Kneading Bread

It is not mere knowledge in which many of us are deficient. We have been instructed from our youth up in the word of God; we have read the Bible, we have heard so many sermons, attended so many meetings, and have associated with the pious, so that we are able to speak much of religion, of godliness, and divine things, and manifest great knowledge; but do we know as we ought to know? Do we know as to consider at the same time, what belongs to our peace? Have we experienced it in our hearts, or have we it only from reading an hearsay, and are, with all this, still ignorant of our inward state? O my friends! Let us consider what belongs to our peace! Those are not pronounced blessed, who know, but those who do. O how great will our responsibility for having known the will of the Lord, and not done it; for having taken his covenant into our lips, and yet hated reproof, having so often called God our Father, and yet not honoured him in our hearts; for having called him Lord, and yet not feared him in reality! Will it avail us that day, that we possessed an outward piety, and specious holiness? Will it avail us then to rely upon our outward religion, in which we have been born and bred, upon our going to church and sacrament, and such like merely external works?[...]Therefore let us reflect what belongs to our peace, and not continue longer in false security with our knowledge, but humble ourselves before him, who is now willing to come to us a a lowly monarch, as a king of peace, in order to make us happy subjects of his kingdom. Let us therefore submit and resign ourselves to him by a true and thorough conversion of the heart, and let ourselves be induced by the tears which he has shed, by the compassion with which he regards even us, and by the patience with which he still bears with us, to listen to his most gracious preacher of repentance, and obey his voice.
From Spiritual Crumbs from the Master’s Table by Gerhard Tersteegen, translated by Samuel Jackson, 1837.