The slightest beginnings of the life of Jesus are through faith counted great. A history from the life of the old fathers.

The Hundred-and-forty-sixth Letter.

The slightest beginnings of the life of Jesus are through faith counted great. A history from the life of the old fathers.

In Jesus our Saviour dearly beloved brother!

—— I can nowhere possibly look with slighting or indifferent eyes upon the smallest, weakest and frailest beginnings and conamina toward the breaking-through of the kingdom and life of Jesus, in a soul in particular, or in the church in general; after I have with believing eyes, God be praised! learned to look into the economy of God in the work of our redemption. Reason's- and nature-impulse will hurry, and see everything finished at a flight; but faith hurries not, but looks and goes after God. There was so much and so great promised, prefigured and prophesied thousands of years concerning the Messiah and His kingdom, that the merely-natural sense and understanding could not possibly conjecture it by the Child at Bethlehem, nor see it in the hated and at last crucified deceiver (as they named Him) of Nazareth, that this were the Man with the whole matter; and those who yet believed something of it would have it finished straightway, and in perfect éclat. O! depth of the wisdom and of the knowledge of God! since everywhere it must be believed through, and faith alone (which is nothing else than a true laying-down of all human wit, ability and virtue at the feet of God) obtain prize and crown. ——

What I mean to have read formerly in those lives of the old fathers is this. "A holy old father had taken a youth to himself, who, to the old man's particular comfort, behaved himself very well, and exercised himself in all pieces of godliness with especial earnest. A supposed holy angel appeared to the old father, to make known to him among other things that his disciple was a reprobate man, and all his earnest and praying would be fruitless. The old man, believing such an angel, fell into utmost melancholy, which moved him especially to bitter tears, so often as the youth came before him." The youth noticed that he mourned on his account; asked him to tell him the cause; and when after long insisting the old man at last said what had been announced to him by the angel, the disciple answered: Dear father, be at peace on my account! be it as it may, what God is finally pleased to make of me, yet will I love Him, and serve Him the whole time of my life. From which composed form and answer the old man then recognized that the one who had appeared had been a deceitful angel. ——

Let the dear brother think of me especially before God. I am in important circumstances, and much more miserable and unfit, than others can believe. The body also becomes quite faint and as it were ruined through all manner of exertions. I see my faults and unfitness, and am yet still too scrupulous to withdraw myself. The Lord direct all, and help us, that we may only please Him, then there is little depending on us.

Mülheim, the 15th of December, 1750.

German

Der hundertsechsundvierzigste Brief.

Die geringste Anfänge des Lebens JEsu werden durch den Glauben groß geschätzt. Eine Historie aus dem Leben der Altväter.

In JEsu unserm Heiland herzlich geliebter Bruder!

— — Ich kan unmöglich irgendwo die kleinste, schwächste und gebrechlichste Anfänge und Conamina zum Durchbruch des Reichs und Lebens JEsu, in einer Seele ins besondere, oder in der Kirche überhaupt, mit geringschätzigen oder gleichgültigen Augen ansehen; nachdem ich mit glaubigen Augen, GOtt Lob! die Oeconomie GOttes in dem Werk unserer Erlösung habe einschauen lernen.

— 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).