True Calvinists, I mean those who depend on a majestic Sovereign Lord, in the same way that John Calvin did, do not use John Calvin as a paper pope. Sadly, all too often, Calvinists can and do, do this, which makes them little different to the papists they ejaculate against, yet they are doing exactly the same in blindly following the teachings of Calvin, and what Scripture says about anything, is not first on their agenda, but rather, What did Calvin say.   Sadly there are very many bad examples of Reformed Christians in our cultures today. They may not all be in the above kinds of ways, but apart fromt that they share the same theology and doctrine, they have nothing else in common at all, with their calvinist heritage, beacuse they certainly do not have the spirits or the hearts. Yes, we all have faults and weaknesses, I have my own fair share, and you can most likely say the same. But I am coming to realize more and more than the damge that Calvinists sustain in our world today, is not inflicted by our enemies, but most often by our own hands. By either apart from doctrine and theology, our hearts and spirits are far removed from the passion that those men had to serve God above all else, and the courage they had, that they were willing to lose all, to serve God and their fellow man. And in other instances , of using Calvin as a paper pope. No one would find it more abhorrent than Calvin that his opinion would be preferred over Scripture, because before anything else, Calvin was a student of the Scriptures.  In his Institutes of Christian religion, alone, he used over 7,000 references to Scripture, and his thought, the way he systemized the theology we now know as Calvinism, was all drive by his studying the Scriptures and his high view of God and low view of himself.

If someone is putting Calvin’s opinion over and above and before that of what God’s Holy Writ says, then they are a follower of Calvin, in name at least, but they are not a follower of Christ, or its at least questionable.  No Calvinist, should prefer Calvin above God, or Scripture. No Calvinist worth his or her salt ever will do. And the same goes for the Westminster Standards too and any of the other great reformers or historic creeds of the church.

Jonathan Edwards, at the start of his work on the freedom of the will wrote something intersting about Calvinism vs Arminianism, and the final sentences of this quote pretty much says it all.

That the difference of the opinions of those, who in their general scheme of divinity agree with these two noted men, Calvin, and Arminius, is a thing there is often occasion to speak of, is what the practice of the latter, itself confesses; who are often, in their discourses and writings, taking notice of the supposed absurd and pernicious opinions of the former sort…. Nevertheless, at first I had thoughts of carefully avoiding the use of the appellation “Arminian” in this treatise. But I soon found I should be put to great difficulty by it; and that my discourse would be so encumbered with an often repeated circumlocution, instead of a name, which would express the thing intended, as well and better, that I altered my purpose. And therefore I must ask the excuse of such as are apt to be offended with things of this nature, that I have so freely used the term “Arminian” in the following discourse. I profess it to be without any design, to stigmatize persons of any sort with a name of reproach, or at all to make them appear more odious. If when I had occasion to speak of those divines who are commonly called by this name, I had, instead of styling them Arminians, called them “these men,” as Dr. Whitby does Calvinistic divines; it probably would not have been taken any better, or thought to show a better temper, or more good manners. I have done as I would be done by, in this matter. However the term “Calvinist” is in these days, among most, a term of greater reproach than the term “Arminian”; yet I should not take it at all amiss, to be called a Calvinist, for distinction’s sake: though I utterly disclaim a dependence on Calvin, or believing the doctrines which I hold, because he believed and taught them; and cannot justly be charged with believing in everything just as he taught. [emphasis added]