Sermons of John Calvin, upon the song that Hezekiah made after he had been…Sermons of Iohn Caluin, vpon the songe that Ezechias made after he had bene…

Let us then mark well whereunto our life is to be directed, that is, that we should perceive that God already in part showeth him self a father toward us. I grant it true (as I have already said) that we are absent from him, for our salvation lieth in faith and hope, it is hidden and we see it not with natural sense. Yet in the mean while God faileth not to send down certain beams hither by low to lighten us so, as we be guided to the hope of the life everlasting and perceive that God is not so far estranged from us, but that yet he stretcheth fourth his hand hither by low to have care of us, and to show us by ⟨p. 17⟩experience that he hath us in his safekeeping. For when the sun riseth in the morning, see we not what a fatherly care God hath for us? After when it goeth down at evening, see we not that God hath an eye to our weakness, that we may have rest, and be somewhat relieved? Doth not God then in so hiding the sun in the night time, show him self our father? Further, when we see the earth bring forth her fruits for our nourishment: when we see the rains and all the changes, and alterations that are in nature: in all this perceive we not that God hath his hand stretched out to draw us alway unto him, and how he already showeth him self a liberal father unto us, and that we enjoy the temporal benefits which he doth for us, to the end that by this mean we may be drawn up higher, that is to say, to know that he hath adopted and made us his children, that we may come to the fullness of joy and of all felicity, when we shall be fully joined with him? Behold now whereunto we ought to apply all our life, if we will not that the same be accursed, and that as many years, months, days, hours, and minutes as we have lived here by low, all the same be put together in account, for ever to increase, and inflame the vengeance of God upon us. And therefore let us know that we ought here to study upon the works of God. For even therefore also are we set in this world, and therefore in the v. chapter,¹ when the Prophet minded to rebuke the Jews of a certain vile brutishness. They have not (sayeth he) beholden the works of God. He speaketh of their drunkenness, of their gluttony, and of their dissolute lives, ⟨p. 18⟩but the lump that maketh up the heap of evil is this, that they have not beholden the works of God.