John Calvin Quotes
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He makes this favor common to all, because it is propounded to all, and not because it is in reality extended to all; for though Christ suffered for the sins of the whole world, and is offered through God’s benignity indiscriminately to all, yet all do not receive him.
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Hatred grows into insolence when we desire to excel the rest of mankind and imagine we do not belong to the common lot; we even severely and haughtily despise others as our inferiors.
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When our faith is tested by suffering "as gold is tried in a furnace" and we depend with confidence on God and rely entirely on his help, we will be granted the most excellent gift of patience and through faith we may victoriously persevere to the end.
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There is no wisdom but that which is founded on the fear of God, which Solomon also declares to be the chief part of wisdom.
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First of all, Scripture draws our attention to this, that if we want ease and tranquility in our lives, we should resign ourselves and all that we have to the will of God, and at the same time we should surrender our affections to him as our Conqueror and Overlord.
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So great and boundless is God's wisdom that he knows right well how to use evil instruments to do good.
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Against the persecution of a tyrant the godly have no remedy but prayer.
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For though we very truly hear that the kingdom of God will be filled with splendor, joy, happiness and glory, yet when these things are spoken of, they remain utterly remote from our perception, and as it were, wrapped in obscurities, until that day.
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The principle exercise which the children of god have is to pray. For in this way they give true proof of their faith.
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Whensoever God's truth is defaced or when any man turns away from the pure simplicity of the Gospel, we must not in any wise spare him, but although the whole world should set itself against us, yet must we maintain the case with invincible constancy, without bending for any creature.
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There is no golden mean between these two extremes; either this early life must become low in our estimation, or it will have our inordinate love.
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All truth is God's truth.
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There is but one Church in which men find salvation, just as outside the ark of Noah it was not possible for anyone to be saved.
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Accursed is that peace of which revolt from God is the bond, and blessed are those contentions by which it is necessary to maintain the kingdom of Christ.
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There is also an old proverb, that they who pay much attention to the body generally neglect the soul.
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When we come to a comparison of heaven and earth, then we may indeed not only forget all about the present life, but even despise and scorn it.
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When we see that the whole sum of our salvation, and every single part of it, are comprehended in Christ, we must beware of deriving even the minutest portion of it from any other quarter.
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Warned by such evidences of their spiritual illness, believers profit by their humiliations. Robbed of their foolish confidence in the flesh, they take refuge in the grace of God. And when they have done so, they experience the nearness of the divine protection which is to them a strong fortress (Ps 30:6-7).
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Every person, on coming to the knowledge of himself, is not only urged to seek God, but is also led as by the hand to find Him.
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That man is truly humble who neither claims any personal merit in the sight of God, nor proudly despises brethren, or aims at being thought superior to them, but reckons it enough that he is one of the members of Christ, and desires nothing more than that the Head alone should be exalted.
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Where is our acknowledgement of God if our thoughts are fixed on the glamour of our garments?
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But the present life should never be hated, except insofar as it subjects us to sin, although even that hatred should not properly be applied to life itself.
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The vices of which we are full we carefully hide from others, and we flatter ourselves with the notion that they are small and trivial; we sometimes even embrace them as virtues.
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The Creation is quite like a spacious and splendid house, provided and filled with the most exquisite, and at the same time, the most abundant furnishings. Everything in it tells of God.