those eternal truths which no time coulfi destroy; and to declare those further truths to which they pointed, and which Calvin was not able to see, but which this generation might see.