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I Believe That Nothing That Happens To Me Is Meaningless And That It Is Good For Us All That It Should Be So, Even If It Runs Counter To Our Own Wishes. As I See It, I'm Here For Some Purpose, And I Only Hope I May Fulfill It.

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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I Believe That Nothing

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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I Believe That Nothing That Happens To Me Is Meaningless And That It Is Good For Us All That It Should Be So, Even If It Runs Counter To Our Own Wishes. As I See It, I'm Here For Some Purpose, And I Only Hope I May Fulfill It.

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While It Is Good That We Seek To Know The Holy One, It Is Probably Not So Good To Presume That We Ever Complete The Task.

When A Man Really Gives Up Trying To Make Something Out Of Himself - A Saint, Or A Converted Sinner, Or A Churchman (a So-called Clerical Somebody), A Righteous Or Unrighteous Man,...and Throws Himself Into The Arms Of God...then He Wakes With Christ In Gethsemane. That Is Faith, That Is Metanoia And It Is Thus That He Becomes A Man And Christian.

We Ought Not To Be In Too Much Of A Hurry Here To Speak Piously Of God's Will And Guidance. It Is Obvious, And It Should Not Be Ignored, That It Is Your Own Very Human Wills That Are At Work Here, Celebrating Their Triumph; The Course That You Are Taking At The Outset Is One That You Have Chosen For Yourselves.

Self-justification And Judging Others Go Together, As Justification By Grace And Serving Others Go Together.

We Must Be Ready To Allow Ourselves To Be Interrupted By God, Who Will Thwart Our Plans And Frustrate Our Ways Time And Again, Even Daily, By Sending People Across Our Path With Their Demands And Requests. We Can, Then, Pass Them By, Preoccupied With Our Important Daily Tasks, Just As The Priest-perhaps Reading The Bible-passed By The Man Who Had Fallen Among Robbers. When We Do That, We Pass By The Visible Sign Of The Cross Raised In Our Lives To Show Us That God’s Way, And Not Our Own, Is What Counts.

My Past Life Is Abundantly Full Of God's Mercy, And, Above All Sin, Stands The Forgiving Love Of The Crucified.

Man Seeks, In His Manhood, Not Orders, Not Laws And Peremptory Dogmas, But Counsel From One Who Is Earnest In Goodness And Faithful In Friendship, Making Man Free.

Discipleship Means Adherence To Christ And, Because Christ Is The Object Of That Adherence, It Must Take The Form Of Discipleship. An Abstract Theology, A Doctrinal System, A General Religious Knowledge Of The Subject Of Grace Or The Forgiveness Of Sins, Render Discipleship Superfluous, And In Fact Exclude Any Idea Of Discipleship Whatsoever, And Are Essentially Inimical To The Whole Conception Of Following Christ....christianity Without The Living Christ Is Inevitably Christianity Without Discipleship, And Christianity Without Discipleship Is Always Christianity Without Christ.

Following Christ

We Must Learn To Regard People Less In Light Of What They Do Or Omit To Do, And More In The Light Of What They Suffer.

We Have Grown So Accustomed To The Idea Of Divine Love...that We No Longer Sense The Awe That God's Coming Should Awaken In Us.

Jesus Is No Draughtsman Of Political Blueprints, He Is The One Who Vanquished Evil Through Suffering. It Looked As Though Evil Had Triumphed On The Cross, But The Real Victory Belonged To Jesus.

No Sacrifice Which A Lover Would Make For His Beloved Is Too Great For Us To Make For Our Enemy.

It Is Infinitely Easier To Suffer In Obedience To A Human Command Than To Accept Suffering As Free, Responsible Men.

Jesus' Call To Bear The Cross Places All Who Follow Him In The Community Of The Forgiveness Of Sins. Forgiving Sins Is The Christ-suffering Required Of His Disciples. It Is Required Of All Christians.

When People Are Deeply Affected By The Word, They Tell It To Other People.

The Consciousness Of Being Borne Up By A Spiritual Tradition That Goes Back For Centuries Gives One A Feeling Of Confidence And Security In The Face Of All Passing Strains And Stresses.

...gratitude Transforms The Torment Of Memory Of Good Things Now Gone Into Silent Joy. One Bears What Was Lovely In The Past Not As A Thorn But As A Precious Gift Deep Within, A Hidden Treasure Of Which One Can Always Be Certain.

But To Procrastinate And Prevaricate Simply Because You're Afraid Of Erring, When Others - I Mean Our Brethren In Germany - Must Make Infinitely More Difficult Decisions Every Day, Seems To Me Almost To Run Counter To Love. To Delay Or Fail To Make Decisions May Be More Sinful Than To Make Wrong Decisions Out Of Faith And Love.

Man No Longer Lives In The Beginning--he Has Lost The Beginning. Now He Finds He Is In The Middle, Knowing Neither The End Nor The Beginning, And Yet Knowing That He Is In The Middle, Coming From The Beginning And Going Towards The End. He Sees That His Life Is Determined By These Two Facets, Of Which He Knows Only That He Does Not Know Them

Often We Combat Our Evil Thoughts Most Effectively If We Absolutely Refuse To Allow Them To Be Expressed In Words.

If You Believe, Take The First Step, It Leads To Jesus Christ. If You Don't Believe, Take The First Step All The Same, For You Are Bidden To Take It.

Help Must Come From The Outside, And It Has Come And Comes Daily And Answers In The Word Of Jesus Christ.

So The Christian, Too, Belongs Not In The Seclusion Of A Cloistered Life But In The Thick Of Foes. There Is His Commission, His Work.

God Is In The Manger, Wealth In Poverty, Light In Darkness, Succor In Abandonment. No Evil Can Befall Us; Whatever Men May Do To Us, They Cannot But Serve The God Who Is Secretly Revealed As Love And Rules The World And Our Lives.

In Me There Is Darkness, But With You There Is Light; I Am Lonely, But You Do Not Leave Me; I Am Feeble In Heart, But With You There Is Help; I Am Restless, But With You There Is Peace. In Me There Is Bitterness, But With You There Is Patience; I Do Not Understand Your Ways, But You Know The Way For Me.” “lord Jesus Christ, You Were Poor And In Distress, A Captive And Forsaken As I Am. You Know All Man’s Troubles; You Abide With Me When All Men Fail Me; You Remember And Seek Me; It Is Your Will That I Should Know You And Turn To You. Lord, I Hear Your Call And Follow; Help Me.

Fulfilled Life Is Possible In Spite Of Unfulfilled Wishes.

The Child Asks Of The Father Whom He Knows. Thus, The Essence Of Christian Prayer Is Not General Adoration, But Definite, Concrete Petition. The Right Way To Approach God Is To Stretch Out Our Hands And Ask Of One Who We Know Has The Heart Of A Father.

Faith Is Only Real When There Is Obedience, Never Without It, And Faith Only Becomes Faith In The Act Of Obedience.

So The Fool, As Distinct From The Scoundrel, Is Completely Self- Satisfied; In Fact, He Can Easily Become Dangerous, As It Does Not Take Much To Make Him Aggressive. A Fool Must Therefore Be Treated More Cautiously Than A Scoundrel.

It Is The Nature, And The Advantage, Of Strong People That They Can Raise The Crucial Questions And Form A Clear Opinion About Them.

Absolute Seriousness Is Never Without A Dash Of Humor.

Salvation Is Free, But Discipleship Will Cost You Your Life

When We Come To A Clearer And More Sober Estimate Of Our Own Limitations And Responsibilities, That Makes It Possible More Genuinely To Love Our Neighbor.

We Are Silent At The Beginning Of The Day Because God Should Have The First Word, And We Are Silent Before Going To Sleep Because The Last Word Also Belongs To God.

Anyone Who Thinks That His Time Is Too Valuable To Spend Keeping Quiet Will Eventually Have No Time For God And His Brother, But Only For Himself And For His Own Follies.

Only In Jesus Are We Able To Pray, And With Him We Also Know That We Shall Be Heard.

The Church Has An Unconditional Obligation To The Victims Of Any Ordering Society, Even If They Do Not Belong To The Christian Community.

The Essence Of Grace, We Suppose, Is That The Account Has Been Paid In Advance; And, Because It Has Been Paid, Everything Can Be Had For Nothing.

Christian Community Is Like The Christian's Sanctification. It Is A Gift Of God Which We Cannot Claim. Only God Knows The Real State Of Our Fellowship, Of Our Sanctification. What May Appear Weak And Trifling To Us May Be Great And Glorious To God. Just As The Christian Should Not Be Constantly Feeling His Spiritual Pulse, So, Too, The Christian Community Has Not Been Given To Us By God For Us To Be Constantly Taking Its Temperature.

Grace At A Low Cost, Is In The Last Resort Simply A New Law, Which Brings Neither Help Nor Freedom.

Must The Christian Go Around Looking For A Cross To Bear, Seeking To Suffer? No, Insisted Bonhoeffer. Opportunities For Bearing Crosses Will Occur Along Life's Way And All That Is Required Is The Willingness To Act When The Time Comes. The Needs Of The Neighbor, Especially Those Of The Weak And Downtrodden, The Victimized And The Persecuted, The Ill And The Lonely, Will Become Abundantly Evident.

Gratitude Changes The Pangs Of Memory Into A Tranquil Joy.

Only The Man Who Follows The Command Of Jesus Single-mindedly, And Unresistingly Lets His Yoke Rest Upon Him, Finds His Burden Easy, And Under Its Gentle Pressure Receives The Power To Persevere In The Right Way. The Command Of Jesus Is Hard, Unutterably Hard, For Those Who Try To Resist It. But For Those Who Willingly Submit, The Yoke Is Easy, And The Burden Is Light.

When One Person Is Struck By The Word, He Speaks It To Others. God Has Willed That We Should Seek And Find His Living Word In The Witness Of A Brother, In The Mouth Of Man. Therefore, The Christian Needs Another Christian Who Speaks God’s Word To Him. The Christ In His Own Heart Is Weaker Than The Christ In The Word Of His Brother; His Own Heart Is Uncertain, His Brother’s Is Sure.

The Test Of The Morality Of A Society Is What It Does For Its Children.

Nothing Can Fill The Gap When We Are Away From Those We Love, And It Would Be Wrong To Try To Find Anything.....it Is Nonsense To Say That God Fills The Gap; He Does Not Fill It, But Keeps It Empty So That Our Communion With Another May Be Kept Alive, Even At The Cost Of Pain.

If I Sit Next To A Madman As He Drives A Car Into A Group Of Innocent Bystanders, I Can't, As A Christian, Simply Wait For The Catastrophe, Then Comfort The Wounded And Bury The Dead. I Must Try To Wrestle The Steering Wheel Out Of The Hands Of The Driver.

Christians Have Forgotten That The Ministry Of Listening Has Been Committed To Them By Him Who Is Himself The Great Listener And Whose Work They Should Share. We Should Listen With The Ears Of God That We May Speak The Word Of God.

It Is The Characteristic Excellence Of The Strong Man That He Can Bring Momentous Issues To The Fore And Make A Decision About Them. The Weak Are Always Forced To Decide Between Alternatives They Have Not Chosen Themselves.

If You Board The Wrong Train, It Is No Use Running Along The Corridor In The Other Direction.

One Act Of Obedience Is Better Than One Hundred Sermons.

Christian Inspirational

God Cannot Endure That Unfestive, Mirthless Attitude Of Ours In Which We Eat Our Bread In Sorrow, With Pretentious, Busy Haste, Or Even With Shame. Through Our Daily Meals He Is Calling Us To Rejoice, To Keep Holiday In The Midst Of Our Working Day.

There Are Only Two Places Where The Powerful And Great In This World Lose Their Courage, Tremble In The Depths Of Their Souls, And Become Truly Afraid. These Are The Manger And The Cross Of Jesus Christ....no Priest, No Theologian Stood At The Cradle Of Bethlehem. And Yet, All Christian Theology Finds Its Beginnings In The Miracle Of Miracles, That God Became Human.

If You Want My Goodness To Stay With You Then Serve Your Neighbour, For In Him God Comes To You Himself; Such A Man Sees In His Neighbour The Material And Spiritual Need He Is Called To Meet.

Monastic Life Thus Became A Living Protest Against The Secularization Of Christianity, Against The Cheapening Of Grace.

The 'polymath' Had Already Died Out By The Close Of The Eighteenth Century, And In The Following Century Intensive Education Replaced Extensive, So That By The End Of It The Specialist Had Evolved. The Consequence Is That Today Everyone Is A Mere Technician, Even The Artist.

It Is The Task Of Youth Not To Reshape The Church, But Rather To Listen To The Word Of God.

Waiting Is An Art That Our Impatient Age Has Forgotten. It Wants To Break Open The Ripe Fruit When It Has Hardly Finished Planting The Shoot. But All Too Often The Greedy Eyes Are Only Deceived; The Fruit That Seemed So Precious Is Still Green On The Inside, And Disrespected Hands Ungratefully Toss Aside What Has So Disappointed Them.

Being Free Means "being Free For The Other," Because The Other Has Bound Me To Him. Only In Relationship With The Other Am I Free

Oh, Give Our Frightened Souls The Sure Salvation For Which, O Lord, You Taught Us To Prepare. And When This Cup You Give Is Filled To Brimming With Bitter Suffering, Hard To Understand, We Take It Thankfully And Without Trembling, Out Of So Good And So Beloved A Hand. Yet When Again In This Same World You Give Us The Joy We Had, The Brightness Of Your Sun, We Shall Remember All The Days We Lived Through, And Our Whole Life Shall Then Be Yours Alone.

Every Wedding Must Be An Occasion Of Joy That Human Beings Can Do Such Great Things, That They Have Been Given Such Immense Freedom And Power To Take The Helm In Their Life's Journey.

Judgement Is The Forbidden Objectivization Of The Other Person Which Destroys Single-minded Love. I Am Not Forbidden To Have My Own Thoughts About The Other Person, To Realize His Shortcomings, But Only To The Extent That It Offers To Me An Occasion For Forgiveness And Unconditional Love, As Jesus Proves To Me.

Unconditional Love

Humanly Speaking, It Is Possible To Understand The Sermon On The Mount In A Thousand Different Ways. But Jesus Knows Only One Possibility: Simple Surrender And Obedience - Not Interpreting Or Applying It, But Doing And Obeying It. That Is The Only Way To Hear His Words. He Does Not Mean For Us To Discuss It As An Ideal. He Really Means For Us To Get On With It.

We Do God’s Work For Our Brothers And Sisters When We Learn To Listen To Them. So Often Christians, Especially Preachers, Think That Their Only Service Is Always To Have To 'offer' Something When They Are Together With Other People. They Forget That Listening Can Be A Greater Service Than Speaking. Many People Seek A Sympathetic Ear And Do Not Find It Among Christians, Because These Christians Are Talking Even When They Should Be Listening.

In Jesus Christ We Have Been Chosen From Eternity, Accepted In Time, And United For Eternity.

What Is Happiness And Unhappiness? It Depends So Little On The Circumstances; It Depends Really Only On What Happens Inside A Person. I Am Grateful For Every Day And That Makes Me Happy.

The Early Morning Belongs To The Church Of The Risen Christ. At The Break Of Light It Remembers The Morning On Which Death And Sin Lay Prostrate In Defeat And New Life And Salvation Were Given To Mankind

Love, In The Sense Of Spontaneous, Unreflective Action, Spells The Death Of The Old Man.

Telling The Truth ... Is Not Solely A Matter Of Moral Character; It Is Also A Matter Of Correct Appreciation Of Real Situations And Of Serious Reflection Upon Them.

Cheap Grace Is The Idea That "grace" Did It All For Me So I Do Not Need To Change My Lifestyle. The Believer Who Accepts The Idea Of "cheap Grace" Thinks He Can Continue To Live Like The Rest Of The World. Instead Of Following Christ In A Radical Way, The Christian Lost In Cheap Grace Thinks He Can Simply Enjoy The Consolations Of His Grace.

Following Christ

The Cross Is God's Truth About Us, And Therefore It Is The Only Power Thatcanmakeustruthful.whenwe Know The Cross We Are No Longer Afraid Of The Truth.

It Is Not In Our Life That God's Help And Presence Must Still Be Proved, But Rather God's Presence And Help Have Been Demonstrated For Us In The Life Of Jesus Christ. It Is In Fact More Important For Us To Know What God Did To Israel, To His Son Jesus Christ, Than To Seek What God Intends For Us Today.

Because I Am A Christian, Therefore, Every Day In Which I Do Not Penetrate More Deeply Into The Knowledge Of God's Word In Holy Scripture Is A Lost Day For Me. I Can Only Move Forward With Certainty Upon The Firm Ground Of The Word Of God. And, As A Christian, I Learn To Know The Holy Scriptures In No Other Way Than By Hearing The Word Preached And By Prayerful Meditation.

How Would You Expect To Find Community While You Intentionally Withdraw From It At Some Point? The Disobedient Cannot Believe; Only The Obedient Believe.

Human Love Has Little Regard For The Truth. It Makes The Truth Relative, Since Nothing, Not Even The Truth, Must Come Between It And The Beloved Person.

Just As God's Love Entered The World, Thereby Submitting To The Misunderstanding And Ambiguity That Characterize Everything Worldly, So Also Christian Love Does Not Exist Anywhere But In The Worldly, In An Infinite Variety Of Concrete Worldly Action, And Subject To Misunderstanding And Condemnation. Every Attempt To Portray A Christianity Of 'pure' Love Purged Of Worldly 'impurities' Is A False Purism And Perfectionism That Scorns God's Becoming Human And Falls Prey To The Fate Of All Ideologies. God Was Not Too Pure To Enter The World.

Fruit Is Always The Miraculous, The Created; It Is Never The Result Of Willing, But Always A Growth. The Fruit Of The Spirit Is A Gift Of God, And Only He Can Produce It. They Who Bear It Know As Little About It As The Tree Knows Of Its Fruit. They Know Only The Power Of Him On Whom Their Life Depends

Fruits Of The Spirit

The Responsible Person Seeks To Make His Whole Life A Response To The Question And Call Of God.

The Limitation Of The Ethical Phenomenon To Its Place And Time Does Not Imply Its Rejection But, On The Contrary, Its Validation. One Does Not Use Canons To Shoot Sparrows.

One Cannot Simply Read The Bible, Like Other Books. One Must Be Prepared Really To Enquire Of It. Only Thus Will It Reveal Itself. Only If We Expect From It The Ultimate Answer, Shall We Receive It. That Is Because In The Bible God Speaks To Us. And One Cannot Simply Think About God In One’s Own Strength, One Has To Inquire Of Him. Only If We Seek Him, Will He Answer Us.

The First Service That One Owes To Others In The Fellowship Consists Of Listening To Them. Just As Love Of God Begins With Listening To His Word, So The Beginning Of Love For Our Brothers And Sisters Is Learning To Listen To Them.

Fellowship With God

If My Sinfulness Appears To Me To Be In Any Way Smaller Or Less Detestable In Comparison With The Sins Of Others, I Am Still Not Recognizing My Sinfulness At All. ... How Can I Possibly Serve Another Person In Unfeigned Humility If I Seriously Regard His Sinfulness As Worse Than My Own?

There Is Meaning In Every Journey That Is Unknown To The Traveler.

Principles Are Only Tools In The Hands Of God; They Will Soon Be Thrown Away When They Are No Longer Useful.

If Any Want To Become My Followers," Jesus Says. Following Him Is Not Something That Is Self-evident, Even Among The Disciples. No One Can Be Forced, No One Can Be Expected To Follow Him. ... "if Any Want To Follow Me, They Must Deny Themselves ... And Take Up Their Cross.

The Devil Doesn't Fill Us With Hatred For God, But With Forgetfulness Of God.

If Christ Has Been Given Us, If We Are Called To His Discipleship We Are Given All Things, Literally _all_ Things. He Will See To It That They Are Added Unto Us. If We Follow Jesus And Look Only To His Righteousness, We Are In His Hands And Under The Protection Of Him And His Father. And If We Are In Communion With The Father, Nought Can Harm Us. God Will Help Us In The Hour Of Need, And He Knows Our Needs.

A Love That Left People Alone In Their Guilt Would Not Have Real People As Its Object. So, In Vicarious Responsibility For People, And In His Love For Real Human Beings, Jesus Becomes The One Burdened By Guilt.

Cheap Grace Is The Grace We Bestow On Ourselves. Cheap Grace Is The Preaching Of Forgiveness Without Requiring Repentance, Baptism Without Church Discipline, Communion Without Confession.... Cheap Grace Is Grace Without Discipleship, Grace Without The Cross, Grace Without Jesus Christ, Living And Incarnate.

Originally Man Was Made In The Image Of God, But Now His Likeness To God Is A Stolen One. As The Image Of God Man Draws His Life Entirely From His Origin In God, But The Man Who Has Become Like God Has Forgotten How He Was At His Origin And Has Made Himself His Own Creator And Judge.

Discipleship Never Consists In This Or That Specific Action: It Is Always A Decision, Either For Or Against Jesus Christ.

Our Community With One Another Consists Solely In What Christ Has Done To Each Of Us.

Pain Is A Holy Angel Who Shows Us Treasures That Would Otherwise Remain Forever Hidden; Through Him Men And Women Have Become Greater Than Through All The Joys Of The World. It Must Be So And I Tell Myself This In My Present Situation Over And Over Again. The Pain Of Suffering And Of Longing, Which Can Often Be Felt Even Physically, Must Be There, And We Cannot And Need Not Talk It Away. But It Needs To Be Overcome Every Time, And Thus There Is An Even Holier Angel Than The One Of Pain; That Is, The One Of Joy In God.

A Pastor Should Never Complain About His Congregation, Certainly Never To Other People, But Also Not To God. A Congregation Has Not Been Entrusted To Him In Order That He Should Become Its Accuser Before God And Men.

Not To Speak Is To Speak. Not To Act Is To Act.

The Biggest Mistake You Can Make In Your Life Is To Be Always Afraid Of Making A Mistake.

Making Mistakes

If You Do A Good Job For Others, You Heal Yourself At The Same Time, Because A Dose Of Joy Is A Spiritual Cure.

Neighbourliness Is Not A Quality In Other People, It Is Simply Their Claim On Ourselves.

... There Are Not Two Realities, But Only One Reality, And That Is The Reality Of God, Which Has Become Manifest In The Christ Event/redemption And Creation.

The Future And The Hope For The Middle Class Church Lies In The Renewal Of Its Lifeblood, Which Is Only Possible If The Church Succeeds In Winning The Working Class.

There Is Not A Place To Which The Christian Can Withdraw From The World, Whether It Be Outwardly Or In The Sphere Of The Inner Life. Any Attempt To Escape From The World Must Sooner Or Later Be Paid For With A Sinful Surrender To The World.

Thus The Call To Follow Christ Always Means A Call To Share The Work Of Forgiving Men Their Sins. Forgiveness Is The Christlike Suffering Which It Is The Christian's Duty To Bear.

I Can Never Know Beforehand How God’s Image Should Appear In Others. That Image Always Manifests A Completely New And Unique Form That Comes Solely From God’s Free And Sovereign Creation. To Me The Sight May Seem Strange, Even Ungodly. But God Creates Every Man In The Likeness Of His Son, The Crucified. After All, Even That Image Certainly Looked Strange And Ungodly To Me Before I Grasped It.

It Is Grace, Nothing But Grace, That We Are Allowed To Live In Community With Christian Brethren.

Jesus Calls Men, Not To A New Religion, But To Life.

A God Who Let Us Prove His Existence Would Be An Idol.

Man Has Learned To Cope With All Questions Of Importance Without Recourse To God As A Working Hypothesis.

It Is The Fellowship Of The Cross To Experience The Burden Of The Other. If One Does Not Experience It, The Fellowship He Belongs To Is Not Christian. If Any Member Refuses To Bear That Burden, He Denies The Law Of Christ.

We Are Torn Out Of Our Own Existence And Set Down In The Midst Of The Holy History Of God On Earth. There God Dealt With Us, And There He Still Deals With Us, Our Needs And Our Sins, In Judgment And Grace.

Destruction Of The Embryo In The Mother's Womb Is A Violation Of The Right To Live Which God Has Bestowed Upon This Nascent Life. To Raise The Question Whether We Are Here Concerned Already With A Human Being Or Not Is Merely To Confuse The Issue. The Simple Fact Is That God Certainly Intended To Create A Human Being And That This Nascent Human Being Has Been Deliberately Deprived Of His Life. And That Is Nothing But Murder.

It Is A Blessed Thing To Know That No Power On Earth, No Temptation, No Human Frailty Can Dissolve What God Holds Together.

The Lord Confers Great Honor On His Servants When He Brings Them Suffering.

God Is Not A God Of The Emotions But The God Of Truth.

Christian Brotherhood Is Not An Ideal Which We Must Realize; It Is Rather A Reality Created By God In Christ In Which We May Participate.

Death Is The Supreme Festival On The Road To Freedom.

Struggling Against The Legalism Of Simple Obedience, We End By Setting Up The Most Dangerous Law Of All, The Law Of The World And The Law Of Grace. In Our Effort To Combat Legalism We Land Ourselves In The Worst Kind Of Legalism. The Only Way Of Overcoming This Legalism Is By Real Obedience To Christ When He Calls Us To Follow Him; For In Jesus The Law Is At Once Fulfilled And Cancelled.

Desires To Which We Cling Closely Can Easily Prevent Us From Being What We Ought To Be And Can Be; And On The Other Hand, Desires Repeatedly Mastered For The Sake Of Present Duty Make Us Richer.lack Of Desire Is Poverty.

Unless He Obeys, A Man Cannot Believe.

If Religion Is Onlya Garment Of Christianityand Even This Garment Has Looked Very Different At Different Timesthen What Is Religionless Christianity?

The More Genuine And The Deeper Our Community Becomes, The More Will Everything Else Between Us Recede, The More Clearly And Purely Will Jesus Christ And His Work Become The One And Only Thing That Is Vital Between Us.

I Believe That God Both Wills And Is Able To Bring Good Out Of Everything, Even The Worst... I Believe That Even Our Mistakes And Wrongdoing Are Not Fruitless.

Only Those Who Obey Can Believe, And Only Those Who Believe Can Obey.

Prayer Does Not Mean Simply To Pour Out One's Heart. It Means Rather To Find The Way To God And To Speak With Him, Whether The Heart Is Full Or Empty.

To Be Sure, God Shall Call You, And Us, Only At The Hour That God Has Chosen. Until That Hour, Which Lies In God's Hand Alone, We Shall Be Protected Even In The Greatest Danger; And From Our Gratitude For Such Protection Ever New Readiness Surely Arises For The Final Call

A Christian Fellowship Lives And Exists By The Intercession Of Its Members For One Another, Or It Collapses.

The Restoration Of The Church Must Surely Depend On A New Kind Of Monasticism, Which Has Nothing In Common With The Old But A Life Of Uncompromising Discipleship, Following Christ According To The Sermon On The Mount. I Believe The Time Has Come To Gather People Together To Do This.

Following Christ

That Fact That Jesus Christ Died Is More Important Than That Fact That I Will Die.

We Are Not To Simply Bandage The Wounds Of Victims Beneath The Wheels Of Injustice, We Are To Drive A Spoke Into The Wheel Itself.

The Christian Life Is Participation In The Encounter Of Christ With The World.

In The First Place, The Church Can Ask The State Whether Its Actions Are Legitimate And In Accordance With Its Character As State, I.e., It Can Throw The State Back On Its Responsibilities. Secondly, It Can Aid The Victims Of State Action. The Church Has An Unconditional Obligation To The Victims Of Any Ordering Of Society, Even If They Do Not Belong To The Christian Community. The Third Possibility Is Not Just To Bandage The Victims Under The Wheel, But To Put A Spoke In The Wheel Itself.

Faith Without Works Is Not Faith At All, But A Simple Lack Of Obedience To God.

Obedience To God

Good Friday And Easter Free Us To Think About Other Things Far Beyond Our Own Personal Fate, About The Ultimate Meaning Of All Life, Suffering, And Events; And We Lay Hold Of A Great Hope.

Death Reveals That The World Is Not As It Should Be But That It Stands In Need Of Redemption. Christ Alone Is The Conquering Of Death.

Let Him Who Cannot Be Alone Beware Of Community... Let Him Who Is Not In Community Beware Of Being Alone... Each By Itself Has Profound Perils And Pitfalls. One Who Wants Fellowship Without Solitude Plunges Into The Void Of Words And Feelings, And The One Who Seeks Solitude Without Fellowship Perishes In The Abyss Of Vanity, Self-infatuation And Despair.

The Earthly Form Of Christ Is The Form That Died On The Cross. The Image Of God Is The Image Of Christ Crucified. It Is To This Image That The Life Of The Disciples Must Be Conformed; In Other Words, They Must Be Conformed To His Death (phil 3.10, Rom 6.4) The Christian Life Is A Life Of Crucifixion (gal 2.19) In Baptism The Form Of Christ's Death Is Impressed Upon His Own. They Are Dead To The Flesh And To Sin, They Are Dead To The World, And The World Is Dead To Them (gal 6.14). Anybody Living In The Strength Of Christ's Baptism Lives In The Strength Of Christ's Death.

Discipleship Is Not Limited To What You Can Comprehend – It Must Transcend All Comprehension. Plunge Into The Deep Waters Beyond Your Own Comprehension, And I Will Help You To Comprehend Even As I Do. Bewilderment Is The True Comprehension. Not To Know Where You Are Going Is The True Knowledge. My Comprehension Transcends Yours.

How Wrong It Is To Use God As A Stop-gap For The Incompleteness Of Our Knowledge. . . . We Are To Find God In What We Know, Not In What We Don't Know; God Wants Us To Realize His Presence, Not In Unsolved Problems But In Those That Are Solved. . . . God Is No Stop-gap; He Must Be Recognized As The Center Of Life, Not When We Are At The End Of Our Resources.

In Normal Life We Hardly Realize How Much More We Receive Than We Give, And Life Cannot Be Rich Without Such Gratitude. It Is So Easy To Overestimate The Importance Of Our Own Achievements Compared With What We Owe To The Help Of Others.

There Remains An Experience Of Incomparable Value . . . To See The Great Events Of World History From Below; From The Perspective Of The Outcast, The Suspects, The Maltreated, The Powerless, The Oppressed, The Reviled ---- In Short, From The Perspective Of Those Who Suffer . . . To Look With New Eyes On Matters Great And Small.

Time Lost Is Time Not Filled, Time Left Empty.

Where Is Love More Glorified Than Where She Dwells In The Midst Of Her Enemies?

Temptations Which Accompany The Working Day Will Be Conquered On The Basis Of The Morning Breakthrough To God. Decisions, Demanded By Work, Become Easier And Simpler Where They Are Made Not In The Fear Of Men, But Only In The Sight Of God. He Wants To Give Us Today The Power Which We Need For Our Work.

Why Do Christians Sing When They Are Together? The Reason Is, Quite Simply, Because In Singing Together It Is Possible For Them To Speak And Pray The Same Word At The Same Time; In Other Words, Because Here They Can Unite In The Word.

Costly Grace Is The Gospel Which Must Be Sought Again And Again, The Gift Which Must Be Asked For, The Door At Which A Man Must Knock.

You Can Only Learn What Obedience Is By Obeying

A King Who Dies On The Cross Must Be The King Of A Rather Strange Kingdom.

And We Simply Cannot Be Constant With The Fact That God’s Cause Is Not Always The Successful One, That We Really Could Be “unsuccessful”; And Yet Be On The Right Road. But This Is Where We Find Out Whether We Have Begun In Faith Or In A Burst Of Enthusiasm.

A Christian Is Someone Who Shares The Sufferings Of God In The World.

Christian Love Draws No Distinction Between One Enemy And Another, Except That The More Bitter Our Enemy's Hatred, The Greater His Need Of Love. Be His Enmity Political Or Religious, He Has Nothing To Expect From A Follower Of Jesus But Unqualified Love. In Such Love There Is Not Inner Discord Between The Private Person And Official Capacity. In Both We Are Disciples Of Christ, Or We Are Not Christians At All.

Not Until One Person Desires To Keep His Own Bread For Himself Does Hunger Ensue.

The Celebration Of Advent Is Possible Only To Those Who Are Troubled In Soul, Who Know Themselves To Be Poor And Imperfect, And Who Look Forward To Something Greater To Come.

What Is The "extraordinary"? It Is The Love Of Jesus Christ Himself, Love That Goes To The Cross In Suffering Obedience.

The Best-informed Man Is Not Necessarily The Wisest. Indeed There Is A Danger That Precisely In The Multiplicity Of His Knowledge He Will Lose Sight Of What Is Essential. But On The Other Hand, Knowledge Of An Apparently Trivial Detail Quite Often Makes It Possible To See Into The Depth Of Things. And So The Wise Man Will Seek To Acquire The Best Possible Knowledge About Events, But Always Without Becoming Dependent Upon This Knowledge. To Recognize The Significant In The Factual Is Wisdom.

Discipleship Is Not An Offer That Man Makes To Christ.

The Fact That We Do Not Speak It But Sing It Only Expresses The Fact That Our Spoken Words Are Inadequate To Express What We Want To Say, That The Burden Of Our Song Goes Far Beyond All Human Words.

When Our Will Wholeheartedly Enters Into The Prayer Of Christ, Then We Pray Correctly.

The Heart Clings To Collected Treasure. Stored-up Possessions Get Between Me And God. Where My Treasure Is, There Is My Trust, My Security, My Comfort, My God. Treasure Means Idolatry.

The More Isolated A Person Is, The More Destructive Will Be The Power Of Sin Over Him, And The More Deeply He Becomes Involved In It, The More Disastrous Is His Isolation.

The Lord Stands Above The New Day, For God Has Made It. All Restlessness, All Worry, And Anxiety Flee Before Him.

The Church ... Is Not Just To Bandage The Victims Under The Wheel, But To Put A Spoke In The Wheel Itself.

We Pray For The Big Things And Forget To Give Thanks For The Ordinary, Small (and Yet Really Not Small) Gifts.

Who Can Really Be Faithful In Great Things If He Has Not Learned To Be Faithful In The Things Of Daily Life?

Then Fear Will Grow Pale And Fade Away, And You Will Be Free, Through Your Faith In Our Strong And Living Savior, Jesus Christ.

Where God Tears Great Gaps We Should Not Try To Fill Them With Human Words.

And After Death Something New Begins, Over Which All The Powers Of The World Of Death Can Have No More Control.

The Great Masquerade Of Evil Has Played Havoc With All Our Ethical Concepts. For Evil To Appear Disguised As Light, Charity, Historical Necessity, Or Social Justice Is Quite Bewildering To Anyone Brought Up On Our Traditional Ethical Concepts, While For The Christian Who Bases His Life On The Bible, It Merely Confirms The Fundamental Wickedness Of Evil.

In Recent Years We Have Seen A Great Deal Of Bravery And Self-sacrifice, But Civil Courage Hardly Anywhere, Even Among Ourselves.

The Pursuit Of Purity Is Not About The Suppression Of Lust, But About The Reorientation Of One's Life To A Larger Goal.

The Only Man Who Has The Right To Say That He Is Justified By Grace Alone Is The Man Who Has Left All To Follow Christ.

Blessed Are They That Hunger And Thirst After Righteousness: For They Shall Be Filled. Not Only Do The Followers Of Jesus Renounce Their Rights, They Renounce Their Own Righteousness Too. They Get No Praise For Their Achievements Or Sacrifices. They Cannot Have Righteous– Ness Except By Hungering And Thirsting For It (this Applies Equally To Their Own Righteousness And To The Righteousness Of God On Earth ), Always They Look Forward To The Future Righteousness Of God, But They Cannot Establish It For Themselves. Those Who Follow Jesus Grow Hungry And Thirsty On The Way.

In A Word, Live Together In The Forgiveness Of Your Sins, For Without It No Human Fellowship, Least Of All A Marriage, Can Survive. Don't Insist On Your Rights, Don't Blame Each Other, Don't Judge Or Condemn Each Other, Don't Find Fault With Each Other, But Accept Each Other As You Are, And Forgive Each Other Every Day From The Bottom Of Your Hearts.

He Who Fears The Face Of God Does Not Fear The Face Of Man. He Who Fears The Face Of Man Does Not Fear The Face Of God.

Any Honours That Come Our Way Are Only Stolen From Him To Whom Alone They Really Belong, The Lord Who Sent Us.

Ultimate Seriousness In Not Without A Dose Of Humor.

Loving God Means Rejoicing In God, Being Eager To Think Of And Pray To God. It Means Being Glad To Be In God's Presence And To Be With God Alone. It Means Not Grieving God, But Rejoicing In God Simply Because It Is God Who Is Involved, And Because We Are Permitted To Know And Have God, And To Speak With And Live With God.

The Psalter Is The Great School Of Prayer.

Thinking In Terms Of Two Realms Understands The Paired Concepts Worldy-christia N, Natural-superna Tural, Profane-sacred, Rational-revela Tions, As Ultimate Static Opposites...and Fails To Recognize The Original Unity Of These Opposites In The Christ-reality.

If We Are To Pray Aright, Perhaps It Is Quite Necessary That We Pray Contrary To Our Own Heart. Not What We Want To Pray Is Important, But What God Wants Us To Pray. The Richness Of The Word Of God Ought To Determine Our Prayer, Not The Poverty Of Our Heart.

The Followers Of Christ Have Been Called To Peace. . . . And They Must Not Only Have Peace But Make It. And To That End They Renounce All Violence And Tumult. In The Cause Of Christ Nothing Is To Be Gained By Such Methods . . . . His Disciples Keep The Peace By Choosing To Endure Suffering Themselves Rather Than Inflict It On Others. They Maintain Fellowship Where Others Would Break It Off. They Renounce Hatred And Wrong. In So Doing They Overcome Evil With Good, And Establish The Peace Of God In The Midst Of A World Of War And Hate.

We Must Be Ready To Allow Ourselves To Be Interrupted By God.

Jesus Is The Only Significance. Beside Jesus Nothing Has Any Significance. He Alone Matters.

A Christian Fellowship Lives And Exists By The Intercession Of Its Members For One Another, Or It Collapses. I Can No Longer Condemn Or Hate A Brother For Whom I Pray, No Matter How Much Trouble He Causes Me. His Face, That Hitherto May Have Been Strange And Intolerable To Me, Is Transformed In Intercession Into The Countenance Of A Brother For Whom Christ Died, The Face Of A Forgiven Sinner.

The Psalter Is The Prayer Book Of Jesus Christ In The Truest Sense Of The Word. He Prayed The Psalter And Now It Has Become His Prayer For All Time...we Understand How The Psalter Can Be Prayer To God And Yet God's Own Word, Precisely Because Here We Encounter The Praying Christ...because Those Who Pray The Psalms Are Joining In With The Prayer Of Jesus Christ, Their Prayer Reaches The Ears Of God. Christ Has Become Their Intercessor.

If Our Christianity Has Ceased To Be Serious About Discipleship, If We Have Watered Down The Gospel Into Emotional Uplift Which Makes No Costly Demands And Which Fails To Distinguish Between Natural And Christian Existence, Then We Cannot Help Regarding The Cross As An Ordinary Everyday Calamity, As One Of The Trials And Tribulations Of Life. We Have Then Forgotten That The Cross Means Rejection And Shame As Well As Suffering .

Politics Are Not The Task Of A Christian.

But Discipleship Never Consists In This Or That Specific Action: It Is Always A Decision, Either For Or Against Jesus Christ...christ Speaks To Us Exactly As He Spoke To Them. It Was Not As Though They First Recognized Him As The Christ And Then Received His Command. They Believed His Word And Command And Recognized Him As The Christ--in That Order.

The Cross Is Not The Terrible End To An Otherwise God-fearing And Happy Life, But It Meets Us At The Beginning Of Our Communion With Christ. When Christ Calls A Man, He Bids Him Come And Die.

Jesus' Commandment Never Wishes To Destroy Life, But Rather To Preserve, Strengthen, And Heal Life.

There Is A Wrong Way Of Staying In The World And A Wrong Way Of Fleeing From It. In Both Cases We Are Fashioning Ourselves According To The World.

Every Call Of Christ Leads Into Death.

The Christian Needs Another Christian Who Speaks God's Word To Him. He Needs Him Again And Again When He Becomes Uncertain And Discouraged, For By Himself He Cannot Help Himself Without Belying The Truth.

Each Morning Is A New Beginning Of Our Life. Each Day Is A Finished Whole. The Present Day Marks The Boundary Of Our Cares And Concerns. It Is Long Enough To Find God Or Lose Him, To Keep Faith Or Fall Into Disgrace.

After He Has Been Following Christ For A Long Time, The Disciple Of Jesus Will Be Asked, "lacked Ye Anything?" And He Will Answer "nothing, Lord." How Could He When He Knows That Despite Hunger And Nakedness, Persecution And Danger, The Lord Is Always At His Side?

Following Christ

Who Among Us Will Celebrate Christmas Correctly? Whoever Finally Lays Down All Power, L Honor, All Reputation, All Vanity, All Arrogance, All Individualism Beside The Manger; Whoever Remains Lowly And Lets God Alone Be High; Whoever Looks At The Child In The Manger And Sees The Glory Of God Precisely In His Lowliness.

In The Gospels The Very First Step A Man Must Take Is An Act Which Radically Affects His Whole Existence.

Sometimes We Just Need A Firm Kick In The Pants. An Unsmiling Expectation That If We Mean All These Wonderful Things We Talk About And Sing About, Then Let’s See Something To Prove It.

Love Asks Nothing In Return, But Seeks Those Who Need It. And Who Needs Our Love More Than Those Who Are Consumed With Hatred And Are Utterly Devoid Of Love.

A Day Without Morning And Evening Prayers And Personal Intercessions Is Actually A Day Without Meaning Or Importance.

Cheap Grace Is Grace Without Discipleship, Grace Without The Cross, Grace Without Jesus Christ, Living And Incarnate.

To Recognize The Significant In The Factual Is Wisdom.

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