Letters · Erster Band · Theil II (1773)

Instruction in cross and suffering.

Bd I · Th II · Brief 9 · Der neunte Brief

Addressee — N. N. (open direction) — but plainly a "liebe Schwester" (woman, Ihr/euch). Not identified (1773-only).
Date — Undated in the print (no dateline, no signature). No year attested.
Provenance — Translated from the public-domain 1773 first edition (Theil II, pp. 28–29), in normalized GS 1845 orthography, collated against the 1845 Gesammelte Schriften (Bd 8) and Hartman's 1819 reprint. All public-domain.

The Ninth Letter.

Instruction in cross and suffering.

N. N.

Your worthy little letters I could not answer with the pen any sooner. You can easily think that I cannot call them pleasant in every part: yet cross and suffering belong to the way. We may not choose it, but must take it upon ourselves, says Jesus, just as we find it before our feet: He knows best which plasters are serviceable for our wounds; the ones that hurt most are often the most serviceable.

Certainly the Lord is constrained, for our best, to overlay the creature and this life with bitternesses. Even the most agreeable thing in this life, and the dearest in the creature, must be mingled with a wholesome bitterness, so that we do not fall too hard upon it, but everything may remain in quiet balance and withdrawnness. Nothing is more needful, in the time of trials and sufferings, than prayer and inward retreat. If one lives too much and too long in the senses and in nature, one sees everything wrongly; one feels the whole weight of the sufferings, and finds nothing but one's own weakness and unrest. But if one seeks to live inwardly-turned, one stands in the right light, judges and takes everything simply in God; there one tastes the sweet kernel of the cross, and there the Lord bears, in us and with us, what there is to bear. O sink yourself into it, dear sister! and let yourself be made into the innocent Christ-child, that thinks nothing evil, takes nothing amiss, knows nothing of growing and staying resentful, but looks upon white and black alike with a friendly face.

❦

German

Der neunte Brief.

Unterricht in Kreuz und Leiden.

N. N. Eure werthe Brieflein habe mit der Feder nicht eher beantworten können. Ihr könnet leicht denken, daß ich selbige nicht in allen Stücken angenehm nennen kann: Doch Kreuz und Leiden gehöret mit zum Weg.

— 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. A short letter of "instruction in cross and suffering," answering a "sister" whose recent letters had been full of hard things. Tersteegen does not explain her suffering away; he sets it inside the way of discipleship and shows how it turns from bitter to sweet when it is met inwardly rather than in "the senses."

Its argument. He admits he cannot call her news "pleasant in every part," but — "cross and suffering belong to the way. We may not choose it, but must take it upon ourselves, says Jesus, just as we find it before our feet." God is the physician: "He knows best which plasters serve our wounds; the ones that hurt most are often the most serviceable." Even the dearest earthly things must be mingled "with a wholesome bitterness," lest we "fall too hard upon" them and lose our "quiet balance and withdrawnness." The remedy in trial is "prayer and inward retreat," because everything depends on where one lives: "if one lives too much… in the senses," one "sees everything wrongly… feels the whole weight of the sufferings"; but living inwardly one "tastes the sweet kernel of the cross, and the Lord bears, in us and with us, what there is to bear." He ends with his tenderest image — to become again a child: "let yourself be made into the innocent Christ-child, that thinks nothing evil, takes nothing amiss… but looks upon white and black alike with a friendly face."

A few words and echoes.

"We may not choose it, but must take it upon ourselves, says Jesus." Matthew 16:24 / Luke 9:23 — "let him… take up his cross" — the cross is received as given, not selected.
"Which plasters serve our wounds; the ones that hurt most are often the most serviceable." The healing behind the hurt — Hebrews 12:11 ("no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous… nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit") and Hosea 6:1 ("he hath torn, and he will heal us").
"The sweet kernel of the cross." Tersteegen's own image: the bitter shell of suffering has a sweet centre, tasted only when the cross is borne inwardly and "in God."
"Let yourself be made into the innocent Christ-child, that thinks nothing evil." Matthew 18:3 ("except ye… become as little children") joined to 1 Corinthians 13:5 (love "thinketh no evil") — the childlike heart that "looks on white and black alike with a friendly face."

Cite this letter

Gerhard Tersteegen, Geistliche und erbauliche Briefe, Erster Band, II. Theil, Brief 9 (Solingen, 1773–75); trans. Jarred Fenlason, https://gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdi-thii-009.html.

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