Attentiveness to the holy calling of God. How one is to conduct oneself in certain temptations.
The Hundred and Twenty-eighth Letter.
Attentiveness to the holy calling of God. How one is to conduct oneself in certain temptations.
In the grace of God, beloved friend and sister!
To your kind letter of the 5th of this month I could not reply this morning, because the carrier did not stay so long here. I see, then, how the precious grace still holds on, to draw you to the divine walk, and to an ever more complete surrender to His divine Majesty. See but how faithful God is! And how little ground unbelief has, when it would cast down the mind!
To give heed to this holy calling of God, and to consent inwardly and lovingly, in secret, to all its demands — without letting in any unrest or perverseness of your outward part — that is the manner in which you are to conduct yourself toward it, so that your whole heart, and your whole will, may at last become a prisoner of the Lord; and oh! how free and blessed you will then be!
As concerns your temptations, you do well to disclose them to me at once; I tell them again to none but the Lord, whatever is entrusted to me in such matters. The simplicity of telling one's temptations, sins, and faults at once is already half the cure: we will lay it before God; the enemy will gain nothing in this. On your side, this is my counsel: to such temptations one must wisely cut off all occasion. When a notion or thought comes, one must strive — NB. — to forget it, not by force, but by a non-attention; one should even distract oneself, for God's sake, with outward business, so long as needed. If you still cannot get free, then renew in your mind the complete surrender to God, whereby you have made yourself over to Him as an eternal possession, by a gentle but inward act of the giving of your whole self to God, and strive to remain thus hidden. If the notions come back nonetheless, then go on, likewise, offering yourself up again, calmly and heartily, to God, with your inner will. If it lasts very long, and you can in no way shake it off, then take it as a cross from the hand of the Lord, and bear it to please Him, saying, as it stands in the Blumengärtlein, pag. 55: Ah, rather die a thousand times, and so forth; and in the 42nd hymn: Yet still I will not sin, etc.
Yes, you are right in this — that you must regard and look upon the corrupt part which stirs against your will as something foreign, and that does not concern you: ah, this is a truly important and necessary point for attaining to inward peace. Meanwhile the hidden man of the heart must hold his confidential converse with God in a gentle and quiet spirit — which is so precious before God. To His faithful leading I commend you, from the heart, and remain, together with greeting,
Your weak fellow-combatant.
Mülheim, the 8th of December 1732.
German
Der hundertundachtundzwanzigste Brief.
Aufmercksamkeit auf den heiligen Beruf GOttes. Wie man sich in gewissen Versuchungen zu verhalten.
In der Gnade GOttes geliebte Freundin und Schwester!
Auf dein Angenehmes vom 5ten dieses konnte heut-morgen nicht antworten, weil der Treiber nicht so lang hier blieb. Ich sehe dann, wie daß die theure Gnade noch anhält, dich zu reizen zum göttlichen Wandel, und zur immer völligeren Uebergab an Seine göttliche Majestät.
— Opening lines of the original German. The complete transcription of all 605 letters appears in the forthcoming Encounter Press critical edition; Brief 1 is shown in full as a sample.
German text: public domain (1773–75 first edition / 1845 Gesammelte Schriften).
Translator’s notes
What this letter is. One of the most practical letters in the whole collection — a piece of hands-on spiritual direction, written 8 December 1732 to Else Otterbeck (who also receives Briefe 112, 119, 121, and 127). She has written to him about her temptations, and he answers her point for point. The heading names the two halves: attentiveness to God's holy calling, and how to conduct oneself in certain temptations. He begins by encouraging her: the fact that she is being drawn to "an ever more complete surrender" is itself grace at work — "see but how faithful God is! And how little ground unbelief has, when it would cast down the mind." The goal he holds out is a striking one: that "your whole heart, and your whole will, may at last become a prisoner of the Lord" — a captivity that is, paradoxically, perfect freedom ("oh! how free and blessed you will then be!").
Then comes the concrete counsel on temptation, and it is unusually specific. First, openness: disclose temptations at once — "the simplicity of telling one's temptations, sins, and faults at once is already half the cure." Then, the method for intrusive thoughts, which he flags with a pointed NB. ("nota bene" — note well): not to fight them head-on. "When a notion or thought comes, one must strive — note this — to forget it, not by force, but by a non-attention"; if needed, simply turn to "outward business, for God's sake." If that doesn't free you, "renew the complete surrender to God"; and if the thing persists anyway, stop struggling and "take it as a cross from the hand of the Lord, and bear it to please Him." He even gives her two lines to say — one from his own Blumengärtlein hymnbook, one from a hymn. Finally, the deepest principle: regard "the corrupt part that stirs against your will as something foreign, that does not concern you" — do not identify with it. This detachment, he says, is "a truly important and necessary point for attaining inward peace." Underneath all the technique lies the real thing he wants for her: that "the hidden man of the heart" keep up its "confidential converse with God in a gentle and quiet spirit." He signs as her fellow-soldier — "Your weak fellow-combatant."
A few words and echoes.
- God's holy calling. The first theme — Beruf, the calling of God that draws the soul; to "give heed" to it and consent to its demands "in secret" is the whole art of the inner life.
- "A prisoner of the Lord." Paul's phrase (Ephesians 4:1) — to be so wholly given to God that heart and will are His captives; Tersteegen makes this the goal, and calls it freedom.
- "Half the cure." His maxim on openness — simply telling one's temptations and faults at once is already halfway to healing (an echo of "confess your faults one to another," James 5:16).
- "Not by force, but by non-attention." The heart of his counsel on intrusive thoughts, flagged NB. — one overcomes a temptation not by wrestling it but by declining to attend to it, and turning gently elsewhere.
- "As something foreign." The key to peace — not to identify with "the corrupt part that stirs against your will," but to regard it as something alien that "does not concern you."
- "The hidden man of the heart." Peter's phrase (1 Peter 3:4) — the inner self keeping its quiet, trusting converse with God "in a gentle and quiet spirit," which Scripture calls "of great price."
- "God is faithful." The encouragement the letter opens on (1 Corinthians 10:13 — "God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able").
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdi-thi-128 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.