Calvin on the Word as the power in the Sacraments
While I was in seminary, a new Calvinism was flourishing among Evangelicals in the United States. Well, to be honest, a partial Calvinism was flourishing. The Calvinism then (and still) popular among American Evangelicals like John MacArthur, John Piper, Albert Mohler, Mark Dever, and others was a Calvinism that was limited to following Calvin on the “doctrines of grace” when it came to salvation. Men like these, all baptists, have very little room for Calvin when it comes to his teaching on the sacraments.
Here is an excerpt I ran across recently from John Calvin's commentary on John 20. Here, he takes a very Augustinian view on the power of the sacraments as coming from the joining of the sacramental act with the word or promises of Christ:
But let the reader observe, that with the visible and outward sign the word is also joined; for this is the source from which the sacraments derive their efficacy; not that the efficacy of the Holy Spirit is contained in the word which sounds in our ears, but because the effect of all those things which believers receive from the sacraments depends on the testimony of the word. Christ breathes on the Apostles: they receive not only the breathing, but also the Spirit. And why, but because Christ promises to them?
In like manner, in baptism we put on Christ, (Galatians 3:27,) we are washed by his blood, (Revelation 1:5,) our old man is crucified, (Romans 6:6,) in order that the righteousness of God may reign in us. In the Holy Supper we are spiritually fed with the flesh and blood of Christ. Whence do they derive so great efficacy but from the promise of Christ, who does and accomplishes by his Holy Spirit what he declares by his word? Let us therefore learn, that all the sacraments which men have contrived are nothing else than absolute mockeries or frivolous amusements, because the signs can have no truth unless they be accompanied by the word of the Lord. Now, since we never sport in this manner with sacred things, without wickedly pouring contempt on God and ruining souls, we ought to be most carefully on our guard against those stratagems of Satan.
Here Calvin sounds almost like Luther. Indeed, there is very little for this Lutheran to quibble with here. If only Calvin's contemporary followers read and taught more of what Calvin actually taught!