John Calvin has been misinterpreted as a theologian who did not have any missionary thought in his theological worldview, Calvinism, nor display any missionary activities in his life. Evangelical theologians such as Gustav Warneck, Kenneth Latourette, and A. M. Hunter and Ruth Tucker criticize John Calvin in this manner, and illustrate many reasons such as the wrongful influence of predestination, extreme emphasis of God’s sovereignty, lack of missionary interest, and no proof of his missionary activities throughout his public life.
However, the writer regards them to have lacked the right and deep knowledge of John Calvin’s theological thought, and that they have terribly misunderstood Calvin’s theological worldview. They have misinterpreted and distorted Calvin’s thoughts twisted to a completely different direction. They also do not recognize Calvin’s activity on the re-evangelization of Europe during the Reformation to be included in the initial mission sphere. How could Calvin participate in world missions without taking the primary task of re-evangelization of Europe, which was deeply imbued with the heretical thought of Roman Catholicism? The writer analyzes and evaluates John Calvin’s writings such his sermons, letters, and books to prove whether or not he showed any missionary thought in those writings.
In Calvin’s sermons on Acts 1: 7, 2 Timothy 1: 8-9, and Deuteronomy 33: 18-19 the writer discovers Calvin’s missionary thoughts, such as universal/eschatological sphere of Christ’s Kingdom, urgent responsibility for evangelism and missions in every Christian, and the Glory of God as the main motivation for missions. In Calvin’s letters, the writer discovers that after Calvin sent out French Huguenot missionaries to their home country, he tried to do his best caring and serving after their ministries and their families. And when they were imprisoned in the midst of their ministries, he tried to comfort and to encourage them and their remaining families through looking ahead to the final victory of the heavenly Kingdom. He also used his letters as the main media for spreading his theological thought of the reformation throughout Europe. In Calvin’s books, the writer also finds Calvin’s missionary thoughts, such as the responsibility of the universal spread of Christ’s Kingdom for every Christian, predestination as the main cause of mission motivation, and the apostolic mission of the Church for the evangelization of the world.
Calvin was converted by a French Huguenot layman missionary, Etienne de La Forge, when he stayed in Forge’s dormitory house. After Calvin settled down in Geneva, he made the Genevan Church and the Geneva academy become the headquarters for the re-evangelization of Europe. He also immediately responded to Villegagnon’s request of sending missionaries of the Genevan Church to Brazil, never showing any reluctance for doing missions. He surely burned with the missionary spirit. We find that throughout the history of missions in the Protestant Church, many prominent missionaries were Calvinists. Calvinism fueled their dedication to serve the Kingdom throughout the five oceans and six continents. They are surely John Calvin’s successors.