And I heard a voice from heaven saying unto me, Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them. —Revelation 14:13
But what advantage, you will say, is it to me to have had a son of so much promise, since he has been torn away from me in the first flower of his youth? As if, indeed, Christ had not merited, by his death, the supreme dominion over the living and the dead! And if we belong to him (as we ought) why may he not exercise over us the power of life and of death? However brief, therefore, either in your opinion or in mine, the life of your son may have been, it ought to satisfy us that he has finished the course which the Lord has marked out for him.
Moreover, we may not reckon him to have perished in the flower of his age who had grown ripe in the sight of the Lord. For I consider all to have arrived at maturity who are summoned away by death; unless, perhaps, one would contend with him, as if he can snatch away anyone before his time. This, indeed, holds true of everyone; but in regard to Louis, it is yet more certain on another and peculiar ground. For he had arrived at that age when, by true evidences, he could prove himself a member of the body of Christ: having put forth this fruit, he was taken from us and transplanted. Yes, instead of this transient and vanishing shadow of life, he has regained the real immortality of being.
Nor can you consider yourself to have lost him, whom you will recover in the blessed resurrection in the kingdom of God. For they had both so lived and so died, that I cannot doubt but they are now with the Lord; let us, therefore, press forward toward this goal which they have reached. There can be no doubt but that Christ will bind together both them and us in the same inseparable society, in that incomparable participation of his own glory.
Beware, therefore, that you do not lament your son as lost, whom you acknowledge to be preserved by the Lord, that he may remain yours for ever who, at the pleasure of his own will, lent him to you only for a season.
Nor will you derive small consolation from this consideration, if you only weigh carefully what is left to you. Charles survives to you, of whom we all entertain this sentiment, that there is not one of us who does not desire that he might have such a son. Do not suppose that these expressions are only intended for your hearing, or that there is exaggeration here, in order to bespeak your favor. This is no more my habit than it is my disposition. —Correspondence
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John Calvin (1509 - 1584)
Was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530. After religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where he published the first edition of his seminal work The Institutes of the Christian Religion in 1536.Calvin's writing and preachings provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The Reformed, Congregational, and Presbyterian churches, which look to Calvin as the chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world.
John Calvin was an influential French theologian and pastor during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system of Christian theology later called Calvinism. Originally trained as a humanist lawyer, he broke from the Roman Catholic Church around 1530. After religious tensions provoked a violent uprising against Protestants in France, Calvin fled to Basel, Switzerland, where in 1536 he published the first edition of his seminal work Institutes of the Christian Religion.
Calvin's writing and preaching provided the seeds for the branch of theology that bears his name. The Presbyterian and other Reformed churches, which look to Calvin as a chief expositor of their beliefs, have spread throughout the world. Calvin's thought exerted considerable influence over major religious figures and entire religious movements, such as Puritanism, and some have argued that his ideas have contributed to the rise of capitalism, individualism, and representative democracy in the West.
Founder of Calvinism. John Calvin, a French scholar who became a leading preacher and dominant force in the Reformation of the 16th Century, studied at the University of Paris and at the University of Orleans. He became dissatisfied with the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church and allied himself with the cause of the Protestant Reformation in 1532.
When the king of France decided to settle the religious question in his country in favor of the Catholics, Calvin fled to Geneva, Switzerland, where his writings and lectures made Geneva the Rome of Protestantism. His institutes of the Christian religion became the basis for the Presbyterian way of thought and church life. Calvinism is the main doctrine of the Presbyterian and Reformed Churches.