Perhaps you expect now to hear of the happy days of Geneva—of a time of rest, and peace, and sunshine. The duke and the bishop, the monks, the nuns, and the priests have all passed away like a dream. The gospel is preached, the Bible is read, the gospellers are persecuted no more.
But Satan was none the less at work, and the sunshine was to be clouded with many a storm sweeping across the blue sky.
At first Farel’s sorrows were for the towns and villages of the Pays de Vaud, rather than for Geneva. The Council of Berne chose a pastor for Lausanne—not good Peter Viret, who had been preaching and laboring then all the summer, but the false, vain, covetous Caroli. Peter Viret was to be his humble assistant.
The lords of Berne had no doubt read, but they had never understood, or rather, had never really believed, the verses we find in the fourth chapter of Ephesians, “He that descended is the same also that ascended up far above all Heavens, that He might fill all things. And He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers.”
Was Christ no longer in Heaven?—no longer able to send pastors and teachers where He would, that the lords of Berne should have to do this? One thing we know, that it was not Christ who sent to Lausanne the impostor Caroli.
The Council of Berne then desired William Farel to find preachers and pastors for the other towns and villages of the Pays de Vaud.
But Farel had long known that though the harvest was great, the laborers were few. Peter Viret, and Christopher Fabri, and Eymer Beynon were hard at work. But “Alas!” said Farel,” most of those who know the truth prefer to die in the land of Egypt, rather than to eat manna in the wilderness.”
He himself went from village to village around Geneva, “and if you do not come to help him,” wrote Calvin to a friend, “you will soon lose him altogether, for the toil and burden are too much even for such a man of iron.”
Meanwhile Calvin was preaching in the cathedral of Geneva. He was at first scarcely noticed. But after some months, the Council of Geneva, at Farel’s recommendation, desired him to remain and give regular instruction to the people. And in a very little while Calvin had risen to be more than a teacher. His word was becoming law to the council, to the people, and, it must be owned, to Farel also. This young man, only twenty-eight years old, was listened to by Farel with respect and awe. “The old man,” we are told, “sat almost as a disciple at the foot of the young doctor.”
There can be no doubt that Calvin was naturally a very extraordinary man. He was possessed of a power of mind, and a force of will, that would have commanded men in some way or another, had he never been a Christian at all. And he was possessed of a special gift, which seemed to the Council of Geneva the one most to be desired for the good of their reformed city. We are constantly reminded by those who have written his history of “his rare genius for system and organization.” To organize means, as you know, to form and place in order the different parts of a living body, so that all may work together, each one in its place as a part of the whole.
“He had conceived,” we are told, “an ideal of a church which was to take the place of the papacy.... Farel had been everywhere, enlightening minds one by one with the torch of the word. It was now needful to bind together the souls thus enlightened.”
But alas! if we compare these remarks with the Bible, the sad truth forces itself upon our minds that the work Calvin was thus undertaking was a work God had not given him to do.
More than that, it was a work which God has given to none to do, excepting to the God-Man who sits at His right hand, and who has already done it.
What was it which Calvin thus set about to organize? It was the Church of God.
“He had conceived an ideal of a church which was to take the place of the papacy.”
And now let us turn to 1 Corinthians 12. There we read of a body “organized” not by man, but by God Himself. That body of which God Himself “conceived the ideal, before the foundation of the world”—that body which is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, even Christ.
And who set the members in their places? “God set the members everyone of them in the body, as it hath pleased Him.”
And let us turn again to Ephesians 4. Of Christ, the risen and glorified Christ, it is written, “He gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.”
Yes, of the church it is said, “It is His body.” It was equally impossible for Calvin to add any member to that body, or to alter the position of any member which God had “added to the Lord.” All that he could rightly do would be to exhort the members to own the place in which God had set them, and do the work which He had assigned to them.
There can be no doubt that Calvin was truly a servant of God, but that he was attempting the right work when he bethought himself of “organizing the church,” is quite another matter. He failed to see that that which he desired to organize was the body of Christ Himself. He could see that the papist, who was doing penance for his sins, was attempting to do that which Christ had already done. But he did not see that Christ had also done that work to which he now betook himself in the city of Geneva.
“It was needful,” he thought, “to bind together the souls that had been enlightened.”
Alas! it needed a far greater than Calvin to bind these souls together. It needed a work that was done 1500 years before, and in consequence of which, it was done completely and forever, by Him alone who could do it.
We read that “Jesus died.... that He should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad.” And if we ask by what means He did this glorious work, let us find the answer in that same 1 Corinthians 12. “By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body.”
Thus are we brought “into the unity of the body of Christ.” The Spirit gives union with (joins us to) all those here on earth who belong to God....... The believer is thus baptized into the one body. He is ‘one spirit with the Lord.’ He is consequently one with all that are the Lord’s........ It is a body, one with Christ, and even called by His name, of which each and all of us are living members. 'So also is Christ....’ Each member is a member of Christ, not of a, but of the church. In fact, there is no such thing in Scripture as a member of a church..... The Holy Spirit takes up all those who believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, and brings them into unity; (in other words, makes them one). This is the true account of the church, and no other; and the consequence is, therefore, that, no matter where it may be, it is always the body of Christ.”
But as to the Council of Berne, so also to John Calvin, these words in the 12th chapter of 1st Corinthians were vague and dim. And I have now to tell you of a sad and sorrowful time in the history of the city which God had so wonderfully delivered.
Calvin’s first step towards the accomplishment of his task was to write a confession of faith, to be signed by every inhabitant of Geneva. A part of this confession pledged each person to keep the ten commandments. And Farel himself, at Calvin’s desire, presented this confession to the council, in order that they might cause it to be signed by the citizens. The council agreed to this.
You will remember, in reading this, how Farel had written to Berthold Haller, telling him that the believer is not under the law. Nor had Farel ever thought of requiring from unbelievers that they would keep the ten commandments.
But he had a respect for Calvin which seems to have deprived him of the power of objecting to anything that Calvin did. He was fully persuaded that by the side of this wonderful young man he was as nothing, and his own thoughts must give place at once to Calvin’s thoughts, and his judgment to Calvin’s.
It has been wisely said, that whilst the people of God are generally on their guard against their natural pride, they are seldom on their guard against their natural humility. And natural humility is just as much a fruit of the evil tree as natural pride, though it is a fault not so often found there. Where it is found, let us beware; it, will lead us into many a snare and pitfall, for it will cause us to give up the truth of God, trusting to the superior wisdom or learning of one to whom perhaps that truth is less clearly shown. If it is our own opinion that we give up, it matters not; but if it is that which God has shown us, let us maintain it, should “an angel from Heaven” preach to us the contrary. Paul, who owned himself “the least of the Apostles,” could yet withstand Peter to the face, “because he was to be blamed.”
The citizens of Geneva were indignant at the order to sign Calvin’s confession. Some said they would never promise to keep the ten commandments, for they could not keep such a promise if they made it. Anthony Saunier protested against the command to sign. But the council insisted. All who would not sign were to leave the city. Many refused to sign or to leave.
In the end of 1537 a second attempt was made to get these refractory persons to sign. But in vain.
And now those who were longing for liberty to drink and riot, to swear and to gamble, were loud in their outcries against Calvin and Farel. They formed themselves into a party of opposition, and were called the Libertines.
In 1538 matters were made worse by an order from Berne. Hitherto the gospellers of Geneva had kept no holy days except the Lord’s day. They had used common bread at the Lord’s Supper, and for baptism they had used any vessel of a convenient size. But now the Bernese council commanded that in Geneva and in the towns of the Pays de Vaud four festivals should be kept—Christmas, New Year’s Day, Lady Day, and Ascension Day. Unleavened bread was to be used in the Lord’s Supper, and stone fonts for baptism.
Farel had hitherto taught that if any Christian desired to observe such days as these, it must be left to his own conscience. He must impose it on no other person. And now that the command of Berne was given, the Libertines rose up in a body to require that these days should be kept in Geneva. They rejoiced in the thought of having religious excuses for drinking and feasting, dancing and rioting.
The Council of Geneva sent for Calvin and Farel, and desired them to conform to the decrees of Berne. But the preachers stood firm. And when the council again insisted that they should use unleavened bread in the Lord’s Supper, they both replied that the citizens of Geneva were not in a fit state to be at the Lord’s table at all. There was no Lord’s Supper, therefore, the Sunday following.
Calvin and Farel both preached, though forbidden by the council to do so. They told the people why they could not consent to meet them at the table of the Lord.
The city was at once in a state of riot. The council sent for the preachers, and ordered them instantly to leave the city. “Well and good,” replied Farel; “God has done it.”
As they walked through the streets, the rioters followed them. Shouts rang on every side, “To the Rhone! to the Rhone!” just as in the old popish days six years before.
Thus was Farel banished from Protestant Geneva!
Geneva, which had been to him dearer than anything on earth besides—Geneva had become the rod of chastening in the Lord’s hand, and Farel was at the same time allowed the honor of suffering reproach and shame for that matter in which he was faithful to God.
You will remember how he had answered the monk at Aigle, “I have preached, and by the Word of God I will maintain it, that no living man has a right to order any other service of God, nor any other manner of serving Him, than that which He has Himself commanded. He has commanded us to do that only which He has Himself ordained, without adding to it, or taking from it, nor may we do that which is right in our own eyes. And if an angel from heaven came to tell us to do any other thing than that which God has commanded, let him be accursed!”
Let us be thankful that rather than go back from this path of obedience to the living God, Farel was willing to go forth as an outcast from the city he loved, though to him it was as cutting off the right hand, or plucking out the right eye. But he could do it for His sake who was dearer to him than Geneva.