COUNT NIKOLAUS LUDWIG VON ZINZENDORF (Part 4)

The Family’s Move to Lutheran Saxony

By the mid-1600s, in order to pursue his newfound Protestant faith, the Count sold his Austrian estate, Wachovia, and moved his wife and five children from Catholic Austria to Lutheran Saxony. Maximilian pledged his allegiance to Saxony, which, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, included the eastern provinces of modern-day Germany and Poland. In time, one of his sons, George Ludwig, married a Christian woman of royal birth, Charlotte Justine von Gersdorf. It was to this couple that young Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf (called “Ludwig”) was born. At the time of Ludwig’s birth, his father served as “counsellor” to the king of Saxony. Tragically, George Ludwig contracted tuberculosis; and, on July 19, 1700, the thirty-seven year old father died six weeks after his son’s birth.

A Mother’s Prophetic Prayer

That day, Charlotte Justine wrote a prayer for baby Ludwig on her Bible: “May the Father of mercy govern the heart of this child that he may walk upright in the path of virtues. Let his ways be strengthened by the Word of God that he will indeed experience what the Lord has promised – I am the Father of the fatherless.” It was a prophetic prayer in the life of her noble little boy.

Early Childhood and Family Support

As a young widow, just twenty-five years old, the grieving Charlotte took her infant son and moved to her mother’s estate in Gross Hennersdorf, Saxony, where Ludwig was lovingly welcomed by a Christian grandmother, aunt, and uncle. When he was four years old, his mother remarried Field Marshall Dubislav von Natzmer, a fifty-year-old widower who lived in Berlin. She left four-year-old “Lutz,” as his grandmother fondly nicknamed him, behind.

Growing Up in a Pietist Environment

Lutz’s grandmother, Countess Henrietta Katharina von Gersdorf, was a devout Christian and an active Pietist. The Pietists were a small group of Christians within the Lutheran Church who longed for a deep personal relationship with their Saviour. They emphasised the priesthood of the believer and the need for a “vigorous” relationship with Jesus Christ rather than the dry worship of the formal church. Philipp Jakob Spener was considered the “father of the Pietist movement” and was a close friend of the von Gersdorf [Zinzendorf] family.

Conversion at Four Years Old

Growing up in this godly environment, little Lutz learnt to lean on Jesus for everything in life. “Already in my childhood,” he recorded later, “I loved the Saviour, and had abundant communion with Him. In my fourth year I began to seek God earnestly, and determined to become a true servant of Jesus Christ. I was as certain that the Son of God was my Lord as of the existence of my five fingers!” There was no doubt that Lutz had unreservedly given his heart to Christ, as he recorded in his childhood diary, “A thousand times I heard Him speak in my heart, and saw Him with the eye of faith.. If Jesus were forsaken by all the world, I still would cling to Him and love Him.”

Tale Tuesday 097

Date:   24th September, 2024
Title: :  COUNT NIKOLAUS LUDWIG VON ZINZENDORF  (Part 4)
Source:  God’s generals- The Missionaries
Author: Roberts Liardon