John Calvin - God Quotes

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Indeed, a Christian ought to be disposed and prepared to keep in mind that he has to reckon with God every moment of his life.

John Calvin
A soul, therefore, when deprived of the Word of God, is given up unarmed to the devil for destruction

John Calvin
God works in his elect in two ways: inwardly, by his Spirit; outwardly, by his Word.

John Calvin
Now the great thing is this: we are consecrated and dedicated to God in order that we may thereafter think, speak, meditate, and do, nothing except to his glory. For a sacred thing may not be applied to profane uses without marked injury to him.

John Calvin
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.

John Calvin
But as a heathen tells us, there is no nation so barbarous, no race so brutish as not to be imbued with the conviction that there is a God.

John Calvin
Since no daily responses are given from heaven, and the Scriptures are the only record in which God has been pleased to consign His truth to perpetual remembrance, the full authority which they ought to possess with the faithful is not recognized unless they are believed to have come from heaven as directly as if God had been heard giving utterance to them.

John Calvin
He who has learned to look to God in everything he does is at the same time diverted from all vain thoughts.

John Calvin
But, as sculpture and painting are gifts of God, what I insist on is, that both shall be used purely and lawfully, that gifts which the Lord has bestowed upon us, for His glory and our good, shall not be preposterously abused, nay, shall not be perverted to our destruction.

John Calvin
But those who wish to prove to unbelievers that Scripture is the Word of God are acting foolishly, for only by faith can this be known.

John Calvin
It is a very important consideration that we are consecrated and dedicated to God; it means that we may think, speak, meditate, or do anything only with a view to his glory.

John Calvin
To know God as the sovereign disposer of all good, inviting us to present our requests, and yet not to approach or ask of him, were so far from availing us, that it were just as if one told of a treasure were to allow it to remain buried in the ground.

John Calvin
We are not to reflect on the wickedness of men but to look to the image of God in them, an image which, covering and obliterating their faults, an image which, by its beauty and dignity, should allure us to love and embrace them.

John Calvin
As by the revolt of the first man, the image of God could be effaced from his mind and soul, so there is nothing strange in His shedding some rays of grace on the reprobate, and afterwards allowing these to be extinguished.

John Calvin
Elisabeth, again, while she praises her, is so far from hiding the Divine glory, that she ascribes everything to God. And yet, though she acknowledges the superiority of Mary to herself and to others, she does not envy her the higher distinction, but modestly declares that she had obtained more than she deserved.

John Calvin
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'.

John Calvin
For it is better, with closed eyes, to follow God as our guide, than, by relying on our own prudence, to wander through those circuitous paths which it devises for us.

John Calvin
But a most pernicious error widely prevails that Scripture has only so much weight as is conceded to it by the consent of the church. As if the eternal and inviolable truth of God depended upon the decision of men!

John Calvin
God orders what we cannot do, that we may know what we ought to ask him.

John Calvin
Without the fear of God, men do not even observe justice and charity among themselves.

John Calvin
For until men recognize that they owe everything to God, that they are nourished by His fatherly care, that He is the Author of their every good, that they should seek nothing beyond Him - they will never yield Him willing service. Nay, unless they establish their complete happiness in Him, they will never give themselves truly and sincerely to Him.

John Calvin
Now we must remark, that there are two parts in the Commandment-the first forbids the erection of a graven image, or any likeness; the second prohibits the transferring of the worship which God claims for Himself alone, to any of these phantoms or delusive shows.

John Calvin
A man will be justified by faith when, excluded from righteousness of works, he by faith lays hold of the righteousness of Christ, and clothed in it, appears in the sight of God not as a sinner, but as righteous...

John Calvin
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).

John Calvin
Man is never sufficiently touched and affected by the awareness of his lowly state until he has compared himself with God's majesty.

John Calvin