John Bolt remembers his enthusiastic reaction when Anthony Hoekema, a professor of systematic theology at Calvin Theological Seminary, read a section from Herman Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics titled “The Wideness of God’s Mercy.”

“It shows the large catholicity of Bavinck’s vision. It is a very hopeful passage, addressing the question of who and how people are saved,” said Bolt, who attended seminary in the early 1970s and went on to himself become a professor of systematic theology at the seminary.

Reaching for a copy of Bavinck’s book on his desk and paging through to find one of the passages Professor Hoekema had read, Bolt said these words resonated for him and helped to draw him into a years-long study of the 19th-century Dutch theologian and eventually to translating Bavinck’s work into English.

Bolt read: “In fact, at bottom the Reformed confessions are more magnanimous and broader in outlook than any other Christian confession.

“It [Reformed theology] locates the ultimate and most profound source of salvation solely in God’s good pleasure, in his eternal compassion, in his unfathomable mercy, in the unsearchable mysteries of his grace, grace that is both omnipotent and free.”

Bolt discussed Hoekema’s influence on him as part of an early May lecture at the seminary. His presentation was part of the grand opening of the Bavinck Institute Special Collection, a repository of Bavinck research material located in the rare books room of the Hekman Library at Calvin College.

In his lecture, and in an interview in his book-packed office at the seminary, Bolt discussed why Bavinck means so much to him as well as why he and others opened the online Bavinck Institute in 2014, making Bavinck materials available to scholars around the world.

“Why Herman Bavinck? Why at CTS?” asked Bolt. “Because Bavinck’s theology, in its content, but perhaps even more importantly in its method, remains relevant for today.”

In fact, there has been a proliferation of interest in Bavinck among scholars and others lately. Bavinck coffee mugs, T-shirts, and other memorabilia bearing his bearded image have been available online, said Bolt.

Bavinck was born in 1854 in the Netherlands. A prolific writer and seminary professor, he was a contemporary of Abraham Kuyper, with whom he clashed on certain topics such as the reasons behind baptizing children.

Kuyper flirted with the notion that presuming children were regenerated could be among the grounds for baptizing them..

Bavinck, however, saw baptism as the way in which a child is welcomed into the community of believers who are bound together by their covenant with God.

In his work, said Bolt, “Bavinck believed that there is evidence in world religions, in literature and poetry, that we all have a sense of and a need for God. . . . He believed we are broken and need mediation [from Christ] to have access to God.”

Bolt said Bavinck had “an incredibly rich missiological theology. He didn’t want biblical truth to just hang up there. Certainly, God said it, and we believe it, and yet Bavinck” taught and wrote about how this biblical truth “speaks to and clarifies our human experience like no one else does.”

An important part of his own scholarship, said Bolt, has been in joining with several others from the CRC and beyond in the English translation of Bavinck’s four-volume Reformed Dogmatics. The first translated volume was published in 2003, and the final volume came out in 2008.

“We had a sense that the broader evangelical world was badly in need of Bavinck’s theology with its strong intellectual roots,” said Bolt.

And to their surprise, Reformed Dogmatics, essentially Bavinck’s explanation of God’s sovereignty and his relationship to his people, has sold some 15,000 copies of the four-volume set, said Bolt.

While many Reformed churches have purchased it, churches from many other denominations have also bought the book. Since it was published in English, it has been translated into Korean, Portuguese, and Indonesian, and it is currently being translated into Mandarin.

“In my wildest dreams I never thought this would be possible, and now it is wonderful to see that it has been received so well,” said Bolt.

For various reasons, Bavinck’s Reformed Dogmatics wasn’t translated into English for more than 100 years after first being published in 1895, so people had little access to his writing. But people in the CRC and beyond were nonetheless influenced by his thinking in two ways.

First, said Bolt, “CTS students [and others] were indirectly introduced to Bavinck’s dogmatic work through Louis Berkhof’s Systematic Theology, which was first published in 1932. . . . Berkhof, however, did not present his own original theology, it was for the most part, in structure and content, the theology of Herman Bavinck.”

Second, work that Bavinck did on Christian education significantly influenced those who began Calvin College in the 1930s.

In his presentation in May, Bolt quoted early 20th-century Dutch educator T. Van der Kooy to summarize Bavinck’s beliefs:

Christian education is “the fashioning of the whole man. . . . Heart, intellect, and will, with an eye to the whole man’s life.”

As the newly opened special collection of Bavinck materials becomes available, Bolt and a team of editors are busy translating Bavinck’s Reformed Ethics — from a handwritten manuscript Bavinck used for his lectures at the Kampen Theological School in the 1880s and ’90s. The manuscript was not discovered until 2008 and will eventually be available in English in three volumes. The first volume is in the hands of the publisher (Baker Academic) and will come out in summer 2018.

“Bavinck’s ethics were deeply rooted in Scripture and are comprehensive,” said Bolt. “His ethics help people sort out questions of conscience . . . He writes about how to pray and how to read the Bible. In his ethics, the best wisdom of the church of all ages is distilled as he gives his own interpretation.”

Bolt will retire from the seminary at the end of 2017. In all of this work, Bolt has seen the impact Herman Bavinck has had on others. And he is grateful for the part he and Calvin Seminary have had in sharing Bavinck’s insights.

“That is my testimony. . . . He’s our guy and one of our most valuable resources for CTS to bless the worldwide church,” said Bolt.