Who has never had their routine interrupted by people arriving to ask for shelter, not knowing that such hospitality would change their own life? That is what happened to a young German nobleman who, by opening his lands to refugees, saw one of the greatest missionary movements in Christian history take root there.
Nikolaus Ludwig von Zinzendorf was born on May 26, 1700, in Dresden, and was raised by his Pietist grandmother after his father’s early death. While still a student, at fifteen, he founded the Order of the Grain of Mustard Seed with classmates, committing to live for Christ and for others.
In 1722, he bought the Berthelsdorf estate from his grandmother and, months later, married Erdmuth Dorothea von Reuss. That same year, the first Moravian families arrived there, heirs of the ancient Bohemian Brethren church, fleeing religious persecution. Zinzendorf settled them in a village he named Herrnhut, meaning the Lord’s watch.
Life together was tense, marked by disputes between groups from different traditions. On August 13, 1727, during a communion service in Berthelsdorf, the community experienced a profound reconciliation, later known as the Moravian Pentecost. Days later, men and women organized an unbroken prayer vigil that would last more than a hundred years.
From there the missionary impulse was born: in 1732, Zinzendorf sent the first Moravian missionaries to the Caribbean, followed by others to Greenland and to various nations. He traveled to North America and England, where the Moravian spirituality he led marked the English preacher John Wesley, even after a tense personal encounter between the two in 1741. By the time of his death, the Moravians had already sent out more than two hundred missionaries, an extraordinary number for such a small community.
Zinzendorf also had documented excesses: starting in 1747, his mystical emphasis on the wounds of Christ led part of the community into a period of devotional excess known as the Sifting Time. He was slow to respond to criticism, but eventually acknowledged and repudiated the excesses.
His life reminds us that hospitality and persevering prayer can bear greater fruit than we imagine. The vigil begun in Herrnhut still inspires prayer communities around the world, and the impulse to send out even those with few resources remains a living invitation to mission today.
