 Calvin thought that agriculture and the traditional crafts were normal human activities . With regard to trade and the financial world he was more liberal than Luther , but both were strictly opposed to usury . However , Calvin allowed the charging of modest interest rates on loans . Like the other Reformers Calvin understood work as a means through which the believers expressed their gratitude to God for their redemption in Christ and as a service to their neighbors . Everybody was obliged to work ; loafing and begging were rejected . The idea that economic success was a visible sign of God 's grace played only a minor role in Calvin 's thinking . It became more important in later , partly secularized forms of Calvinism and became the starting @-@ point of Max Weber 's theory about the rise of capitalism . 
