John Calvin Quotes
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The happiness promised us in Christ does not consist in outward advantages-such as leading a joyous and peaceful life, having rich possessions, being safe from all harm, and abounding with delights such as the flesh commonly longs after. No, our happiness belongs to the heavenly life!
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Justification by faith is the hinge on which all true religion turns.
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If we are proud of our talents we betray our lack of gratitude to God.
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Christians rejoice even while they truly sorrow - because their rejoicing is in the hope of heaven... While joy overcomes sorrow, it does not put an end to it.
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God does not bestow his spirit on his people in order to set aside the use of his word, but rather to render it fruitful.
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We are not to look to what men in themselves deserve but to attend to the image of God which exists in all and to which we owe all honor and love.
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Angels are the dispensers and administrators of the divine beneficence toward us.
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How do we know that God has elected us before the creation of the world? By believing in Jesus Christ.
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Nothing, including human suffering, happens by chance.
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...nothing good can proceed from our will until it be formed again, and that after it is formed again in so far as it is good, it is of God, and not of us.
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Nevertheless, our constant efforts to lower our estimate of the present world should not lead us to hate life or to be ungrateful toward God. For this life, though it is full of countless miseries, deserves to be reckoned among the divine blessings which should not be despised. Therefore, if we discover nothing of God's goodness in it, we are already guilty of no small ingratitude toward him.
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If we believe heaven to be our country, it is better for us to transmit our wealth thither, than to retain it here, where we may lose it by a sudden removal.
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The name of Christ excludes all merit of our own.
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It is amazing how much our lack of trust provokes God if we request of him a boon that we do not expect.
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For so great is the difference between just and unjust, that it is visible even in the lifeless image of it. For what order will be left in the world, if these opposites be confounded together? Such a distinction as this, therefore, between virtuous and vicious actions, has not only been engraven by the Lord in the heart of every man, but has also been frequently confirmed by his providential dispensations.
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The pastor ought to have two voices: one, for gathering the sheep; and another, for warding off and driving away wolves and thieves. The Scripture supplies him with the means of doing both.
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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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For, since the fall of Adam had brought disgrace upon all his posterity, God restores those, whom He separates as His own, so that their condition may be better than that of all other nations. At the same time it must be remarked, that this grace of renewal is effaced in many who have afterwards profaned it
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Now among the other things proper to recreate man and give him pleasure, music is either the first or one of the principal;and we must think that it is a gift of God deputed for that purpose'.
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There are sons of God who do not yet appear so to us, but now do so to God; and there are those who, on account of some arrogated or temporal grace, are called so by us, but are not so to God.
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All our words ought to be filled with true sweetness and grace; and this will be so if we mingle the useful with the sweet.
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The human heart has so many crannies where vanity hides, so many holes where falsehood works, is so decked out with deceiving hypocrisy, that it often dupes itself.
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Hence that dread and amazement with which as Scripture uniformly relates holy men were struck and overwhelmed whenever they beheld the presence of God. Men are never duly touched and impressed with a conviction of their insignificance until they have.
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We are nowhere forbidden to laugh, or be satisfied with food...or to be delighted with music or to drink wine.