Reason #10: Calvin models for us how to teach and practice evangelism and missions.

One of the most fallacious charges against Calvin is that he did not fuel a passion for evangelism and missions. Others assert that Calvin was responsible for relighting the torch of biblical evangelism during the reformation and thus should be credited with being a theological father of the reformed missionary movement. Views of Calvin’s attitude toward evangelism and missions have ranged on the positive side from hearty to moderate support, and on the negative side from silent indifference to active opposition. Calvin’s teaching and his practice both confirm that he was a model evangelist. Calvin taught evangelism in a general way by earnestly proclaiming the gospel and by reforming the church according to biblical requirements. More specifically, Calvin taught evangelism by focusing on the universality of Christ’s kingdom and the responsibility of Christians to help extend that realm.

Calvin asserted that both God’s sovereignty and our responsibility are involved in evangelism. The work of evangelism is ultimately God’s work, not ours, but God uses us as His instruments. Calvin writes that the gospel “does not fall from the clouds like rain,” but is “brought by the hands of men to where God has sent it.” God “uses our work and summons us to be his instruments in cultivating his field.” The power to save rests with God, but He reveals His salvation through the preaching of the gospel. God’s evangelism thus causes our evangelism.22 He allows us to participate in “the honor of constituting his own Son governor over the whole world.”

According to Calvin, this convergence of divine sovereignty and human responsibility in evangelism means that we must pray daily for the extension of Christ’s kingdom.24 We should not become discouraged by a lack of visible success in evangelism but pray on, believing that “Christ shall manifestly exercise the power given to him for our salvation and for that of the whole world.” We must also diligently work for the extension of Christ’s kingdom, knowing that our work will not be in vain.

We evangelize for many reasons, Calvin says: God commands us to do so, God leads us by His own example, evangelism is our duty to God, we want to glorify Him0 and please Him,1 we are grateful to Him,2 and evangelism is our duty to fellow sinners.

Calvin taught we must make full use of the opportunities God gives to evangelize. “When an opportunity for edification presents itself, we should realize that a door has been opened for us by the hand of God in order that we may introduce Christ into that place and we should not refuse to accept the generous invitation that God thus gives us,” he wrote. On the other hand, when opportunities are restricted and doors of evangelism are closed to our witness, we should not persist in trying to do what cannot be done. rather, we should pray and seek other opportunities. “The door is shut when there is no hope of success. [Then] we have to go a different way rather than wear ourselves out in vain efforts to get through it,” Calvin wrote.

“Difficulties in witnessing, however, are not an excuse to stop trying. To those suffering severe restrictions and persecutions in France, Calvin wrote: “Let every one strive to attract and win over to Jesus Christ those whom he can.”

Calvin practiced what he taught. His efforts can be categorized into four concentric circles. First, Calvin evangelized in his local congregation of Geneva, beginning with preaching. Calvin reached out to unsaved people through his preaching, impressing them with the necessity of faith in Christ and what that meant. Calvin made it clear that he did not believe everyone in his flock was saved. Though charitable toward church members who maintained a commendable outward lifestyle, he referred more than thirty times in his commentaries and nine times in his Institutes (only counting references within .21 to .24) to the small numbers of those who received the preached Word with saving faith. “If the same sermon is preached, say, to a hundred people, twenty receive it with the ready obedience of faith, while the rest hold it valueless, or laugh, or hiss, or loathe it,” Calvin said.

Second, Calvin used preaching as a tool to spread the reformation throughout the city of Geneva. On Sundays, the Genevan Ordinances required sermons in each of the three churches at day-break and at 9 a.m. at noon, children went to catechism classes. at  p.m., sermons were preached again in each church. Weekday sermons were scheduled at various times in the three churches on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. By the time Calvin died, a sermon was preached in every church nearly each day of the week.

Third, Calvin sought to evangelize all of Europe. The reputation and influence of the Genevan community spread to neighboring France, then to Scotland, England, the Netherlands, parts of western Germany, and sections of Poland and Hungary. Calvin increasingly viewed Geneva as a kind of model for the reformed movement and for Christ’s reign throughout the world.

Inspired by Calvin’s ecumenical vision, Geneva became a nucleus from which evangelism spread throughout the world. In 1561 alone, 142 men were sent out from the Geneva academy on missions to different places in the world. That is an amazing accomplishment for an effort that began with a small church struggling within a tiny city-republic.

Finally, Calvin became involved in overseas missions, most notably, a mission effort among the Indians in Brazil. With the help of a Huguenot sympathizer, Gaspard de Coligny, admiral of France, and the support of Henry II, then king of France, Nicolas Durand (also called Villegagnon; 1510–1571) led an expedition to Brazil in 1555 to establish a colony. When trouble erupted in the new colony near rio de Janeiro, Villegagnon turned to the Huguenots in France, asking for better settlers. He also appealed to Coligny, to Calvin, and to the church in Geneva.

The Company of pastors chose two ministers and eleven laymen to send to Brazil. as Neal Hegeman writes:

The first protestant congregation in the New World was started in Coligny, Brazil, in april of 1557. The Coligny expedition turned out to be short lived as the Vice admiral Nicholas Durand de Vil- legagnon (1510–1571) betrayed the French Huguenots and the colonists. The fruit of the first protestant entrance into the New World was the martyrdom of Jean du Bordel, Matthieu Vermeil, and pierre Bourdon, who died at the hands of Villegagnon. These men wrote the “Coligny Confession,” the first confessional and theological document to be written in the New World.

Later, the Portuguese destroyed the remainder of the settlement. Calvin was clearly interested in spreading the gospel overseas, but that interest was limited by time constraints, his work at home, and by government restrictions. Nearly every door to the heathen world was closed to Calvin and fellow reformers. The world of Islam to the south and east was guarded by Turkish armies, while the navies of Spain and Portugal prevented access to the recently discovered New World. additionally, most of the governments in Europe were controlled by roman Catholic princes, kings, and emperors. The conclusion is seamless: both Calvin’s writings and practice showed his large heart for evangelism to extend the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ to the ends of the earth. establishing the heavenly reign of God upon earth was so important, Calvin said, that it “ought not only to occupy the chief place among our cares, but even absorb all our thoughts.”

(Taken with permission from Joel Beeke’s, Calvin for Today)

His book is a fascinating glimpse into the young and formative years of John Calvin. While much of the book is worth sharing, I was particularly impressed with Blackburn’s account of Calvin’s encounter with the one only referred to as, the hermit of Livry. The hermit’s presentation of the Gospel and evangelistic vigor was both encouraging and convicting. Apparently I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. In fact, his presentation was so grand that, as Blackburn accounts, the hermit of Livry is later seen as such a threat to the Catholic Church that he is burned at the stake for sharing the Gospel.

I’ve included Calvin’s encounter with the hermit below:

In the forest of Livry, about seven miles from Paris, dwelt a hermit, who had built his hut from the ruins of an old abbey of the Augustine monks. In his wanderings, begging through the country, he had met some men who told him of the wonderful reformation at Meaux. Farel and Lefevre were there teaching the gospel. Meaux might have become the Wittemberg of France, had not the bishop proved false to the gospel, and Noel Beda been commissioned to persecute and slay the believers in justification by faith. Driven from Meaux, the disciples went everywhere preaching the word. By some wayside this poor hermit learned the true way of salvation. His heart leaped for joy. He had once thought that, by living a life of solitude and denial, he was best imitating Christ and the holiest saints, and that his extreme poverty would save his soul. But now he renounced the supposed store of merits he had laid up for himself, and believing in Jesus, began to publish his faith. He went from house to house in the surrounding villages; he pointed out the way to heaven to the poor peasants in their lowly huts; and at the door of the mansion where the inmates gave him a crust, he offered them in return the ever new bread of life. It was not long until he was known in the suburbs of Paris.

One evening he was about leaving the banks of the Seine, thinking less of the long walk before him than of the poor cottagers whom he was leaving happier for his words and prayers, when he saw two persons standing and gazing at the setting sun.

“Let me tell you of a glorious Sun of righteousness that never sets,” he cried out to them. The voice startled Mathurin Cordier and his pupil (John Calvin). The professor’s astronomical descriptions were suddenly broken off, and they turned to see the aged man, bent and broken, walking towards them with his rough cap in the hand extended toward them. Supposing he had a long story to tell, which he would wind up with an appeal for money, the generous professor was about to toss him a franc, and thus cut short the interview.

“I ask not your silver and gold,” said the hermit; “I am rich. I come to show you the richest pearl that ever dropped from heaven. Yes, I am richer than the king.” Cordier thought him deranged.

“In what does your wealth consist?” inquired the professor in a tone of pity.

“Not in the merits and good works which I once imagined myself to have; but in the grace of Jesus Christ. He is my confessor now. He has granted me, I trust, a perfect pardon; one that no man can buy of a priest; one that he purchased with his own blood. Why, good gentlemen, why give your money for naught in paying for masses and absolutions, and to deliver souls out of purgatory?”

“Would you have us give it to you?”

“Nay, nay, kind gentlemen; but I would have you accept the salvation of my Lord Jesus Christ as a free gift.”

“Where do you live, my aged friend?” was the next compassionate inquiry of Cordier, who thought that the poor man should be taken up as an object of public charity.

“I stay in my hermitage; but my heart lives in heaven with my blessed Lord Jesus. There are poor people here in these huts around us, who would gladly give me a home; but I choose to spend the rest of my few nights on earth in my old abode. And when I am sick, these kind peasants come to see me, and sometimes the rich come, and then we talk of what great things the Lord hath done for us, whereof we are glad.”

“Do you not hunger sometimes?”

“The bread which came down from heaven is my food.”

“Does not the rain pour down upon you?”

“The Lord is my shelter; the shadow of the Almighty is over me.”

“Are you not cold when the winter storm beats?”

“The love of God is a fire in my heart.”

“Are you not afraid to dwell alone in the forest? Afraid that you will die with no friends near you.”

“No friend near me! Ah, kind gentlemen, you neither believe nor understand. Perhaps you are a nobleman and his son, living in yonder castle, with great bolts on your doors, and a retinue of servants and soldiers around you.”

“Oh, no; we are quite humble persons, and good Christians too, I trust.”

“Yet you do not know that I am never alone. My Lord is always with me, and if I should die, his holy angels would take me right up into heaven. How can good Christians be ignorant of this? Do you believe that a man is justified by faith and not by works?”

“Not, perhaps, in your sense of the words. God has given us the church as the channel of his grace. Through the church, built on St. Peter, we believe in Christ. The good works which we do in the church are done to Christ.”

“Oh, kind gentlemen, you are too learned to believe the simple gospel. You cover up the sense by words, and faith by works. You make a Saviour of the church, and Christ is so hidden in its dark shadow that you do not find him. I know all about it. I have read your books. I once thought as you do. I retired from the world, and dreamed that I was far away from its sins. I imagined that I was a saint. But Christ came to my soul, and he showed me that I was a great sinner. I had an awful fear that I was doomed and lost for ever. Then he came again with his Holy Spirit. I confessed my sins to him. I took him at his word, as he said, ‘Thy sins be forgiven thee.’ And now I renounce the learning which perverts the word of Christ. Enough for me that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief.”

The professor and the student looked at each other, abashed and confused in their thoughts, for they did not yet know the Scriptures. They felt the deepest pity for the old man, whom they supposed to be under some strange delusion. Such simple faith was to them a mystery. And their looks seemed to say, “Why talk farther with an insane hermit?”

“I perceive that you will not believe,” said he, as he bowed politely and turned away. “It is growing dark; my walk is long and weary; may God give you light, and show you the free way to heaven. Remember Christ’s pardon is free; it may be had by a prayer of faith. Good-night, kind gentlemen.” They heartily returned the adieu to the hermit of Livry, the mild and fervent missionary for the simple people of the suburbs and villages.

Wm. M. Blackburn, College Days of Calvin (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 2009), 28-33.

College Days of Calvin can be found in the Calvin 500 collection, as well as in the Calvin and History of Calvinism Collection, for Logos Bible Software.

If we allow Scripture to be our guide, we’ll find that election—rather than being the enemy of missions—is actually the very source of evangelistic zeal. Paul, the great missionary, labored “for the faith of those chosen of God” (Tit 1:1) and endured “all things for the sake of those who are chosen, so that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus and with it eternal glory” (2 Tim 2:10). It was confidence in the electing and saving God that motivating Paul to evangelize—even if it meant risking his own physical safety. The Lord Himself encouraged Paul not to be afraid, but to continue to proclaim the gospel, “For,” He said, “I am with you, and no man will attack you in order to harm you, for I have many people in this city” (Acts 18:9-10). These words echo what Jesus said in John’s Gospel: “I have other sheep, which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they will hear My voice; and they will become one flock with one shepherd” (Jn 10:16). Notice the juxtaposition of missions (i.e., “I must bring them also”) and the certainty of the salvation of the elect (i.e., “they will hear My voice”). The fact that God had given many to the Son, meant that those many would certainly come, but this does not eliminate the need to bring them in; rather, it creates it. The simple resolution to the apparent tension is that God ordains both the end (i.e., election to salvation) and the means to the end (i.e., evangelism). So according to the Bible, election does not undercut missions. Instead, it provides the very basis for confident evangelism.

One of the best little books on this subject is J. I. Packer’s Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God (Downers Grove: IVP, 1961). Also worth consulting is John Murray’s The Free Offer of the Gospel (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 2001).

There’s also a great article on Calvinism and missions in the latest issue of Themelios: Kenneth J. Stewart, “Calvinism and Missions: The Contested Relationship Revisited,” Themelios 34:1 (2009): 63–78. It’s worth a read.

Update: Here are a couple of other resources on the subject that look helpful:

• Keith Coleman, “Calvin and Missions,” WRS Journal 16:1 (February 2009): 28–33.
• Ray Van Neste, “John Calvin on Evangelism and Missions,” Founders Journal.