Portrait of Calvin

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Book by T.H.L. Parker, Foreword by John Piper

This Desiring God reprint of T.H.L. Parker’s classic 1954 biography commemorates the 500th anniversary of Calvin’s birth in 1509. Parker is a former Reader in Theology at the University of Durham in England and an expert on Calvin’s life and thought.

Calvin's words and life point beyond himself to where the crucified and risen Christ sits at the right hand of God. Before he died, he saw to it that there should be no posthumous canonization. He left orders that he should be buried in an unmarked grave. So his death and burial were of one piece with his life. Calvin bent all his energies in life and death to making Jesus Christ alone great, and making that greatness visible.

In his foreword, John Piper writes, “I am eager for people to know Calvin not because he was without flaws, or because he was the most influential theologian of the last 500 years (which he was), or because he shaped Western culture (which he did), but because he took the Bible so seriously, and because what he saw on every page was the majesty of God and the glory of Christ.”

Download this book (PDF).

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