Books by John Calvin

This book collects for the first time John Calvin's teachings on prayer, taken from his 1559 classic Institutes of the Christian Religion. Calvin scholar John Hesselink puts Calvin's views in context with an introductory essay for the book. A summary and questions for discussion precede each segment of Calvin's text, making this volume ideal...

The name of John Calvin is frequently associated with the doctrine of predestination. Published in 1552 to counteract the criticisms and contrary views being taught by others, this work shows Calvin rigorously defending his controversial position. Readers will witness Calvin masterfully arguing his points, wrestling with scriptures, and fully...

"Here, in these words from his lectures and prayers in the Geneva Academy, John Calvin most fully revealed his heart. As he prepared an international gathering of talented young men for gospel ministry--and not a few for martyrdom--he poured his knowledge into them and prayed fervently with them. Here he models what he sought to teach: if a man would be a pastor he must know God. If he would know God and serve man he must devote himself to prayer and the ministry of the word."- Sinclair B Ferguson"This precious book confirms Calvin's conviction that the Word and prayer work together to develop genuine piety in the Christian. Calvin taught that the Word is God's communication to us, providing us with spiritual food and medicine for spiritual health. Prayer is our communication to God by which we express praise and adoration, and bow in submissive piety before Him. May God mightily use this little volume to foster this spirit of devotion in many hearts and lives."-Dr. Joel R. Beeke

These forty-six letters and writings of John Calvin, translated into English, demonstrate how Calvin applied the theology of the Institutes and the biblical exegesis of his commentaries to issues of everyday life. Here, Calvin gives advice to individuals and groups about theology, ethics, worship, politics, economics, and church practices...

The translator has done a truly excellent job of putting Calvin's work into a very readable English format. If you have ever wanted to read Calvin, here is your chance. Frankly, one might compare the study of Calvin to the opportunity to either sit with Christ on the mount or later to hear Matthew retell the story. Why go to a secondary source when Calvin is so easy to understand and so readily available in this edition? These pages bring Calvin right into your living room, where you learn the reformed faith first hand. To sum it up: Pastor, student, or layman, if you don't have this work in your study collection, such a collection is incomplete. Complete enough to suit the demands of the scholar, written so the average layman can understand, here is John Calvin. This is a terrific tool in understanding our Reformed faith from the very father of the reformation that led to the Presbyterian Church.

This translation of Calvin's enlightening book includes the essentials of his position on how one should think and live as a Christian. Keeping Calvin's intentions for a clear and simple text in mind, Paul Fugrmann presents an edition that has value for people who have a scholarly interest in the Reformed tradition and for lay readers who wish...

In this classic devotional, John Calvin urges readers to apply the Christian life in a balanced way to mind, heart, and hand. Rather than focusing on contemplative otherworldliness, the book stresses the importance of a devotedly active Christian life. In style and spirit, this book is much like Augustine's Confessions, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, or Thomas à Kempis's Imitation of Christ. However, its intense practicality sets it apart, making it easily accessible for any reader seeking to carry out Christian values in everyday life. Chapter themes include obedience, self-denial, the significance of the cross, and how we should live our lives today.

This selection of the writings of John Calvin (1509—1564) is the first for general readers to appear in many years. It showcases his powerful legacy, which has had far-reaching consequences for the development of religion and culture in Western Europe and in the shaping of American identity.Calvin was a prodigious preacher and writer, and his sermons, Bible commentaries, tracts, and letters fill dozens of volumes. The works chosen for John Calvin: Steward of God's Covenant highlight ideas central to the Reformation but also to his influence on modern life, e.g., the importance of a work ethic and the notion of being "called” to action in the world; his belief in universal education for boys and girls; and his belief in the sanctity and freedom of individual conscience. Calvin's theology of the "elect” of God motivated the English and Dutch Calvinists who settled the Atlantic seaboard, their Promised Land. The traditions of their communities and churches and laws produced the widespread present-day American belief in a divinely favored national destiny. In her brilliant preface to this edition, Pulitzer Prize—winning novelist Marilynne Robinson makes the clearest connection between John Calvin's own biblical and patristic heritage and the heritage he in turn left the modern world.

This volume presents texts selected from the full range of John Calvin's writings, including excerpts from commentaries, sermons, letters, catechisms, tracts, broad-based theological works.

Martin Luther and John Calvin were the principal 'magistral' Reformers of the sixteenth-century: they sought to enlist the cooperation of rulers in the work of reforming the Church. However, neither regarded the relationship between Reformed Christians and the secular authorities as comfortable or unproblematic. The two pieces translated here, Luther's On Secular Authority and Calvin's On Civil Government, constitute their most sustained attempts to find the proper balance between these two commitments. Despite their mutual respect, there were wide divergences between them. Luther's On Secular Authority would later be cited en bloc in favour of religious toleration, whereas Calvin envisaged secular authority as an agency for the compulsory establishment of the external conditions of Christian virtue and the suppression of dissent. The introduction, glossary, chronology and bibliography contained in this volume locate the texts in the broader context of the theology and political thinking of their authors.