Encouragement to suffering and to loving.

What this letter is. A short undated letter of 1749, written from Mülheim to a sister — Catharina Krabbe, whose name the old print suppresses and the critical edition restores. Its whole burden is already in the argument: encouragement to suffering and to loving. He greets her sitting in the stillness before the Savior's face, tells her she is not alone in what she suffers, and then gives the two verbs as one act: suffer, and love, as a child in its mother's lap. It closes with a four-line blessing on the sweet name of Jesus.

Not alone. "Only be wholly of good cheer and content in your suffering! Jesus suffers with you; Jesus suffers in you, and you suffer in and with Him, and you are indeed not alone." The three clauses are the letter's first movement, and he does not leave her with the doctrine: "I too suffer with you, my dear child! In spirit I find you near." Then the invitation: come, and let us worship our highest Good; let us love, and let ourselves be loved by Him who is so near. In Him they have all, when they give Him their All — and she is already given: "To Him you are irrevocably devoted with body and soul; therefore only do not be anxious, for you are already in His hand."

Suffer then and love. The second movement is the argument in two verbs. "Suffer then and love, as a child in its mother's lap; there remain wholly still and will-less, yes, imageless: He Himself will surely form you, as you must be." The counsel is not to manage the suffering but to stay in it as a child stays, without a will of her own and without a picture of what she should become. "O how so simple, pliant, innocent, and childlike He will make you! O how so absolutely He will be your Lord and Master, your life and your All!" She is only to commit herself with sweet trust to His hand, and give His workings unconstrained room: "He is faithful, He will carry it out."

The close. He greets her once more as his daughter, assures her of brotherly remembrance and of "unmoved fellowship of the Spirit," and asks to be offered up to the Lord — the intercession asked in return. Then the verse: the sweet name of Jesus, forever sweet and every morning new to her, mighty for loving and for suffering, and toward completion diligent in power.

A few words and echoes.

• sitting in the stillness. The letter opens from where he is: before the face of the dearest Savior, in stillness, greeting her from there.
• Jesus suffers with you. The first consolation is not explanation but company — His, and then Tersteegen's. (Romans 8:17 — "if so be that we suffer with him.")
• let us love, and let ourselves be loved. Both directions of the one love; the second is as much the work as the first.
• in Him we have all, when we give Him our All. The fullness so near, already hers, on the one condition that is not a condition: she is already irrevocably devoted, already in His hand.
• do not be anxious. Sorge nur nicht — because the hand already holds her. (1 Peter 5:7 — "Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.")
• as a child in its mother's lap. Schooß — the lap (the place of being held, not of effort). Still, will-less, imageless: He Himself will form her.
• will-less, imageless. Willenlos, bilderlos — without a will of her own and without an inner picture of the form she should take; the forming is His.
• He is faithful, He will carry it out. (1 Thessalonians 5:24 — "Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.")
• Him who is so near. (Psalm 145:18 — "The LORD is nigh unto all them that call upon him.")
• fellowship of the Spirit. Geistes-Gemeinschaft — the unmoved inner fellowship he claims with her; Im Geist earlier is "in spirit" (his own spirit finding her near).
• Offer me up also to the Lord. The return of intercession: she is to name him before God as he has named her.
• toward completion diligent in power. The verse's last line: the sweet name, not idle, diligent about the finishing of what He has begun. Rendered as rhymed AABB, the house practice for closing verses.