Cling Only to Him

Jonathan Watson gave a few samples of letters written by Alexis baron von Roenne in the March, 2011 edition of The Banner of Truth magazine (pp. 21-27). Alexis baron bon Roenne was born in Prussia in 1902 [03?] and was a career officer in the German army. He opposed Nazism and was later implicated in an assassination attempt of Hitler, of which he was not guilty, yet he was executed. He had strong Christian convictions and died with great faith in Christ on October 12, 1944. This letter was written to his wife on the day of his death.

My dearest beloved:

In a moment now I shall be going home to our Lord in complete calm and in the certainty of salvation. My thoughts are with you, with all of you, with the very greatest love and gratitude.

As my last wish, I entreat you only to cling to Him and to have full confidence in Him; He loves you.

Any decision you may take for all of you, after prayer, has my complete sanction and my blessing. If only you knew with what inconceivable loyalty He is standing by my side at this moment, you would be armoured, and calm, for all your difficult life. He will give you strength for everything.

I bless both of our beloved children, and include them in my last ardent prayer. May the Lord let His countenance shine upon them and lead them home.

Heartfelt greetings and thanks to my beloved Mama, to your parents and my brothers and sisters. May they, safeguarded by Him, survive even difficult times in our ardently beloved fatherland.

To you, my very dearest of all, belong my ardent love and thanks to the last moment and until our blessed reunion.

God keep you.

Dying We Live: The Final Messages and Records of Some Germans Who Defied Hitler, edited by Helmut Gollwitzer, Kathe Kuhn, Reinhold Schneider, translated by R. C. Kuhn, Harvill Press, London, 1956.

Taste the Pleasant Fruits of God's Love

A selection from a letter by the Puritan preacher, Joseph Alleine, to his congregation from prison. He was ejected from the Church of England for nonconformity in 1662 and was imprisoned. Alleine wrote letters to his church while incarcerated. He highlights the theme of love in this letter. He writes of their love for God and says, "How little, how very little, would our love be, if he had it all… Oh that we might love him with our little all!" But he writes mainly of God's love for them. To that we now turn in this letter written October 28, 1663.

This is a love worthy of your ambition, worthy of your adoration and admiration. This is the womb that bore you from eternity, and out of which have burst forth all the mercies, spiritual and temporal, that you enjoy. This was the love that chose you; when less offenders, and those that being converted might have been a hundred-fold more serviceable to their Maker's glory, are left to perish in their sins. May your souls be filled with the sense of this love!

But it may be you will say, "How shall I know if I am an object of electing love?" Lest an unbelieving thought should damp your joy, know, in short, that if you have chosen God, he hath certainly chosen you. Have you taken him for your blessedness? And do you more highly prize, and more diligently seek after conformity to him, and the fruition of him than any, than all the goods of this world. If so, then away with doubts; for you could not have loved, and have chosen him, unless he had loved you first. Now may my beloved dwell continually in the thoughts, the views, the tastes of this love. Get you down under its shadows, and taste its pleasant fruits. Oh the provisions that love hath made for you, before the foundation of the world!

Life and Letters of Joseph Alleine, by Rev. Richard Baxter, Theodosia Alleine, and others, with a new introduction by Joel R. Beeke and Herb Samworth, Reformation Heritage Books, reprinted in 2003, pp. 168-69.

Some Exceedingly Difficult Letters to Answer

A selection from a letter by A. W. Pink to his friend, Lowell Green. Mr. Pink received many letters and responded to them, saying in 1946 that he had written "by hand well over 20,000 letters." He was a pastor and counselor to many by means of correspondence. This letter, which was written July 10, 1939, make clear some of the troubles to which he sought to bring light and comfort.

Of late I have had some exceedingly difficult letters to answer: among them one from a Sister who allowed her heart to run away with her head… She thought she was doing God's will, is now satisfied she was deceived by Satan, and wanting to know how the promptings of the Holy Spirit may be distinguished from those of the Evil One.

Another from a preacher of many years' experience: had a nervous breakdown; eventually went to a "Prayer Healer" (a servant of the Devil), since which the spirit of prayer has been stifled in his own soul, all assurance of salvation gone, so that he no longer dares to preach to others.

What saddens me so much is that there seem to be so very few today unto whom these poor souls can turn for helpful counsel. Many who can preach gospel, doctrinal and prophetic sermons appear to be quite incapable of entering into the experiences of the perplexed and distressed and giving them "a word in season" [Isa. 50:4]. Unless pastors are Divinely qualified to be doctors of souls they are "physicians of no value," as Job [13:4] had to say unto those who failed to diagnose his case and minister to him in his trouble. Such "qualification" cannot be acquired in any Seminary or Bible School.

The Life of Arthur W. Pink, Revised and Enlarged Edition, Iain H. Murray, Banner of Truth, 2004, p. 216.