John Calvin: The Human Heart Is A Factory of Idols - The Context

You have heard me mention that statement attributed to John Calvin.  It is important enough and I point to it often enough that I wanted to provide ore context.

It is a statement from Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion found in:

• BOOK ONE - The Knowledge of God the Creator 
• CHAPTER XI - It It Unlawful To Attribute a Visible Form To God, And Generally Whoever Sets Up Idols Revolts Against The True God 
• SECTION 8 -  The Origin of Images: Man’s Desire for a Tangible Deity

  and here is the statement with surrounding context:

   .  .  .  From this we may gather that man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols. .  .  . 

.  .  .  Man’s mind, full as it is of pride and boldness, dares to imagine a god according to its own capacity; as it sluggishly plods, indeed is overwhelmed with the crassest ignorance, it conceives an unreality and an empty appearance as God.

To these evils a new wickedness joins itself, that man tries to express in his work the sort of God he has inwardly conceived. Therefore the mind begets an idol; the hand gives it birth. The example of the Israelites shows the origin of idolatry to be that men do not believe God is with them unless he shows himself physically present. .  .  .

.  .  .  Daily experience teaches that flesh is always uneasy until it has obtained some figment like itself in which it may fondly find solace as in an image of God. In almost every age since the beginning of the world, men, in order that they might obey this blind desire, have set up symbols in which they believed God appeared before their bodily eyes.

John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion & 2, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, vol. 1, The Library of Christian Classics (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011), 108–109.

Classic Christian Writers For FREE!

That is correct: Free in the Kindle digital format.  Don't have or use Kindle?  There is a free answer to that: The Kindle app is FREE for computer (Mac and Windows), iPad and tablets and smartphones of all sorts (Appled iPhone, Samsung with Android, Google phones and more).  Get the app and you can get the books free - and read them at no cost on your computer, tablet or phone.  One chapter a day of a classic Christian writer for FREE?!?  At that price, I got over my yearning to "have a physical book in my hand."  Try it.  CLICK HERE to learn more and download the Kindle app.

Of course, all the books I link below are also available in paperback, so there is that option as well.  It's just not free.

My Initial Suggestions

As a start, you will find below links to 5 different classics that I would recommend for personal growth from a favorite author of mine: Andrew Murray, the 19th century South African Dutch Reformed writer.  

Note: many older books are available in "new and updated versions" that I typically advise.  A case in point are my recommendations from Andrew Murray.  Murray has shaped my prayer life probably more than any other single writer.  I did my doctoral dissertatin on him in fact!  But he was educated in Scotland and the Netherlands.  Pastored in South Africa, preaching in their dialect of English, Dutch, Afrikaans and several tribal languages.  Frankly, my usual language is pretty different than his language - even his English.  The "new and updated" versions that I am recommend will alter vocabulary, syntax and a few phrases to make that bridge easier to cross.

CLICK each image for the Amazon Link.

The Prayer Life

With Christ in the School of Prayer

Humility

Divine Healing

Absolute Surrender

Just So You Know: Lakeshore Little People's Place Closing

What does Harderwyk have to do with the closing of the Lakeshore Little People's Place (LLPP) childcare center on our property?  Actually, not much.

I was away at the beach when I first heard about the sudden closing of the childcare center called Lakeshore Little People's Place. I pass by it every day as I come to my office.  It stands between Harderwyk's Red Brick Building where our offices are and the Anchor Gym across the parking lot.  Since hearing about the closure, I have followed the events as reported in The Holland Sentinel and been suprised to read the center consistently referred to as "Lakeshore Little People's Place Harderwyk" or "Harderwyk location."

So what does Harderwyk Ministries have to do with this unfortunate and disruptive series of events?  As I said, not much.

Lakeshore Little People's Place is an independent business with it's own governing board that leases building space from Harderwyk Ministries.  They had four - now only three - different locations in Holland and Hamilton, all of them using building space connected with churches.  Here is what I learned from their website:

How We Started

In 1993, a group of community members noticed a need for local Christian childcare. To ask for help, they contacted the Holland Deacons’ Conference, a coalition of Christian Reformed churches. After exploring many options, it was suggested that churches could partner to provide childcare for the community. In 1997, Lakeshore Little People’s Place opened its doors for the first time, serving twenty preschool children at Maplewood Reformed Church. Our program continued to grow and by August of 1997, we were able to open two additional centers. Today, we serve more than 400 children and families across four locations in the Holland and Hamilton areas. - CLICK HERE for link to site.

Some Observations

Two things stand out to me as I've followed this situation:

This Is Hard For Families of the Children

Wow!  I can only imagine the disruption for the parents of the children served - married couples, single parents, grand-parents helping out.  Less than 48 ours before starting work on Monday, you find out that your pre-school child/ren are without the care that they have been accustomed to!  Hard on parents and disrupting on the children themselves.

Staffing Continues To Be A Challenge For Local Businesses

Harderwyk Ministries has one liaison on the board of LLPP.  They explained to me how that unexpected and sudden resignations by multiple staff made it impossible to open and meet both the safe expectations of families and mandatory state staffing ratios.  While I can't know what led to that situation, I can see the consequences that we all have to deal with.  Ouch all around.

At present, we at Harderwyk have no plans regarding what might be next for the building that we leased to Lakeshore Little People's Place all these past years.  Things happened as unexpectedly for us as it did for the managers of LLPP and families of the children served.  We are gathering facts, generating options and researching costs.  We will see where the Lord leads in the months to come.

For now, our hearts go out to all affected by this sudden turn of events, most of all the children and their families and then the staff and leaders of LLPP. 

Holland Sentinel Articles

May 24 - Lakeshore Little People's Place closes Harderwyk location amid staffing struggles

• CLICK HERE for article.

June 2 - Parents: Sudden childcare center closure was ‘disappointing,’ ‘heartbreaking’

• CLICK HERE for article.

June 6 - Staff, families come together for student celebration after LLPP daycare closure

CLICK HERE for article.