A Fatherly Farewell

The paternal farewell, testament and an earnest scriptural instruction from Hendrick Alewijns to his children

Hear me, your father, O my own, well-disposed, dear and greatly afflicted orphans, my three motherless and soon also fatherless children, of ten, eight and six years, deprived of me, and without property, alas, O God! Once more I tell you, O my dear children, from one dear mother I received and kept you all; and she most solemnly charged me at her end, as the holy Scriptures also teach and command me concerning you, that I should, as a father ought, bring you up in divine instruction (Ephesians 6, verse 4), to be good and orderly children and men of God, which I have done until now, as was right for me, with great carefulness and earnestness, but I have not yet completed it. And see, now my labor is taken away, and under these circumstances I cannot further fulfill toward you my fatherly love and debt of discipline. I have therefore now faithfully commended you from this time on to the God of heaven and to my fellow believers, the friends; and I am fully confident that you will be well, very well, taken care of, out of love, for God's sake and mine.

Be subject most obediently, as dear children, to the friends, and you will make yourselves dear to them all. I have charged them with the guardianship over you, as though they were your parents; so be very obedient; fear words, and you will not need lashes. Otherwise you will have to be beaten and chastised much, as the holy Scriptures require and teach, about which I shall write more plainly later on.

My dear little children, it is true, it is true I say, you are still too childish, the oldest as well as the youngest, to understand the holy Bible, and also what I shall teach here; but I hope you will delight in reading in it often, and in having others read it to you. I also trust that your understanding will increase from day to day, and that you will yourselves discern good and evil, and will wisely learn to know who are the true believers and who the unbelievers; which are the children of God, and which are the children of the devil and the world; who bear the name of Christ rightly, and who wrongly. I therefore write in this hope, and to acquit myself of the duty of fatherly instruction which is still to be discharged toward you, and to the fulfillment of which much is lacking on my part, since I am taken away from you too soon to discharge it fully. Nevertheless, out of love, I cannot keep from offering and sending you this from afar, my dear children, if perhaps I must shortly go with David the way of all this mortal earth. First Kings 2, verse 2. So I instruct, charge and counsel you, after my departure, as many patriarchs and holy fathers did to their children, that you be of good cheer and courage in patience, and that you follow the ways, commandments, laws and ordinances of the Lord, and do His whole will. Always do what is right and good; love honesty, modesty, courtesy, shamefacedness, virtue, praise (Philippians 4, verse 8); and whatever is Christian-like and of good report, do that and think on it, and you will be holy, and Christians. Then you shall have everlasting life and the beautiful heaven, that you may be with God and His angelic host, with all the elect of God, in eternal rest and joy of your souls; and then you shall not have to fear the second death, the fiery lake, eternal fire, the wages of sin, disinheritance from Christ's kingdom, or exclusion by Christ. Matthew 25, verse 10.

My dear children, lay this to heart. As soon as your little understanding can take it in, think of returning from the old rebellious man into the new man (Matthew 18, verse 3); of the heavenly regeneration of water and of the Spirit (John 3, verse 35); of the grace of God and making good use of the right time (Second Corinthians 6, verses 1 and 2); of living peaceably with all men, if it is justly possible and lies in you (for the other half of peace lies with the other party); and also of holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord, or enter into Christ's kingdom. [n944-2] Romans 12, verse 18; Hebrews 12, verse 14.

This, my dear children, is my careful counsel and command to you, after my death.