The Quiet Way

Gerhart Tersteegen was an apprentice shopkeeper in Mulheim, Germany more than 250 years go. It was a time of extended war (more than 30 years), religious interest was at a low ebb, and there was not a single copy of the Bible or New Testament in any bookshop in Leipzig. Four-fifths of the population had died. Out of this spiritual vacuum, God provided a few embers of His giving which led to the revival of religion in Germany and later in England. One of those “lights” was the humble ribbon-weaver, Gerhart Tersteegen. Poor health forced him to a quiet and isolated existence in a small cottage. After coming to faith and the discovery of God’s peace for his life, Tersteegen brought that small cottage to become a place of frequent spiritual counsel and often twenty or thirty people each evening waiting to speak to Gerhart about their spiritual condition. His insights were many and when he preached, often four or five hundred would gather at his cottage to hear him. Even the king, Frederick the Great, summoned him to the palace for spiritual counsel and conversation.

Tersteegen’s advice was simple. You are a child of God. Withdraw from outward things. Pray, and you will make contact with God, the source of your being.
Forget yourself. Look to God. Die to your own will, live for God’s will and you will know true life.

In one of his letters he wrote, “I believe that in the eyes of God there are really only two sets of people on earth: the children of the world in whom love of the world rules, and the children of God into whom the love of God is poured by His Holy Spirit; and that, apart from this, God pays no attention to any difference or name.”

Tersteegen’s reflections encourage us with the powerful reminder that there is no life worthy of living apart from Christ. He called us “to live wholly for God”, reminding us to follow “the teaching and life of Jesus by His Spirit.” Tersteegen spent little time focusing on particulars of doctrine or denominations…he wrote, “For love will win in the end, but it will be that pure love of God which is poured out in true fellowship with the Father and the Son in the hearts of those who strive to walk in the light, turning from the shadow to the substance, from the outer to the inner, and from all multiplicity to the one thing needful. This alone brings us union with one another and peace with God.”

(Adapted from “The Quiet Way,” Selections from the Letters of Gerhart Tersteegen. Translated by Emily Chisholm. London: The Epworth Press, 2nd Edition, 1953.)