Zinzendorf

 One of the greatest figures in Christian history, who motivated an army of servants of Christ to enter service in Christian ministry and missions, found his own attempt to become a minister a strange and lengthy process that was finally resolved on this date. We refer to Count Nicholas Ludwig von Zinzendorf. He was born in the year 1700 into a noble family that went back to the 11th century.

His father died at thirty-eight leaving his widow and her son Nicolas in the care of the maternal grandmother, Baroness Henrietta Catherine von Gersdorf, a woman of many intellectual and cultural abilities. Nicholas grew up in his grandmother's great, remote country-house castle at Gross-Hennersdorf near Dresden.

The Count was raised in a truly pious home, and admitted that his "heart's affections never departed" from His Savior and that his "heart was religiously inclined" as far back as he could remember.

Zinzendorf earnestly wanted to become a minister early in life, but his family resisted, expecting him to live the life of a nobleman. Thus he did not achieve his desire to be a minister (officially at least) until he was thirty-four years old. But from the year 1721 he had actually been functioning in this capacity by holding services in his Dresden apartment, only refraining from administering the Sacraments.

It was in 1734 that Pietists, members of a devout spiritual movement in the German Lutheran church, expressed their belief that Zinzendorf had never really been converted, and this surprising accusation forced him to reexamine his spiritual life. By accident, he found among the ashes of some papers he was burning the verse: "He shall choose our inheritance for us, the excellency of Jacob whom He loveth." (Ps. 47:4.)

In order to become a minister in Germany in those days it was necessary to pass a theological examination overseen by a university faculty. This simply was not possible for the Count. He grasped at an opportunity that came to the Herrnhut Brethren from Sweden in the form of a request for a tutor. (The Herrnhut Brethren refers to a group of Christian refugees who had been given a home by Zinzendorf on his estate in Herrnhut, Germany). Accordingly, Zinzendorf carried through a well-thought out scheme by presenting himself to the theologian Langemack, an examiner for ministerial candidates at the University of Greifswald, Count Zinzendorf used the name Herr von Freydek, and introduced himself as tutor for the children of a man named Richter. Zinzendorf felt comfortable doing this because one of his titles was Lord of the Barony of Freydek. He eventually revealed his real identity to Langemack, but his employer, Richter, who later became a missionary, was one of the last to know.

It was necessary for a candidate to the ministry to have a parish appointment waiting for him. Zinzendorf had plans for the creation of a seminary from an abandoned cloister in the Black Forest. The proposal he presented to the Duke of Wurtemburg for the seminary was rejected.` Zinzendorf's, friend and associate, Augustus Gottlieb Spangenburg. went to the University of Tubingen on Zinzendorf's behalf. This resulted in a favorable written declaration from Chancellor Pfaff. Not knowing of this, and believing his Black Forest plans to be hopeless, Zinzendorf wrote to the church directory of Wurtemberg at Stuttgart. He declared that he had resolved to take clerical orders according to the apostolic example of Stephanas (believing this verse to refer to self-ordination-- see 1 Corinthians 16:15). This letter was favorably received and Zinzendorf's feet were at last placed on his chosen path. On this day, December 19, 1734 he day after presenting a stirring plea and statement of intention, the faculty of the University recognized Count von Zinzendorf as a minister of the Gospel. this official recognized really just confirmed a powerful ministry he already exercised in leading his Moravian Brethren from Herrnhut to launch the modern Protestant missionary movement. Their first missionaries had gone out two years earlier in 1732.