When Count Nicholas Zinzendorf was a young man, he had an experience in an art gallery that changed his life forever.
He was born an aristocrat and had always known wealth and luxury, and he was an extremely gifted individual. Zinzendorf had been reared and trained for a diplomatic career in the Court at Dresden.
Beyond all of this, it has been said of him that he was a child of God. One day, on a trip to Paris, he stopped for a rest in Dusseldorf. During his stay in the city, he visited the art gallery. There he caught sight of Domenico Feti’s painting of the crucified Jesus that he calls “Ecce Homo.” The artist had written two short lines in Latin beneath the painting:
Hoc feci pro te:
Quid facid pro me?
(“This is what I did for you: what have you done for me?”)
When his eyes met the eyes of the thorn-crowned Savior, he was filled with a sense of shame. He could not answer that question in a manner which would satisfy his own conscience.
He stayed there for hours, looking at the painting of the Christ on the cross until the light failed. And when the time arrived for the gallery to be closed, he was still staring at the face of Christ, trying in vain to find an answer to the question of what he had done for Christ.
He left the gallery at nightfall, but a new day was dawning for him. From that day on, he devoted his heart and soul, his life and his wealth – all that he had – to Christ, declaring, “I have but one passion — It is Jesus, Jesus only.” A God Flash
The sight of the crucified Jesus “high and lifted up” on the Tree made a sudden and permanent change in his life, and the resurrection bore fruit then and there in his heart and soul.
Thanks to George Bass
This is what Jesus did for you. What have you done for Jesus?
