People tend to either vilify Calvin or hold him up as the standard by which all of Christian thought must be measured. For either, I found this helpful. A Respost by Justin Taylor.
Calvin on the Good News in Christ
From John Calvin’s preface to Pierre-Robert Olivétan’s 1535 translation of the Bible.
“To all those who love Christ and his gospel,” Calvin writes:
Without the gospel
everything is useless and vain;
without the gospel
we are not Christians;
without the gospel
all riches is poverty,
all wisdom, folly before God;
strength is weakness, and
all the justice of man is under the condemnation of God.
But by the knowledge of the gospel we are made
children of God,
brothers of Jesus Christ,
fellow townsmen with the saints,
citizens of the Kingdom of Heaven,
heirs of God with Jesus Christ,
by whom
the poor are made rich,
the weak strong,
the fools wise,
the sinners justified,
the desolate comforted,
the doubting sure, and
slaves free.
The gospel is the Word of life.
In Institutes 2.16.19 he explains that “We see that our whole salvation and all its parts are comprehended in Christ [Acts 4:12]. We should therefore take care not to derive the least portion of it from anywhere else.”
If we seek salvation
we are taught by the very name of Jesus that it is “of him.”
If we seek any other gifts of the Spirit,
they will be found in his anointing.
If we seek strength,
it lies in his dominion;
if purity,
in his conception;
if gentleness,
it appears in his birth. For by his birth he was made like us in all respects that he might learn to feel our pain.
If we seek redemption,
it lies in his passion;
if acquittal,
in his condemnation;
if remission of the curse,
in his cross;
if satisfaction,
in his sacrifice;
if purification,
in his blood;
if reconciliation,
in his descent into hell;
if mortification of the flesh,
in his tomb;
in newness of life,
in his resurrection;
if immortality,
in the same;
if inheritance of the Heavenly Kingdom,
in his entrance into heaven;
if protection, if security, if abundant supply of all blessings,
in his Kingdom;
if untroubled expectation of judgment,
in the power given to him to judge.
In short, since rich store of every kind of good abounds in him, let us drink our fill from this fountain and from no other.