Tracts & Letters (Vol 2) - Calvin - IX - Chapter 9 continued (Second defence of the pious...)

Required reading
Tracts and Letters (Volume 2) by John Calvin (Available from Amazon or free here).  Continue Chapter IX (Second defence of the pious and orthodox faith concerning the sacraments, in answer to the calumnies of Joachim Westphal) by reading up to the paragraph commencing 'The matter now controverted between us, viz., Whether unbelievers receive the substance of the flesh of Christ without his Spirit, is peculiarly applicable to the Supper.' (page 305 of the Banner edition).

My summary
Today we carry on with Calvin's second defence against Westphal by reading Calvin's responses to Westphal's nine charges against Calvin. 

Westphal charges Calvin with:
(i) overturning the faith of the Church;
(ii) making the taking of the body and blood to consist in the spiritual fruition of Christ so that eating the flesh and drinking the blood is nothing else than believing in Christ;
(iii) denying the true presence of the body and blood when he infers the absence of Christ in respect of his body;
(iv) defaming those who hold that the true flesh of Christ is distributed in the supper;
(v) regarding the faith of the church as a dream;
(vi) making the bread and wine to be the body and blood of Christ in the same sense that to the fathers of old the manna was spiritual food, and the rock was Christ;
(vii) exhibiting a Supper devoid of Christ;
(viii) having no belief at all in any real distribution of the flesh of Christ in the supper;
(ix) making void the Supper because he sends unbelievers empty away;

What grabbed me
Calvin made a very good point about Christ exhibiting himself in the word without meaning he is physically present: 'But Christ exhibits himself in the word and sacraments. This we deny not : only let the nature of the exhibition be explained. As Westphal here points to the promises, he must necessarily admit that the presence of Christ is manifested without the use of the Supper as well as in the Supper. The promise of Christ is, " I am with you always, even to the end of the world ;" and again, " Where two or three are met together in my name, there am I in the midst of them," He will say, that there is no mention of flesh and blood. What ? Is not the whole and entire Christ, God manifest in the flesh ? I hold, therefore, that there also Christ is in a certain sense to be sought.'

If Christ is with us when two or three gather and yet is not physically present, why it is so hard to believe that he is with us at the Lord's supper and yet not physically present?

Next week's reading
Conclude Chapter IX (Second defence of the pious and orthodox faith concerning the sacraments, in answer to the calumnies of Joachim Westphal).

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.