CHAPTER II. A WINDFALL AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
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CHAPTER II.
A WINDFALL AND ITS CONSEQUENCES.
I ALWAYS drove with pleasure to the mill, because, while the corn was being ground, I sometimes found something to read. The mill was in the parish of Vilsen---not in our parish of Hoyerhagen. Now, it happened once, when I went into the miller's room, that I saw printed papers lying on the table. I at once looked at them. There was a picture on the top representing the rays of the rising sun, and over it was written "The glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." Both the picture and the title touched my receptive mind. The rays of the rising sun in the early hours of the morning were always enchanting natural objects to me; and I had often read the words from the sixtieth chapter of Isaiah with awe, because they sounded so lovely, and because the chapter contained such sublime poetry. I knew by heart.
Arise, shine, for thy light is come,
And the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee.
It was no wonder that I was attracted by so good an impression of the meaning of the print. I read further: Merciful Missionary Leaf. These were strange words to me, but that did not trouble me; the narratives of foreign lands and heathen were attractive. I asked the miller's wife to allow me to take the pamphlet away till my next trip to the mill, which I was willingly permitted to do. Yes, she seemed pleased, the good old wife (she was old-fashioned in her belief, and abhorred novelties), to distribute the pamphlets with a good conscience.
The finding of the missionary tract on the miller's table was, unknown to me at the time, the turning point of my life, and the hand of God can be clearly seen therein. The tracts were not regularly received by the people at the mill. I never saw them there before or after. As I heard later, Pastor Kohler, at Vilsen, had only sent them there that one time in order that the peasants, when they came to the mill, might read them there, and I--long
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anticipating something unknown to me, sought for it painfully--came and found them. I must say about this dear family of millers that some years later I found awakened Christianity in them.
The wide surrounding district suffered at that time from a spiritual drought. Real infidelity had, so far, made but little advance, but a dreadful indifference reigned supreme that was no better than unbelief. Some held on to the old-fashioned forms of piety; but there was no inner life, and where the voice of one calling for repentance was raised in the wilderness, as that of Pastor Kohler, at Vilsen, who demanded conversion of heart and an awakened Christian life, it was considered novelty, and those who held by old-fashioned ways feared it might bewilder them.
I have already remarked that I had a considerable stock of the yearly land calendar, because there were some good things to read in it; only I was sorry that I always had to wait a whole year before a new one was published. Here, now, was a publication that came out every fourteen days, and was just as good to read as a calendar. As I had heard in the mill that the Missionary Leaves could be got from Pastor Kohler, at Vilsen, I resolved on the occasion of my next journey to the mill to run over and order the publication. I had previously heard of Pastor Kohler. Some praised him up to heaven; others damned him down to hell. I was indifferent to both opinions, for I did not know him, and did not belong to his parish. As the upper classes had nothing in common with the peasantry I did not trouble myself about them. The ordering of the missionary publication was a matter of business; there was no necessity to see him in person. The pastor received me in a friendly manner, and appeared to be much astonished that a young peasant servant, for which he took me, and from the parish of Hoyerhagen, of his own accord should desire to have the missionary tract. As he still hesitated, and seemed to be in doubt whether or not I was in earnest, I asked how much the yearly: subscription cost. He told me, and I laid the money on the table. Thereupon he laid the numbers together which had appeared since the beginning of the year, and as he reached me the packet I snatched it with eagerness and said, "Here I have secured a treasure of learning." I wondered why
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a man in such a high position could talk with an uncultivated peasant boy in so friendly and unrestrained a manner.
The reading and re-reading of the tracts awakened in me an inclination towards, and then a heartfelt sympathy for, the heathen, and a desire for their conversion to Christianity, and I waited with eager curiosity to know what the next number would bring. I soon remarked that in these leaves there was a different tone of piety from what I was accustomed to hear. This reminded me of the pious speeches which I had heard in my childhood from my mother and grandmother (now dead); but it made no further impression on me than that the wavering of my belief, which I had for a long time remarked, again received stability.
Although I always faithfully fulfilled my agricultural labours, which, however, gave me not the least inclination to become a farmer--as I always had a great thirst for knowledge, as if I suspected there was something unknown in its possession--it was natural that a longing should arise in me to be sent to the heathen myself--especially as nothing prevented my leaving my fatherland and my friends.
Although I had now read the missionary publication for a considerable time, I was still unacquainted with the institutions of the mission. I expected that the missionaries must be all men of university education, and had therefore no idea of becoming a missionary; but I read also of assistants, and for that office I considered myself eligible, and I never expected to be sent out in the uncultivated state of mind in which I then was. I was not quite without means (our district was beginning to recover itself from the French occupation), and intended to take a short course in a school of not too high a grade, at my own expense, if the superintendent of the mission thereupon would give me an occupation. There was only one man who could advise me in the matter--namely, Pastor Kohler at Vilsen, and in order to do this he ought to know all my intentions, my age, and circumstances. This was best done in writing. The art of writing which I had so far acquired was neither grammatical, nor did I always use the right words; but that made no difference, the pastor knew
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the language of the peasantry. I wrote him with the request that when I next had an opportunity of speaking to him he would let me hear what he thought about it.
The next time I went to him he took my hand and said, "You have quite surprised me with your writing." Then, after a few questions, which I answered, he said that nothing stood in my way--neither my age, my want of knowledge, or of means, would hinder my being taken into a missionary seminary; but that in order that we might see whether the wish was of the Lord, or a mere flash in the pan (strohfeuer), I had better wait a year and say nothing about it. Both suggestions appeared to me to be right. The first, that I should wait a year, was so welcome to me that it appeared like a reprieve, for a thought came into my mind that had not hitherto occurred to me, to examine myself closely, and I wished in the very first place to be quite clear in my own mind as to what my real intentions and desires were. The other condition, to say nothing about it, I would have imposed myself if he had not done so. He was afraid that, perhaps, I had represented my purpose to myself in too attractive colours. I replied that no one would be likely to laugh at me. He thought that if they did it would not trouble me. But he did not know the depth of ignorance in our dead community. It was not a matter of bringing reproach on the name of Christ--the people did not even know what a mission was; the word was never heard; and the word heathen was supposed to mean wild men who ate live hens, feathers and all. If, therefore, I allowed my intention to be become known, people would have said that if I was not born a fool I was become one, and I was not yet ready to bear the public scorn for no purpose whatever. The conversation with the pastor made a deep impression on me. It gave rise to the thought I have mentioned. It would present itself to me that I was not yet converted myself, and consequently was not fit to undertake the conversion of the heathen.
The year of waiting is the most important of my life--it is the year of my second birth--and I always look back to it gratefully, although forty years have since passed by. I have already said that as I had nothing better I sought to bind up my faith in
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the works of creation, that such attempts ended in a sort of soft sorrowful sadness that at first was not unpleasant, but lost themselves in an anxious doubt whether there was a living God and a life after death. Such doubts, with all sorts of disagreeable ideas about my existence, sat upon my breast cold as a corpse. In the previous time when I had read the missionary tract and taken interest in the conversion of the heathen, it is true my doubts had fled; but it appeared to me now as if the corpse was decaying and my inner consciousness filled with the putrid stink of my sins. I understood now what this meant. "O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death." I recognized that I had served and honoured the creature more than the Creator, who is to be praised to all eternity. Amen. So far I had only known Jesus Christ as the founder of our religion, who had delivered us from the sins of ignorance and of life, and brought the light of eternal life to the enlightenment of the Christian nations. But these are poor considerations which cannot content an anxious state of mind that yearns for life and blessedness. My soul thirsted for God--the living God.
I knew well from my catechism, which I had learnt by heart in school and have not yet forgotten, what the conditions of penitence--that is, the change of heart--were, namely, a lively conviction and earnest repentance of our sins; a confident reliance on the mercy of God in Christ; an earnest striving to better oneself. If these portions of the catechism had enforced themselves on my mind from their own power of conviction, I had been a converted Christian years before. But that is as impossible as, in our natural strength, to rise to heaven and bring Christ down, or to go down to hell and fetch Christ from the grave. The Kingdom of God does not come with any outward expression: it is within us; and when one gives oneself wholly to Christ, it becomes a living power. No forcing of penitence is necessary. The renewing of the heart within us comes as something quite new, worked by God from inward outward.
"For by grace are ye saved, through faith, and not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast." I learnt to pray. Previously I knew no other method of
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praying but that of repeating or thinking over a prayer I had learnt by heart, out of which I was able to extract but little devotion, now prayer flowed freely from my heart. Oh! sweet and heavenly devotion that flows from it freely into one's heart! Is there anyone who feels his heart drear and joyless?--let him go into his closet and close the door. Now he will discover that he is alone with God, with the invisible, ever-present God, who, in spite of our wickedness, loves us as the children of His heart. Let him kneel down--it is so joyfully solemn to bow the knee to God in the stillness of the little chamber--and pray to his Father in secret, as the words come straight from the heart. Our dear Heavenly Father understands the stammering of his weak children, and is pleased to hear it. He presses us to His heart. We feel it in the sublime devotion with which our heart is filled. And then the blessing with which we rise up and take away with us, that strengthens us to confident and joyful faith and all good, and in temptations mightily supports us! He who once knows this blessing will often seek the stillness of his chamber.
The change of heart is something so wonderful, so divine, that it does not permit itself to be compared with anything but a new birth. Other circumstances arise in life which move the heart mightily, but none of them change one's very heart. It is different with the new birth; by its means one is permanently inclined towards heavenly things. One attends to one's earthly affairs just as well as before, only with more conscientiousness and thoroughness, and therefore they succeed so much the better. One guards oneself against sin, and for that reason escapes many vexatious pursuits. But the inward consciousness, the new birth, is a secret of the soul with God, that only those can learn and know who not by men, but by God, are initiated into its mystery. It is like the new name and the new song in the Revelation of John.
A new song to sing,
That no other can,
To raise it to the Lamb,
The conqueror's path along.
Yes, to the Lamb who bears the sin of the world! On the cross Christ for us, Christ in us, where He wins an abiding place.
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Virgins pure and holy,
Pictures all of Christ,
With His Spirit all are filled,
Him in all they see.
--Herder.
I had promised to say nothing of it that I wished to become a missionary, and as my own inclination so entirely agreed with this suggestion, I held my peace on the subject. From the pleasures which young people generally love I silently withdrew myself. This silence, doubtless, had its advantages. Not without reason does Jesus say, "See thou tell no man." By talking of it, whilst still new to me, I would only have done harm to myself and no good to others; yet my quiet walking in the fear of God could not remain unobserved, and I noticed that I was regarded with a sort of holy awe. When occasion arose to lay blame or to witness for the Lord I did it with a few words, and these were always taken in good part. If, on the other hand, I had talked much, it would have only aroused contempt and argument. This silence, however, did not arise from my Christian knowledge--I had no great acquisitions in this respect,--but from the promise which I have previously mentioned.
Nor was I quite alone. Pastor Kohler could have easily made me acquainted with converted Christians in his parish, but he did not do it. Doubtless he had his reasons. I can see now that he knew me most thoroughly, better than I knew myself. Our conversations, when I fetched the Missionary Leaves, were usually short, but I had on one occasion let fall that sometimes, especially when my feelings were laid hold of by the contemplation of the works of God all around me, I had placed my thoughts on paper, and in this way had filled many sheets. He told me to bring him these papers. No one had seen them so far. I hesitated, as I remarked my views had altered themselves very considerably; but he wanted all the papers, and I must go through them with him on my next visit. Naturally there was a lot of nonsense in them, but they were written in such a manner that one could learn from them what my disposition was.
In our work out of doors among the peasantry there is no distinction of rank between the servant and the sons of the
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household, but there is a distinction in the inside life of the house. Accordingly, I alone had a roomy, light bed chamber all to myself, with a chair, a little table, and an oil-lamp. On the table always lay my Bible, and in the chest of drawers lay writing materials and a few books which Pastor Kohler had lent me, among these the first volumes of Blumhardt's "History of Missions," embracing the first centuries of Christian chronology.
During the short Summer nights I had, with the exception of the Sunday afternoons, little time for reading; but as the nights became longer in the Autumn, of an evening, when all were in bed, I could sit still by my lamp and study Blumhardt's "History of Missions." I had often wondered whether other occurrences besides those related in the Bible were known in these ancient times, and here I found them. It was as if a whole new world of knowledge was laid open before me. It is no little matter, when one has been occupied all day with plough and harrow in the fresh air in the field, or has walked up and down with a heavy sack of seed on one's shoulders on newly ploughed land and sown the seed broadcast, to keep one's eyes open of an evening for the purpose of reading. But the spread of Christianity and its consequences under the Roman Emperors were to me so deeply interesting that I could have sat up with pleasure more than half the night if I had not promised Pastor Kohler on no account to deprive myself of the necessary sleep for the sake of study, and I would not break this promise secretly.
About half a year of the term of my probation had passed by. The time had not seemed long. It never occurred to me to count the months as young folks, who expect great things to happen at a certain date, are accustomed to do.
I was now acquainted with a man in an elevated position who could understand me. I could now have books and quench my thirst for knowledge as long as time was granted to me, and therewith I was content. And more than that--I had my Saviour Jesus Christ, and in Him a wealth of contentment that fills a deeper yearning in the soul than a thirst for knowledge.
