Christian Life and Witness. Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf
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up by hell (James 3:6). They bear the image of the devil and are declared, public, trained, yes truly purchased enemies of the rule of Christ. They diligently seek to hinder by all sorts of ways and methods, and make it a special merit and religious duty to let themselves be instruments against the work and the servants of God; they often have no glory and benefit, but rather detriment and shame because of it and they do it anyway. Such people are truly dangerous sinners and tools of Satan and indeed they even become his martyrs: they are almost unconquerable; and because they are hard, yes almost impossible, to persuade on account of the deeply established foundation of their sin, the Lord must employ highly unusual means for their salvation if it is ever to come about at all.
They are, to repeat, either virtuous like Saul, who even greatly raged and believed that he had to do many terrible things against the name of Jesus, while at the same time he was blameless and pious according to the Law; or they are corrupt and vicious, who in their crude wrongdoing have occasionally become mockers and enemies of the truth. Those women and men who serve Christ are intolerable to look upon because they rebuke and censure such evil-doing, as the matter finds expression in the Book of Wisdom,6 and Herod is a biblical example of it (Mark 6: 18–19). All these sorts are wretched and lost and need a Savior who could help them out of this predicament, if they are willing and obliged to be saved.
But what does salvation mean? It means one is torn from the ruling authority of darkness and one is placed within the ruling authority of Jesus. He will help the dead out of their death, bring the slaves of Satan to freedom, take away enmity and unbelief, and give faith and love in their place.
The Lord himself must make a beginning for such a salvation: since no saying of Jesus about people demands that they should begin and help themselves, rather the Savior said, “I will draw them all to me. They only have to let themselves be saved and reconciled.” He will do it all through his Spirit. Cast fire upon the earth and pour out his love upon all hearts, yes even breathe the breath of life into the dead. One must only be still and wait and be attentive to the voice of the Lord when he comes to the heart with his power, his fire, his promptings, and his Spirit, and thereafter not talk things over with flesh and blood but be obedient to the heavenly visitation.
God sees according to his wisdom, so he can make an impression on each soul in the best, that is, most effective, way. The methods, occasions, and hours are different for all so that one cannot determine it. The Lord takes hold of one in preaching, another in his house, overcomes a third in the street, another again out in the field, and seizes a fifth in the very act of sinning. Therefore, it is not in accordance with the Gospel to lay down fixed rules, or to set forth methods7 and forms in which souls must first be situated, or to expect a coincident method in the seeking and gathering of souls. One must entrust to the Savior’s free grace and judgment how he can and will reach souls.
But in the meantime he is indeed willing and ready to receive all souls with prevenient grace.8 Therefore it is inexcusable, an atrocious sin, if one seeks to elude and avoid the Holy Spirit when he9 comes to the soul with divine power, or is frivolous, light-minded and neglectful of the Spirit’s drawing near. Then one can often miss a moment upon which great grace and salvation depended, a moment which one cannot bring back again for days or years, and which one seeks fruitlessly for a long time, until the Holy Spirit, who in the meantime returned to his place again (Hosea 5:15), returns in grace.10 Therefore, one must leave everything lie just as it is when such times and promptings of grace come, because all things (including the most important commercial dealings in the world) can be retrieved except this visitation itself. Indeed, if someone were in church and felt the Holy Spirit begin to preach in his heart, he should follow Dr. Luther’s counsel; let the preacher one can see preach on, and attend instead to the gracious movement, in the heart, of the preacher one cannot see.
It is good to notice this, in order that one not make a mess of, hinder, and stop the work of God, but rather make it firm and durable with prayer and supplication. It can even happen in a person’s heart this briefly, when one has no other opportunity, “Lord! Have mercy! Lord, be gracious to me, a sinner!” This carries just as much weight with God, as if one had spoken many words; since Moses himself spoke no words at all (Exodus 14:15), that is to say, he just cried out. But at the same time it must be nothing compulsory and feigned, but rather free and brought about by the grace of God, because otherwise one impedes both self and others. One must simply allow grace to have a free run in all its work, until faith has been joined with the Word (see Hebrews 4:2 as a foundation text). This does not come about because of deep understanding, great aptitude, courage and worthiness, or even from a journey of soaring genius beyond the divine boundary, but rather from the free mercy of God in the order of grace.
The cause of all grace is to be sought in the merits and sufficiency of Christ alone. He must become and remain the only source of our salvation, and must matter and have value for us; he must be effective for us, only in his bloody form on the cross. Because on the cross he himself was baptized with a baptism of blood, and consecrated as the Savior of the world, his name, “Jesus,” was sealed for us unto all eternity. Therefore, whoever understands the mystery of the cross and the wounds of Jesus can have comfort and counsel, even if he were the greatest sinner, because Jesus atoned for all sins that have taken place and all that will take place unto eternity. He confessed for the whole world when he said from the cross, “Father, forgive them’“ And when he called out, “It is accomplished”; he pronounced at the same time a general absolution over the whole world. Thus, whoever now believes in him will not be judged (John 3:18).
In addition one need not worry now that souls do not humble themselves enough and become contrite on account of their sins. All have to experience a true form of abasement by grace; it is necessary for as many as the Savior perceives [living] under other motives, with every single one, to break his mind and to transform and convert him; “Indeed, the taste of the powerful reconciliation itself must serve to [evoke] true abasement.”11 For as on the Day of the Lord those who are found still living, to whom it is not prevented, are thus raised up out of their decomposition [before they experience anything else] (what the others who were dead experienced slowly and without feeling, the living must undergo in an instant and probably more uncomfortably, as regards the transformation of their mortality into immortality and their corruption into incorruption) in the same way some are able to experience in an instant or in a few hours everything that others feel over the course of days and years; because the circumstances with such guidance of souls appear incomprehensible and the obstacles seem in some cases insurmountable. Therefore one can dictate nothing to the Savior concerning [the] mortification and pardoning of wretched sinners, but rather one must entrust it all to him and his wisdom and faithfulness alone, how many he thinks it proper to allow to experience, each one, the dread, and how soon he can with this and that be ready to persuade and save [the sinner]. To be sure, his desire is to deliver and help soon. “Your king comes to you, a Deliverer and a Helper” (Zechariah 9:9).
The Savior’s method is not to command that souls go through a long process of penitence and preparation, but rather only a true and heartfelt word is required; thus grace is present and has helped one out of all sins. And actually the greatest wretchedness is when one has not the Savior and has not love; as on the other hand that is heaven on earth to live in the grace and love of the Savior: thus it is a great benefit that no one is more eager than he to disclose himself to the soul as Savior, so that no one would rather give faith; for he surely bears salvation to us.
If we now usually gladly think about things which can contribute something to our advantage and use; so it is easy in stillness also to think about this matter by which we once can say out of our own experience: He can save forevermore; “He can deliver all who come to him.” Then, after that: I will recount all that he has done in my soul (Psalm 66:16).
1. The tetrarchs, each of whom ruled a region of the Roman Near East under close Roman watch.
2. It is quite interesting that Count Zinzendorf quotes a book of the Old Testament Apocrypha. But it is unclear what it means. Did he make this reference only to add rhetorical