Calvin on the Battle

Those who serve Christ will face a battle. We will face opposition from Satan, unregenerate family members and friends, our flesh, and the world. Don't give up! God has appointed both the battle and the enemies. It is for your good and his glory. Read the following excerpts from John Calvin's sermon on 1st Timothy. This will encourage you and help steel your spine.

"Every man feels in himself how he is assailed on all sides, we need not go out of ourselves to know what war means, and enemies that torment and trouble us; for as many thoughts and affections as we have, so many enemies we have, which turn us away from following God and his word.  And again, there are an infinite sort of temptations which Satan lays across our paths.  To be short, the faithful have to fight if they want to serve God. They have to fight against nature and against many temptations which Satan always has at hand; for the devil makes as great resistance as he can, because the doctrine of salvation which is preached unto us by the Gospel is, as it were, the soul of the church, the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the bliss of men.  Therefore the utter destruction of Satan must be at hand, and this is the cause why the Gospel cannot be preached without the devil going into such a rage that he goes about to break off the course of the Gospel. Yea, he sets as many as he can on fire with madness;  he has many supports, he will find at all times instruments enough in the world, as we know, that until God changes us we are given to wickedness and bend ourselves to nothing else.

And why is this so?  The Devil cannot abide that they should preach the word of God purely, instead he will resist it and work to have a thousand devils against it, attempting all that he can.  Therefore we must be ready to fight.  And it is not only in this place that the Scripture speaks of it, but also the rule that was given to Jeremiah is direct to all when God says, “They shall fight against thee” (Jer. 1:19).  So then our Lord and God does not only exhort his Prophet to bear the yoke which he has laid upon his back; he also gives him to understand that he shall have many gainsayers, and therefore he should prepare himself for it. For men hate the light of God, and endeavor, as much as they can, to put it out, because it discovers their shamefulness and filthiness, and they seek nothing else but liberty to do evil in darkness.  So then it cannot be but that wherever the word of God is preached, by and by there must be troubles and much sedition.


This fight is good.  It is as if he should say, the issue of it will be happy; for we have promised us victory, and we cannot be deceived, as it is said in this text of Jeremiah (Jer. 1:19): They shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail.  And thus our Lord shows us, that the world will be forward and will always resist the word of God and trouble those who bring it; but in the end the wicked shall be confounded.  When they have strived as much as they can, God will not cease to triumph over them.  Yea, and this rebellion and rage that they have shown shall serve to give greater focus to the virtue which our Lord gives unto his word.

(L)et all the faithful also mark, when there are seditious people who lift up themselves against the word of God, seeking nothing else but to bring all to naught, to sow tares, to make havoc of all, that it must be so because God has so appointed it.

And therewithal, let every one of us also for his own part know, seeing our Lord Jesus Christ is our head, our captain, it cannot be but that our life must be as it were a continual fight. For Satan who is a mortal enemy to the son of God will never leave the members of Christ in rest, but will torment them and vex them; so that we shall have nothing but disquietness in this life; but be we of good courage in him that has overcome the world, and let our trust in him be such that we doubt not that the victory which he has gotten is ours.