Thorough and loving instructions to a sick brother, to look not upon himself, but in everything upon the crucified Jesus.
The First Letter.
Thorough and loving instructions to a sick brother, to look not upon himself, but in everything upon the crucified Jesus.
My dearly beloved brother in Jesus!
I long hereby to greet you heartily, and to visit you, with heart and pen, in your present weakness, in the Spirit of the love of Jesus — may He be near to your spirit! As regards your outward state, you will doubtless have received from N. the needful medicine and directions for your care. . . . .
As regards the inward, dear brother, I praise the Lord that He grants you so much union with His good pleasure in the cross. Thank our kindly Father with me for it, and be simply childlike toward God, who has loved you. The Mosaic, timorous spirit of the Law does no service on Golgotha: when it comes to the cross, or to dying, the crucified and dying Jesus must be our object, and His childlike Spirit of love and of faith must govern us. Do not reckon long, now, whether you will come through — your head is too weak for that. Jesus has settled the account with His heavenly Father according to the strictness of His righteousness; and we have settled it with Jesus according to the riches of His mercy. The willing acceptance of His cross, and the mortification of our own life, are included in that reckoning. Let Him chasten us, then: we will be silent, bow ourselves, and love still, through His mercy. Let Him melt and refine us — He remains our Friend even so.
Make no reflections! Now is no time to examine yourself. Give yourself over. Sink down, like a sick, poor child, into its mother's lap, and suffer there what, how, and as long as the Father wills. God is God: that is enough. Do not seek faith in the head, and pay no heed either to the unbelief in the head. To give heed to the foolish doubtings and temptations of the enemy in the reason is to lay far too much weight and honor upon such fantasies. Should we turn back, and once more (as over a doubtful matter) open an inquiry into what has long since been settled and concluded? Childish trifles! Do not ask long: Whether God is? whether this or that is? Simply take hold of the matter! Serve God, love God, honor and glorify God, were it only by resigned suffering, as well as you can. Think now more of suffering well than of doing well! Yea, think only of God, and forget yourself and all things. See the hymn: "God, whom I know as Love," and so forth.
Mülheim, the 20th of April 1739.
German
Der erste Brief.
Gründliche und liebreiche Unterweisungen an einen kranken Bruder, um nicht auf sich selbst, sondern in allem auf den gekreuzigten JEsum zu sehen.
Mein herzlich geliebter Bruder in JEsu!
Ich begehre dich hierdurch herzlich zu grüßen, und mit Herz und Feder in deiner jetzigen Schwachheit zu besuchen in dem Geist der Liebe JEsu, welcher deinem Geiste nahe sey!
— 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. The first letter of the Third Part — written to a sick friend of many years, on 20 April 1739. His counsel for the sickbed runs against every instinct of a weak and anxious mind: stop examining yourself. The medicine and the doctor's directions will look after the outward man; for the inward, there is only one thing to look at — "not upon yourself, but in everything upon the crucified Jesus."
The letter's center is a bookkeeping image bold enough to startle: "Jesus has settled the account with His heavenly Father according to the strictness of His righteousness; and we have settled it with Jesus according to the riches of His mercy." Even the willing bearing of the cross, even the dying of our own life, are "included in that reckoning" — so the sick man need not reckon at all. And if God chastens: "we will be silent, bow ourselves, and love still… He remains our Friend even so."
Then the letter turns wholly practical. No reflections; no self-examination; "sink down, like a sick, poor child, into its mother's lap." Faith is not to be hunted for in the head, nor unbelief fretted over there. And to the oldest sickbed doubts — whether God is, whether this or that is — he gives the shortest answer he ever wrote: "God is God: that is enough." The letter closes by pointing the sick man to a hymn he loved — "God, whom I know as Love," written by Christian Friedrich Richter, the physician of Halle who was also one of its finest hymnwriters. There is a quiet fitness in that: a sickbed letter, sent with a parcel of medicines, ending with a doctor's hymn. And one further human touch the printed edition quietly removed: the original letter came with a little parcel — the very medicines it prescribes — and a paragraph of careful dosage instructions (and the plea "guard your eyes and head, that you not spoil them now with reading or writing") that the 1775 editor trimmed to a discreet row of dots. The manuscript preserves it all, down to the name of the physician-brother the print hides behind "N."
A few words and echoes.
- The timorous spirit of the Law. Romans 8:15 — "ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear"; the anxious, driving spirit that has no place on Golgotha.
- Our object. When he says the crucified Jesus must be "our object," he uses the old sense — that which is set before the soul to gaze upon (1 Corinthians 2:2).
- The settled account. Colossians 2:14 — the "handwriting of ordinances… nailed to his cross."
- Into its mother's lap. Psalm 131:2 — "as a child that is weaned of his mother: my soul is even as a weaned child."
- Suffering well before doing well. His standing sickbed counsel: in weakness, the soul's one work is willing endurance out of love.
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdii-thiii-001 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.