New Book on the Way: The Expository Genius of John Calvin

Yesterday, after hearing about it at Challies.com, I ordered The Expository Genius of John Calvin a book by Steven Lawson in his A Long Line of Godly Men series. Calvin is one of those people who have been much maligned in recent years, to the point that where I live in NC, the term Calvinism is practically synonymous with the heresy of Hyper-Calvinism. I find that sad, and am quite interested in learning more about the man that Karl Barth described as follows:

Calvin is a cataract, a primeval forest, a demonic power, something directly down from Himalaya, absolutely Chinese, strange, mythological; I lack completely the means, the suction cups, even to assimilate this phenomenon, not to speak of presenting it adequately. What I receive is only a thin little stream and what I can then give out again is only a yet thinner extract of this little stream. I could gladly and profitably set myself down and spend all the rest of my life just with Calvin (Letter to Eduard Thurneysen, June 8, 1922).

I’ll write up a review once the book is in and I’ve had a chance to read and (hopefully) digest it.