What comes to mind when you hear the word renunciation? One might think of a brave dissident who renounces her citizenship before officials of her native land in favor a of chosen country with greater political freedom. If you are a fan of history (or of the Netflix series The Crown), maybe you think of the scandalous 1938 abdication of King Edward VIII, who renounced his claim to the British imperial throne to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson.

Closer to home, perhaps, you may think of a wedding. The declaration of intent asks bride and groom, “Forsaking all others, do you pledge yourself to each other for as long as you both shall live?” In affirming this declaration, a husband and wife freely and intentionally renounce all other possible partners and embrace a vow of lifelong, exclusive commitment.

Public, binding renunciations are deeply significant. They declare a person’s free choice to deny one path in exchange for another. They bind a person’s decision to the accountability of chosen witnesses. They stand throughout time as a testimony — in record and memory — of a deliberate and sober commitment, come what may. They are made by persons of responsible age who can understand the entailments of the commitment.

“No renunciation is more central to the Christian life than the one that occurs at baptism.”

While the practice has all but disappeared from many liturgies, no renunciation is more central to the Christian life, nor more rooted in the history of Christian tradition, than the one that occurs at baptism. And this renunciation also underscores why baptism should be reserved for professing believers.

Baptism from the Beginning

From the earliest days of the church, baptism was understood as a person’s public identification as a disciple of the risen Christ (Matthew 28:18). Baptism testifies to a person’s conscious faith in Jesus as Lord, reflects the deep inworking of grace in the transformation of desire, and marks the believer’s entry into the community of the local church (Romans 6:3–5; 1 Corinthians 12:13; Galatians 3:27). Luke’s narrative history of the early church depicts new believers being baptized in the presence of witnesses, testifying to their adoption as fellow heirs, and signaling their pledge to live as citizens of a heavenly kingdom (Acts 10:44–48).

Leaders in the early church universally maintained these emphases in the post-apostolic age.1 They emphasized the importance of public profession of faith as part of baptismal practice by pointing to the “good confession” Timothy made “in the presence of many witnesses” (1 Timothy 5:12). So also, they noted how the apostle Peter linked the public “pledge of a good conscience to God” to the celebration of baptism (1 Peter 3:21 CSB). Tertullian (155–220) argued that the practice of profession of faith at baptism, if not directly derived from the Scriptures, “without doubt flowed down from tradition,” having been “handed down” from the disciples.2

One’s public testimony at baptism not only highlights the work of sovereign grace in election and regeneration; it also reflects supernatural deliverance from the domain of darkness and into the kingdom of the beloved Son (Colossians 1:13). Trusting in Messiah Jesus entails deliberately forsaking the self-reliance, idolatry, and vain pursuits that characterize life under the power of the evil one (1 John 5:19). As with a wedding vow, the new believer makes a dual commitment at baptism. He freely and intentionally renounces the claims of Satan upon his life, and he consciously embraces a lifelong, exclusive commitment to the lordship of Christ.

Satan, We Renounce You

In the early church, new converts entered a process of instruction as catechumens (Greek katēkhoumenos, “being instructed”), in which they were taught the basics of the Christian faith. Only upon clear understanding and conscious profession of faith would a catechumen be accepted for baptism. The earliest accounts of baptismal practice thus record not only a profession of faith, but the renunciation of Satan. Tertullian of Carthage writes,

When we are going to enter the water, but a little before, in the presence of the congregation and under the hand of the bishop, we solemnly profess that we disown the devil, and his pomp, and his angels.3

Allegiance to Christ meant renouncing, rejecting, and repudiating the reign believers were formerly under and the practices they previously performed. The Apostolic Tradition, an early third-century Egyptian handbook to church order, records a similar instruction:

Then the presbyter, taking hold of each of those about to be baptized, shall command him to renounce, saying: I renounce thee, Satan, and all thy servants and all thy works.4

In a series of lectures designed to prepare catechumens for baptism, Cyril (313–386) describes how this renunciation was practiced at the church at Jerusalem. On the night before their baptism, after candidates entered the outer hall of the baptistery building, they were told to face west (symbolically the region of darkness), stretch forth their hand, and, “as though he were present, [say,] ‘I renounce thee, Satan!’” Cyril continues,

What then did each of you stand up and say? “I renounce thee, Satan,” — thou wicked and most cruel tyrant! meaning, “I fear thy might no longer; for that Christ hath overthrown, having partaken with me of flesh and blood, that through these He might by death destroy death, that I might not be made subject to bondage for ever.” “I renounce thee,” — thou crafty and most subtle serpent. “I renounce thee,” — plotter as thou art, who under the guise of friendship didst contrive all disobedience, and work apostasy in our first parents. “I renounce thee, Satan,” — the artificer and abettor of all wickedness.5

“Allegiance to Christ meant renouncing, rejecting, and repudiating the reign believers were formerly under.”

Such was the universal practice from Africa to Palestine to Asia. In a homily on baptism, Proclus (d. 446), bishop of Constantinople, reminds catechumens that blasphemy, empty pleasure, evil deeds, and idolatry are the schemes of the devil. To renounce Satan means forsaking idolatry, rejecting envy and drunkenness, disavowing stealing, lying, and prostitution, and rejecting the use of magic to obtain health.6 Proclus instructs baptismal candidates to declare, “I renounce you, Satan, and your pomp and your cult and your angels and all your works.” He continues,

These things you called out in words. Demonstrate it with your deeds! Sanction your confession with your conduct. Do not return to the place whence you ran away!7

Confessions of Catechumens

Clearly, the affirmations and renunciations of the baptismal rite can only be made by those who knowingly, freely, and authentically profess faith in Christ. Only believers can bear public witness to the radical transformation of sovereign grace. Only believers can solemnly renounce their former way of life and forsake the power and promises of the evil one. Only believers can commit to live in holiness by the power of the Spirit as part of a community of faith. For centuries, the liturgical practice of the church demonstrated the priority, temporally and theologically, of the baptism of adults.

The prevalence of infant baptism in the sixth century spelled the end of the catechumenate in many places. Even then, however, medieval liturgies in the Western tradition continued to be designed with mature candidates in mind.8 The profession of faith and renunciation of Satan were so essential to the practice of baptism that they could simply not be abandoned. Instead, they were erroneously transferred to the infant’s parents or godparents as sponsors — the very concern Tertullian had raised nearly four centuries earlier.9

The teaching of the New Testament and the practice of the early church was to admit to baptism only those whose conversions reflected a clear understanding of its meaning. As with marriage vows, no alternate can stand in with the authority of the baptizand. Profession of faith in the Lord Jesus and renunciation of Satan, his works, and his ways is the glory of the believer alone.

Expect great things, attempt great things.

These six words fueled the transformation of global missions — and on a smaller and more personal scale, the vision and direction of my life.

I don’t remember exactly when I first met William Carey (1761–1834), but he has haunted my life since my junior year of college. Like many college students, I had taken a long and winding path before committing myself to membership in a local church. But when I found a church home, God opened a river of grace to me — and launched perhaps the most transformative period of spiritual growth in my life. One tributary was a providential encounter during my senior year with a set of excerpts from Carey’s pamphlet An Enquiry Concerning the Obligation of Christians to Use Means for the Conversion of the Heathen (1792).

I read excerpts from An Enquiry for a national course on Christian missions my church hosted on Wednesday nights. As with many eighteenth-century writings, the title was intimidating. But what I found inside was captivating.

From Suggestion to Commission

In addition to a review of global missions from the apostles to the present day, Carey (an almost entirely self-educated bi-vocational pastor) had compiled statistics on the state of global evangelization on every continent.

Most powerfully, Carey concisely captured the beauty of the gospel before addressing nearly every excuse that could be given for not taking up Jesus’s commission of making disciples of all nations (Matthew 28:18–20). Carey was puzzled that “multitudes sit at ease and give themselves no concern about the far greater part of their fellow-sinners, who to this day are lost in ignorance and idolatry.”1 Love for the global glory of Jesus and for the good of our fellow man, he argued, obligates us to proclaim the gospel in all places. “Surely it is worthwhile” Carey concluded, “to lay ourselves out with all our might in promoting the cause and kingdom of Christ.”2

Carey’s words struck me to the heart. I had given so little thought beyond my own self-centered, provincial concerns. Shockingly, the task of gospel proclamation to the least-reached and unreached was something I had hardly even thought about. Carey showed me that my vision was not as big as Scripture’s vision of the global glory of Jesus. Is Jesus worthy of the praise of all peoples? Yes, he is. The great commission, as has been said, was not the great suggestion. The task of gospel-proclamation was the Christian’s duty, and therefore my life’s mission had to be altered. To live for Christ meant to put his global glory as my great aim, no matter my vocation.

“To live for Christ meant to put his global glory as my great aim, no matter my vocation.”

But there was a missing piece. How could the nearly impossible political, technological, cultural, and religious barriers be overcome? What could sustain the difficult work of “laying ourselves out with all our might in promoting the cause and kingdom of Christ”? How could such labors not end in total exhaustion?

Possibility and Duty

These questions also concerned Carey, though for a slightly different reason. In the late eighteenth century, Baptist pastors in north-central England were grappling with an understanding that had paralyzed the churches in their association — the notion that some additional, Pentecost-like (Acts 2) outpouring of the Holy Spirit would be necessary before the nations could come to Christ. Until God moved in a clearly supernatural way, some argued, churches had neither the duty to act nor any hope of success. At a gathering of Northamptonshire pastors in June of 1791, fellow pastors Andrew Fuller and John Sutcliff preached powerful messages addressing the “procrastinating spirit” of the day and the fervent evangelistic zeal that ought to attend the good news of the gospel.3

At the conclusion of the meeting, Carey was asked to address in print the question for which they already knew the Scriptures’ answer: “whether or not it was possible for, as well as the duty of, the Christian to preach the gospel among the unreached nations.”4 His pamphlet, An Enquiry, was published later that year.

But my excerpted copy of An Enquiry focused only on the duty. It left out the most important part of the argument — how such a duty was possible.

Unlikely and Timely Text

Several months after the publication of An Enquiry, the pastors of the Northamptonshire association met to discuss Carey’s answer. On May 31, 1791, Carey began the gathering by preaching on Isaiah 54:2–3:

Enlarge the place of your tent,     and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out;do not hold back; lengthen your cords     and strengthen your stakes.For you will spread abroad to the right and to the left,     and your offspring will possess the nations     and will people the desolate cities.

His text, at first, seems a curious choice. In light of the many crystal-clear New Testament texts on evangelism and disciple-making, why choose a text from the Prophets to argue for the great commission’s possibility?

Carey knew the Scriptures well and recognized the brilliance and importance of Isaiah’s redemptive-historical vision. The victory of the suffering servant (Isaiah 53:10–12) would result in not only rejoicing (Isaiah 54:1a) but blessing (Isaiah 54:1b). Isaiah foresaw that the Messiah’s victory would forever incapacitate the enemies of God. No longer could the bewitching of foreign gods prevent the nations from receiving God as king. God’s people would “spread abroad to the right and the left . . . possess the nations . . . and people the desolate cities” (Isaiah 54:2–3).

This future vision, Carey knew, was realized in the resurrection and ascension of the Lord Jesus.

Expect and Attempt

The crescendo of his message was captured by those who heard it in six unforgettable words: “Expect great things, attempt great things.”5

Jesus’s singular fitness as the suitable substitute for mankind had been vindicated in the resurrection. And the outpouring of the Spirit at Pentecost was the signal of the Messiah’s ultimate victory over all thrones and dominions, whether seen or unseen. Jesus hadn’t simply launched the mission of the gospel to the nations; his ascension to glory had removed every obstacle that stood in the way of the gospel’s absolute triumph (Mark 3:24–27; Revelation 20:1–2).

Therefore, Carey argued, Christians must expect great things — and not only must we expect them; we must attempt them. No matter how small the beginning, no matter how complicated the task, in the power of the Spirit, under the authority of the risen Christ, we can have absolute confidence in the success of our mission. In commissioning his church, Jesus had said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:18–19). And Pentecost decisively proved that his command was possible, because it fulfilled his promise of the commission: “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20).

We Can Risk Everything

In the excerpt missing from my copy of An Enquiry, Carey had made this crucial connection:

If the command of Christ to teach all nations extend only to the apostles, then, doubtless, the promise of the divine presence in this work must be so limited; but this is worded in such a manner as expressly precludes such an idea. Lo, I am with you always, to the end of the world. . . . Where a command exists nothing can be necessary to render it binding but a removal of those obstacles which render obedience impossible, and these are removed already.6

Carey saw that the triumph of the resurrection meant the good news of the gospel could not possibly be stopped. All things were now in subjection to Jesus — and by his Spirit and through his church, he was plundering the strong man’s household (Mark 3:24–27). Nothing could turn back the tide of the victory of Christ.

This revelation cracked open the world for me. In the early years of my walk with Jesus, I was afraid that I might meet some insuperable intellectual obstacle to the gospel. Likewise, I feared failing to adequately explain the gospel in personal evangelism. Those fears were only enhanced when meeting the challenges of cross-cultural evangelism. But grasping the implications of Jesus’s glory and resurrection authority decisively defeated those fears.

Not only must I reorient the priorities of my life to put the concerns of Christ at the very center, but I can risk everything in following him wherever he leads. Because Jesus, in fact, lives, I can expect great things and attempt great things.

Six World-Changing Words

The vision captured by those six words also forever changed the history of Christian missions. At the conclusion of Carey’s sermon, the pastors of the Northamptonshire association resolved to develop a plan for a “society to preach the gospel” among the unreached. Four months later, on October 2, 1792, they adopted that plan, forming the Baptist Missionary Society.

A year later, the Society sent William Carey, his family, and several others to India as the first of what now constitutes many thousands of missionaries of the BMS. “Expect great things, attempt great things” became the motto of the Baptist Missionary Society and captured the biblical vision for gospel proclamation among the unreached.7

And the retrieval of Scripture’s cross-cultural vision reverberated across the rising evangelical movement. Carey’s friend and fellow pastor John Ryland Jr. went on to help London Congregationalists launch the London Missionary Society (1795) and assisted the Anglican church in launching the Church Missionary Society (1799).

“What might God be pleased to do in our day if we expect great things and attempt great things?”

In 1806, five college sophomores at Williams College in Williamsburg, Massachusetts, read Carey’s An Enquiry and dedicated themselves to praying for the launch of a missionary society in the United States. Four years later, they helped form the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1810) to send two of their own, Adoniram Judson and his wife Anne Hasseltine, to gospel ministry in Burma.

Luther Rice, another of the Williams College five, would unite Baptists in America to support the work of foreign missions and four years later launch the General Missionary Convention of the Baptist Denomination — the precursor to the International Missions Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, now the largest missionary-sending organization in the world.

What might God be pleased to do in our day if, confident in the victory of our reigning Christ, we expect great things and attempt great things?

On May 27, 1564, just after eight o’clock in the evening, a nurse urgently summoned Theodore Beza (1519–1605) to Calvin’s bedside. “We found he had already died,” Calvin’s friend and fellow pastor later wrote. “On that day, then, at the same time with the setting sun, this splendid luminary was withdrawn from us.”1 Calvin was 54 years old.

Calvin’s death sent a shock wave throughout Geneva and beyond. Beza writes, “That night and the following day there was a general lamentation throughout the city . . . all lamenting the loss of one who was, under God, a common parent and comfort.” He records that two days later “the entire city” gathered at the St. Pierre Cathedral to honor their beloved pastor. Despite Calvin’s prominence, the funeral was unusually simple, “with no extraordinary pomp.”2 But Calvin’s burial was particularly unusual.

Unmarked Grave

Eighteen years earlier, on February 18, 1546, fellow Reformer Martin Luther died at the age of 63. As was common practice for ministers, Luther’s remains were interred inside the church where he had faithfully served. His casket lies in Wittenberg’s Castle Church, near the pulpit, seven feet below the floor of the nave. Luther’s successor and fellow Reformer, Philip Melanchthon (1490–1560), is buried beside him.

So also William Farel (1489–1565), who first called Calvin to Geneva in 1536, is buried in the cathedral of Neuchâtel, where he spent the final years of his ministry. When Calvin’s friend and successor Theodore Beza died in 1605, he was buried next to the pulpit of St. Pierre, the Genevan church in which he and Calvin ministered together.

But Calvin’s remains lie elsewhere.

Rather than being interred in St. Pierre, Calvin’s body was carried outside the city wall to a marshy burial ground for commoners called Plainpalais. With close friends in attendance, Calvin’s body was wrapped in a simple shroud, enclosed in a rough casket, and lowered into the earth. Beza writes that Calvin’s plot was unlisted and, “as he [had] commanded, without any gravestone.”3

Why did Calvin command that he be buried, contrary to common practice, in an unmarked grave? Some speculate that he wanted to discourage religious pilgrims from visiting his resting place or to prevent accusations from the Roman church that he desired veneration as a saint.4 But the answer lies somewhere deeper — in Calvin’s understanding of Christian modesty.

Forgotten Meaning of Modesty

When we speak of modesty today, we most often mean dressing or behaving in such a way as to avoid impropriety or indecency. But modesty more generally refers to the quality of being unassuming or moderate in the estimation of oneself. For centuries, the church understood the connection. Immodest dress was not simply ostentatious or sexually suggestive; it reflected an overemphasis on appearance. As Jesus warned, outward appearance can mask impiety (Matthew 6:16) or pride (Luke 18:12).

This is why both Gentile women converts in Ephesus and the Jewish Christians addressed in Hebrews are urged to consider how their outward appearance relates to the disposition of the heart. Excessive adornment could be evidence of self-importance (1 Timothy 2:9). Acceptable worship requires a posture of reverence, not pretension (Hebrews 12:28). Thus, a modest person represents himself neither too highly nor too meanly because he understands both the dignity and the humility of being transformed by the grace of God.

“Modesty is simply the outward reflection of true Christian humility.”

Modesty, then, is simply the outward reflection of true Christian humility. It obliterates pride by embracing the reality that a Christian is both creaturely and beloved. In this light, self-importance becomes absurd. Grandiosity becomes laughable. Celebrity becomes monstrous.

We Are Not Our Own

For Calvin, the gospel radically reshapes our view of self. As those created in God’s image, provisioned by his goodness, redeemed by his mercy, transformed by his grace, and called to his mission, those who belong to Christ no longer live for themselves. “Now the great thing is this,” Calvin writes, “we are consecrated and dedicated to God in order that we may thereafter think, speak, meditate, and do, nothing except to his glory.” Calvin continues,

If we, then, are not our own but the Lord’s, it is clear what error we must flee and whither we must direct all the acts of our life. We are not our own: let not our reason nor our will, therefore, sway our plans and deeds. We are not our own: let us not therefore see it as our goal to seek what is expedient for us according to the flesh. We are not our own: in so far as we can, let us therefore forget ourselves and all that is ours.

Conversely, we are God’s: let us therefore live for him and die for him. We are God’s: let his wisdom and will therefore rule all our actions. We are God’s: let all the parts of our life accordingly strive toward him as our only lawful goal. Oh how much has that man profited who, having been taught that he is not his own, has taken away dominion and rule from his own reason that he may yield it to God! For, as consulting our self-interest is the pestilence that most effectively leads to our destruction, so the sole haven of salvation is to be wise in nothing through ourselves but to follow the leading of the Lord alone.5

“Modesty blossoms when we experience the freedom from having to prove ourselves to God or one another.”

Modesty and humility flow from a heart transformed by the Spirit of Christ. “As soon as we are convinced that God cares for us,” Calvin writes, “our minds are easily led to patience and humility.”6 The Spirit shapes us with a kind of moderation that “gives the preference to others” and that guards us from being “easily thrown into agitation.”7 Modesty blossoms when we experience the freedom from having to prove ourselves to God or one another.

‘Modesty, His Constant Friend’

Calvin’s life reflected this reality. Despite the doors that were opened to him through his writing and network of connections, he was committed to “studiously avoiding celebrity.”8 When the Institutes was published in 1536, he was so successful in his object to “not acquire fame” that no one in Basel knew that he was its author. For the rest of his life, wherever he went, he took care to “conceal that I was the author of that performance.”9 Calvin even sought to avoid a wider ministry in Geneva, having “resolved to continue in the same privacy and obscurity.” He was drawn into the limelight only when William Farel warned him “with a dreadful imprecation” that turning down the post would be refusing God’s call to service.10 In brief autobiographical comments he wrote the year that he died, we see a glimmer of his own surprise over God’s sovereign hand through his life.

God so led me about through different turnings and changes that he never permitted me to rest in any place, until, in spite of my natural disposition, he brought me forth to public notice. . . . I was carried, I know not how, as it were by force to the Imperial assemblies, where, willing or unwilling, I was under the necessity of appearing before the eyes of many.11

It is no surprise, then, that a few days before his death, Calvin exhorted his friends to not be those who “ostentatiously display themselves and, from overweening confidence, insist that all their opinions should be approved by others.” Instead, he pleaded with them to “conduct themselves with modesty, keeping far aloof from all haughtiness of mind.”12 For Beza, Calvin’s modesty — forged by his vision of God’s glory, Christ’s redeeming love, and the Spirit’s animating power — was his defining characteristic. After Calvin’s burial, Beza captured it in verse:

Why in this humble and unnoticed tombIs Calvin laid — the dread of falling Rome;Mourn’d by the good, and by the wicked fear’dBy all who knew his excellence revered?From whom ev’n virtue’s self might virtue learn,And young and old its value may discern?’Twas modesty, his constant friend on earth,That laid this stone, unsculptured with a name;Oh! happy ground, enrich’d with Calvin’s worth,More lasting far than marble is thy fame!13

Free to Be Forgotten

In old Geneva, on the grounds of the college Calvin founded, stands an immense stone memorial to four leaders of the Protestant Reformation. At its center are towering reliefs of Calvin, Beza, Farel, and John Knox (1513–1572). Calvin would surely detest it. But the monument is a metaphor. We live in a culture that fears obscurity and irrelevance. We measure ourselves against others and build our own platforms in the hope that we will not be forgotten. We attempt to distinguish ourselves at the expense of the humility and modesty that honors Christ. Calvin would have us be free from such striving.

For however anyone may be distinguished by illustrious endowments, he ought to consider with himself that they have not been conferred upon him that he might be self-complacent, that he might exalt himself, or even that he might hold himself in esteem. Let him, instead of this, employ himself in correcting and detecting his faults, and he will have abundant occasion for humility. In others, on the other hand, he will regard with honor whatever there is of excellences and will, by means of love, bury their faults. The man who will observe this rule, will feel no difficulty in preferring others before himself. And this, too, Paul meant when he added, that they ought not to have everyone a regard to themselves, but to their neighbors, or that they ought not to be devoted to themselves. Hence it is quite possible that a pious man, even though he should be aware that he is superior, may nevertheless hold others in greater esteem.14

We may rightly regard Calvin as a hero of the faith, but he didn’t ultimately see himself that way. Humility had taught him to walk modestly before God and others — and, in the end, the freedom to lie down in a forgotten grave.

We, body and spirit, have desires that are at odds with one another until Christ our Lord comes to help. He places the jewels of the virtues in their proper places — and in the place of sin, he builds the courts of his temple. He makes for the soul ornaments from its dark past to delight Wisdom as she reigns forever on her glorious throne. (Aurelius Prudentius Clemens, Psychomachia)

To those of us accustomed to a wide array of rich resources for discipleship, lists of vices and virtues might seem rudimentary. In fact, we tend to view lists that say “do this” or “don’t do that” as legalistic obstacles to spiritual formation. But dismissing the seven virtues and their related vices would be to abandon centuries of profound theological and pastoral reflection. To understand their history is to take a large step toward recovering their value.

From Martyrdom to Monasticism

The church underwent massive transformation as Christianity transitioned from a persecuted sect to the predominant religion of the Roman Empire.

For much of the first two centuries of the church’s existence, the Roman government regarded Christianity as an illegitimate religion. Professing faith in Christ, therefore, was a sober and serious commitment. Christians faced episodic persecution by the empire and were occasionally publicly executed as martyrs. Because of these dangers, candidates for membership in the early church were rigorously examined to ensure a clear understanding of the gospel and prepare them for the possibility of martyrdom.

The situation changed markedly under emperor Constantine the Great (reign 306–337), who declared tolerance of Christianity throughout the Roman Empire in AD 313. As Christianity became more acceptable and the ranks of the church swelled with new converts, the task of discipleship became more difficult. The threat of death by martyrdom no longer protected the church from insincere professions. This resulted in assemblies that neglected basic Christian discipleship and biblical spirituality. In some cases, churches looked as decadent as the surrounding culture.

Men and women arrested by the call of Scripture to live in holiness and service to others found it increasingly difficult to do so in a church in cultural captivity. Many of them established new communities outside of urban centers where they committed themselves to generosity, Scripture memory, worship, and prayer. The monastic movement became the new martyrdom — committed believers gave up wealth and prestige to bear witness for Christ in lives of radical self-sacrifice and personal holiness.

It was in this setting of intense disciple-making that virtue and vice lists were freshly developed.

Diagnosing the Disease

In their decades of caring for members of monastic communities, leaders like Evagrius of Pontus (346–399) and his disciple, John Cassian (360–430), sought to understand the patterns in sin and temptation.1 The most enduring and comprehensive account of these patterns emerged with the teaching of Gregory the Great (540–604), the bishop of Rome. As a monk, Gregory traced the many permutations of sin to seven “heads” that branched from the root of pride:

For pride is the root of all evil, of which it is said, as Scripture bears witness: Pride is the beginning of all sin. But seven principal vices, as its first progeny, spring doubtless from this poisonous root; namely, vainglory, envy, anger, melancholy, avarice, gluttony, lust. For, because He grieved that we were held captive by these seven sins of pride, therefore our Redeemer came to the spiritual battle of our liberation, full of the spirit of sevenfold grace.2

“Understanding the seven ‘capital’ sins was critical to diagnosing disordered affections in the Christian life.”

Understanding the pathology of the seven “capital” (from Latin caput, “head”) sins — how all other sin branched from these heads — was critical to diagnosing disordered affections in the Christian life.3 But diagnosis of the disease only goes so far. Following the pattern of Scripture, the church also sought to find ways to capture the virtues that characterize new life in Christ.

Applying a Remedy

The term “virtue” comes from the Latin translation (virtus) of the Greek word meaning “moral excellence” (aretē). For centuries, Greek philosophy consistently identified four virtues as central to a life of moral excellence: prudence (wisdom), justice, temperance (self-control), and fortitude (courage).

These four virtues not only appeared in Aristotle’s (384–322 BC) Nicomachean Ethics and Plato’s (c. 427–347 BC) Republic, but also in intertestamental literature like The Wisdom of Solomon — a book that was included by Alexandrian Jews in first century BC editions of the Greek translation of the Old Testament.4 According to Wisdom 8:7, “If anyone loves righteousness, her labors are virtues (aretai); for she teaches self-control and prudence, justice and courage; nothing in life is more profitable for men than these.”

Christian leaders like Ambrose of Milan (c. 340–397) thought the four classical virtues reflected what the Scriptures taught as the “cardinal” excellencies upon which all other moral virtues in the Christian life hinged (Latin cardo means “hinge”).5 They added to these the three transcendent “theological” virtues identified by Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:13: “So faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” Augustine (354–430) argued that the four cardinal virtues ultimately grew out of the greatest theological virtue, love:

. . . temperance is love giving itself entirely to that which is loved; fortitude is love readily bearing all things for the sake of the loved object; justice is love serving only the loved object, and therefore ruling rightly; prudence is love distinguishing with sagacity between what hinders it and what helps it. The object of this love is not anything, but only God, the chief good, the highest wisdom, the perfect harmony. So we may express the definition thus: that temperance is love keeping itself entire and incorrupt for God; fortitude is love bearing everything readily for the sake of God; justice is love serving God only, and therefore ruling well all else, as subject to man; prudence is love making a right distinction between what helps it towards God and what might hinder it.6

Foils for the Deadly Sins

Thus, a tension emerged between the seven deadly sins and the seven heavenly virtues. The virtues (prudence, justice, temperance, fortitude, faith, hope, and love) did not clearly oppose an opposite deadly sin (vainglory, envy, anger, melancholy, avarice, gluttony, and lust).

Aurelius Prudentius Clemens (348–c. 410) recognized this tension and saw the pastoral benefit of assigning opposing virtues as foils for each of the deadly sins. In Psychomachia, a graphic poem in the style of Virgil’s (70–19 BC) Aeneid, Prudentius squares off each of Cassian’s vices with the personified biblical virtue that could defeat it in the Christian’s battle for holiness. In the poem, as in the life of the believer, vainglory is defeated by humility, lust by chastity, anger by patience, and so on. The idea sprang from biblical teaching: the command to put off sin is grounded in the call to put on Christ — to walk by his Spirit and so bear spiritual fruit (Galatians 3:27; 5:16–24). Christians fight the schemes of their adversary clothed in gospel armor and equipped with spiritual weaponry (Ephesians 6:10–20). Additionally, the New Testament almost always places the characteristics of true spirituality alongside the descriptions of the sins the believer is to flee.7

Nevertheless, despite the widespread influence of Prudentius’s poem in the medieval period, the seven heavenly virtues — not a list of opposing virtues to contrast the deadly sins — endured as a lasting framework for spiritual formation.

Framework for Spiritual Formation

Writing for the instruction of fellow Dominican monks, Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) gave extensive attention to the nature of virtue and how it functioned in the life of the Christian. In his Summa Theologica, Aquinas argued that virtues are habitual dispositions — patterns of mind and heart that bring about good actions, especially by preventing our impulsive desires from taking us to sin’s opposite extremes.8 The virtue of temperance, for example, guards the appetite against gluttony on the one hand and abstinence on the other. Similarly, fortitude fears neither danger nor labor.9

“Christians act in virtuous ways because of the regenerating power and sanctifying grace of the Holy Spirit.”

Aquinas also argued that Christian virtue was more than the Greek philosophers’ quest for self-improvement. Christians are disposed to act in virtuous ways because of the regenerating power and sanctifying grace of the Holy Spirit. But new dispositions also require habituation — intentional cultivation through a life of obedient dependence on Christ.10 Like Augustine, Aquinas argued that the theological virtues — connected to and comprehended in love — were the specific means of grace God used to deepen and mature all other virtue.11

The seven heavenly virtues, however, remain more foreign to contemporary readers than the more familiar seven deadly sins. The centuries-old tension Prudentius felt between the two lists, persists. Therefore, we shouldn’t abandon either approach to spiritual formation. Contrasting the deadly sins with their opposite virtue can be a valuable way to gain insight and mature in holiness (see Colossians 3:5–17). Humility poisons pride, chastity defangs lust, temperance bridles gluttony, charity overpowers greed, diligence overcomes sloth, patience outlasts envy, and kindness conquers anger.

Ultimately, cultivation of virtue is not the remedy for sin — justification and final salvation come through the atoning work of Christ, alone. But in the same way the seven capital sins provide a diagnostic for disordered affections, the seven heavenly virtues provide a framework for spiritual formation. Generations of faithful Christians have used the language of heavenly virtues and deadly vices as means for growing in grace. And by recovering these tools for the modern church, we are better equipped to present ourselves holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship (Romans 12:1).