...Christian faith, being God's witness in us, can be understood only as the answer to this interior and intimate self-witnessing of the God who opens up the secrets of his Heart as he gives himself to humanity. This is a first and most formal affirmation, and one which must proceed all those particular modalities which are related to man's concrete condition: his sinful turning away from God, his blindness and obstinacy, and finally, those things which grace works in him - his conversion, his breaking, his humbling and his exultation. Faith is participation in the free self-disclosure of God's interior life and light, just as the spiritual nature of the creature means participation in the unveild-ness of all reality, which in one way or another must also include the divine reality. The created spirit does not "deduce" this reality (in which God is included in whatever way) from indications and logical premises; as spirit, it is from the very start set in the light of this reality, at the same time thinking from within it and directing its thought toward it - (Hans Urs von Balthasar The Glory of the Lord p. 157).
I'm working on a paper on the topic of divine sovereignty and human freedom. Occasionally on this topic (or the subtopic of election) you will hear people through out the barb at strong Calvinists that they're 'being more Calvinist than Calvin.' After having read Calvin carefully on the issue I don't think that there's any validity to that charge. I don't see a material difference here between Calvin and say John Piper. Here are several quotes from the Institutes to prove my point. 'All events are governed by God's secret plan.' I.xvi.2 'Governing heaven and earth by his providence, he also so regulates all things that nothing takes place without his deliberation.' I.xvi.3 'Nothing happens except what is knowingly and willingly decreed by him.' I.xvi.3 Calvin explicitly rejects a limited providence, 'one that by a general motion revolves and drives the system of the universe, with its several parts, but which does not specifc
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