Union and a wish for the New Year. Of the unblessed essence of nature, and of the blessed essence of the love of God.
The Hundred-and-Twelfth Letter.
Union and a wish for the New Year. Of the unblessed essence of nature, and of the blessed essence of the love of God.
In Jesus, beloved brothers!
My spirit has, at the beginning of this year, begged of God much blessing for you all there, and wished it to you in Jesus' Name. You will surely have done the like. We will, then, in this year too, love Jesus heartily, and cleave to Him as true nurslings of grace. We will also love one another, and not grieve one another; our little crumbs we will share among one another, and bear love and sorrow together, through Him who bears and has borne us, that He may have much joy in us, and we in Him.
Is it not so, dear children? Should we not be wholly the Lord's, who has become to us such a good Lord and dear Emmanuel? We are to dwell in Him unmovedly; in the creature and in ourselves it avails nothing at all. The inmost or deepest essence in us, according to nature, looks all too wretched; there is nothing there but sin, darkness, pride, fierce fire, hard essence, anguish, death, and hell. No better lodging has the spirit, so long as it is not in Jesus; let a man bear himself outwardly as he will. But — O sweet Gospel, and blessed New-Year's tidings! — that God became man, and has so inwardly incorporated His love into us in the winsome Name Jesus, that we can now find in us a wholly other essence, which is yet deeper and yet more inwardly near to us than the first essence of our nature — which also constantly meets us and lures us to itself, to go forth out of the creature and selfhood; and this essence is even the love of God in the sweet Name Jesus, wherein we find complete redemption from all evil — all salvation, light, humility, cooling water, gentle oil, delight, life, and paradise.
O how good it is! — to let oneself be led, through suffering, dying, and praying, into this kingdom of God, which is within us. To this we are, and shall be, called; therefore let us ever more let ourselves go, and, like little children, sink in, and hide ourselves in this our mother's-lap, that we may stand sheltered in all trials, and, if we should die in this year, may yet be found nowhere else than in the Lord — which is the wish of
Your
Mülheim, the 5th of January, 1737. — devoted fellow-brother.
German
Der hundertundzwölfte Brief.
Verbindung und Wunsch zum Neuen Jahr. Von dem unseligen Wesen der Natur, und von dem seligen Wesen der Liebe GOttes.
In JEsu geliebte Brüder!
Mein Geist hat euch allen daselbst beim Anfang dieses Jahrs viel Segen von GOtt erbeten, und in JEsus Namen zugewünschet.
— 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 New Year letter — written the same day as Brief 111 — but this one to a whole circle of "beloved brothers" at one place. It is a wish and a renewal of union: "my spirit has, at the beginning of this year, begged of God much blessing for you all."
Its argument. The title sets the two halves: the unblessed essence of nature, and the blessed essence of the love of God. First the hard truth: our "inmost or deepest essence… according to nature… looks all too wretched — nothing there but sin, darkness, pride, fierce fire… death and hell," and "no better lodging has the spirit, so long as it is not in Jesus." Then the turn — Tersteegen's "sweet Gospel and blessed New-Year's tidings": that God became man, and "has so inwardly incorporated His love into us in the winsome Name Jesus," that we can find within us "a wholly other essence… yet more inwardly near to us than the first essence of our nature." That new essence is the love of God in the Name Jesus, "wherein we find complete redemption from all evil — all salvation, light, humility, cooling water, gentle oil, delight, life, and paradise." So the New-Year resolve is to be led "through suffering, dying, and praying, into this kingdom of God, which is within us," and to hide "like little children… in this our mother's-lap," that whether they live or die in the year, they "may be found nowhere else than in the Lord."
A few words and echoes.
- "Nurslings of grace" (Gnaden-Säuglinge). Newborns at the breast of grace — cf. 1 Peter 2:2, "as newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word."
- "Such a good Lord and dear Emmanuel." Matthew 1:23 / Isaiah 7:14 — "they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us" — the Christmas name carried into the New Year.
- "The winsome Name Jesus… cooling water, gentle oil." The Name as the whole of salvation; cf. Song of Solomon 1:3 ("thy name is as ointment poured forth") and the healing oil and water of the soul's refreshment.
- "This kingdom of God, which is within us." Luke 17:21 — "the kingdom of God is within you."
- "Like little children, sink in, and hide ourselves in this our mother's-lap." Matthew 18:3 ("become as little children") joined to Isaiah 66:13 ("as one whom his mother comforteth") — the love of God as a maternal lap in which to hide.
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdi-thii-112 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.