To an anxious soul; to quiet her by holding before her the love of Jesus.
Addressee, date, and source
The Eighty-Second Letter.
To an anxious soul; to quiet her by holding before her the love of Jesus.
Beloved friend!
It is not out of hatred, but out of love, that God lets such anxieties come upon you. I perceive that He means to draw your soul with power away from the world to Himself: O what grace! Who should not yield himself wholly to such a God? The dog may well frighten the little sheep and drive them, but he may not devour them nor do them harm. This fear, sent to you by God, is likewise meant only to drive you to the Shepherd, who will surely preserve you in distress and in death. O then run to Him, for He loves you. Run to Him, for He calls you. Run to Him, and forsake the deceit of this world, for Jesus alone gives life and contentment. He is the good Shepherd, who in ardent love laid down His life for you, His little sheep. Think much upon this great love of Jesus! Only think what He has not done and suffered for you! To seek you and me, He came down from heaven. Your sins and mine have cost Him countless sighs, bloody sweat, distress and death; that you might but have the forgiveness of your sins and eternal life. Now He comes to your heart as well, to draw it away from the world to Himself. Love, then, love this sweet Savior, who has loved you so dearly! Beseech Him much at this time that He would forgive you all your sins, and make Himself known to your heart. I hope to enclose you also in my intercession. Do not be afraid; God does not hate you. Think nothing evil of the good God, but only good, and remain faithful to His call unto death! In Him I remain
Your well-disposed intercessor.
Mülheim, — — 1747.
German
Der zweiundachtzigste Brief.
An eine beängstigte Seele; um Sie durch Vorhaltung der Liebe JEsu zu beruhigen.
Herzgeliebte Freundin!
Es geschieht nicht aus Haß, sondern aus Liebe, daß GOtt dergleichen Beängstigungen über euch kommen läßt. Ich merke, Er will eure Seele mit Macht von der Welt zu sich ziehen: O welche Gnade!
— 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 letter to a frightened woman whose name is lost. She had written — or someone had written for her — about attacks of dread, and this is the answer: one paragraph, undated except for the year, and almost every sentence of it drawn from a single chapter of John. It is the shortest kind of pastoral letter and one of the surest, because it does not argue her out of the fear. It re-describes what the fear is for.
A few words and echoes.
- anxieties. Beängstigungen — the constricting, breath-tightening dread; the same root as the “anxious soul” of the heading.
- with power. Mit Macht — God is not coaxing her away from the world but pulling.
- the dog. The shepherd’s dog, permitted to frighten and drive and forbidden to harm — and it is a dog, not a wolf, which is the whole point.
- drive you to the Shepherd. One verb for what the dog does and for what the fear does: it moves her, and only in one direction.
- This fear, sent to you by God. The pivot of the image.
- the Shepherd. John’s tenth chapter runs under the whole letter: the sheep that hear His voice, the good shepherd who lays down His life, the hand out of which none shall pluck them.
- life and contentment. Vergnügen — in 1747 still the older sense of sufficiency, having enough, not the modern “amusement.”
- ardent love. Brünstig — burning, fervent; an eighteenth-century word that has since narrowed.
- what He has not done. The German exclamation means the opposite of what it says: there is nothing He has not done.
- bloody sweat. Gethsemane, named without being named.
- enclose you in my intercession. Einfassen — to set a stone in its setting; not “include” but “enclose.”
- Do not be afraid. Plain, colloquial, and placed after all the argument rather than before it.
- Think nothing evil. The phrase from the great chapter on love, turned around: it is God who must not be thought evil of.
- unto death. The word to Smyrna — “be thou faithful unto death” — laid over a private fright.
- your well-disposed intercessor. The subscription: not director, not teacher; the man who prays for her.
trans. Jarred Fenlason · gerhardtersteegen.com/letters/bdii-thiii-082 · all rights reservedEnglish translation © Jarred Fenlason · All rights reserved · gerhardtersteegen.com.