I was thankful to receive Helga’s letter today. From it we hear that you are back in your old stomping grounds again. It was delightful to see and speak with you both.

Last night we had a very good meeting; one sister was beside herself for about two hours. We didn’t leave the hall until 12:30 a.m., after she thanked God for freeing her from all her bonds. Halvorsen, the storekeeper, prayed fervently that God might search his heart and set him free from everything. It was an unusually good meeting. God prompted me to speak about the fine linen, which is the righteous acts of the saints. Rev. 19:7-8. God made this clear to me before the meeting.

What, then, is this precious linen which the bride is to put on? The precious linen is her virtues.

There are essentially three kinds of perdition and three kinds of salvation related to perdition and salvation:

Perdition: 1) The one who is lost suffers the loss of his body. 2) He takes his evil works with him (filthy clothes). 3) His body of sin cannot be satisfied (the rich man).

Salvation: 1) The one who is saved saves his body. 2) His good works are his “precious linen.” 3) He is fully satisfied by beholding the face of Christ.

Every life must have clothing and nourishment for the body.

We have spoken before about the fact that every sin a person commits is outside the body, but it has been performed by the body. It is worn on the outside of the body, like a filthy garment.

Similarly, all the good that a person does is also outside the body, but it has been performed by the body as well. That’s why these virtues are the garments of the saints, clean and bright.

This ought to encourage us and spur us on to good works, so that we may be found clothed and not naked. We weave our garment for eternity now in this time. If we want beautiful garments, we now know how to weave them.

We spoke about grace being for the transgressor and not for the righteous. To understand this, we can use an example:

Let us imagine that the body of Christ, where all God’s fullness dwells, covers my body, in which the body of sin still dwells. That part of Christ’s body which covers my body of sin we call “grace”—let us say 97%; while the remaining 3%, which is committed into death (water and blood) is one with the body of Christ (made righteous).

An example only fits for one thing—not everything.

Recently, a brother said that a branch that grows on the north side of a tree bears less fruit than one facing south, and that the branch on the north side must remain where it is; it is on the north side through no fault of its own. It wasn’t easy to comment on this, but I said to him that there is no “north side” in Christ, since He Himself is the light—the sun, in whom we must walk. Perhaps the parable about the talents would have been more appropriate here, because the one who had ten talents could earn another ten, whereas the one who had only one talent could earn only one more.

Then we spoke about Phil. 3, that we are to know Him, the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, so that we can be conformed to His death. In the German Bible it reads: “Seines Todes Gestalt annehmend”—“Taking the form of His death.” However, in order for Him to take on this form, Phil. 2:7 had to take place first: “Taking the form of a servant” (Indem er Knechtgestalt annahm), because it’s unlikely that one of the lords of this world would be sentenced to death.

Now Ellefsen is here, and he just read Helga’s letter. Many greetings from him.

Hearty greetings from all of us here: Pauline, Kristian, Johanne, and me.

Yours,