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The Proclamation Of Grace Has Its Limits. Grace May Not Be Proclaimed To Anyone Who Does Not Recognize Or Distinguish Or Desire It... The World Upon Whom Grace Is Thrust As A Bargain Will Grow Tired Of It, And It Will Not Only Trample Upon The Holy, But Also Will Tear Apart Those Who Force It On Them.

-Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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The Proclamation Of Grace

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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The Proclamation Of Grace Has Its Limits. Grace May Not Be Proclaimed To Anyone Who Does Not Recognize Or Distinguish Or Desire It... The World Upon Whom Grace Is Thrust As A Bargain Will Grow Tired Of It, And It Will Not Only Trample Upon The Holy, But Also Will Tear Apart Those Who Force It On Them.

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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?

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

And If We Ask How Are We To Know Where Our Hearts Are, The Answer Is Just As Simple - Everything Which Hinders Us From Loving God Above All Things And Acts As A Barrier Between Ourselves And Our Obedience To Jesus Is Our Treasure, And The Place Where Our Heart Is.

Time Is The Most Valuable Thing That We Have, Because It Is The Most Irrevocable.

Valuable Things

Ultimate Seriousness In Not Without A Dose Of Humor.

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.

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.

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

There Is No Worse Sin Than Unbelief Toward The Gospel.

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

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.

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.

A Righteous Person Is One Who Lives For The Next Generation.

The Way To Misuse Our Possessions Is To Use Them As An Insurance Against The Morrow. Anxiety Is Always Directed To The Morrow, Whereas Goods Are In The Strictest Sense Meant To Be Used Only For To-day.

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

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

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.

Bless Them That Persecute You.' If Our Enemy Cannot Put Up With Us Any Longer And Takes To Cursing Us, Our Immediate Reaction Must Be To Lift Up Our Hands And Bless Him. Our Enemies Are The Blessed Of The Lord. Their Curse Can Do Us No Harm. May Their Poverty Be Enriched With All The Riches Of God, With The Blessing Of Him Whom They Seek To Oppose In Vain. We Are Ready To Endure Their Curses So Long As They Redound To Their Blessing.

Gratitude Changes The Pangs Of Memory Into A Tranquil Joy.

If Any Man Would Come After Me, Let Him Deny Himself." The Disciple Must Say To Himself The Same Words Peter Said Of Christ When He Denied Him: "i Know Not This Man." Self-denial Is Never Just A Series Of Isolated Acts Of Mortification Or Asceticism. It Is Not Suicide, For There Is An Element Of Self-will Even In That. To Deny Oneself Is To Be Aware Only Of Christ And No More Of Self, To See Only Him Who Goes Before And No More The Road Which Is Too Hard For Us. Once More, All That Self Denial Can Say Is: "he Leads The Way, Keep Close To Him.

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.

The Entire Day Receives Order And Discipline When It Acquires Unity. This Unity Must Be Sought And Found In Morning Prayer. The Morning Prayer Determines The Day.

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

Christianity Means Community Through Jesus Christ And In Jesus Christ. No Christian Community Is More Or Less Than This.

The Deceit, The Lie Of The Devil Consists Of This, That He Wishes To Make Man Believe That He Can Live Without God's Word.

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.

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.

Desires Repeatedly Mastered For The Sake Of Present Duty Make Us Richer. Lack Of Desire Is Poverty.

Cheap Grace Is Grace Without Discipleship.

Christian Discipleship

Salvation Is Free, But Discipleship Will Cost You Your Life

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

All Are Called To Be What In The Reality Of God They Are Already.

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.

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.

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

The World Upon Whom Grace Is Thrust As A Bargain Will Grow Tired Of It.

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

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.

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.

It Is A Dangerous Error, Surely Very Widespread Among Christians, To Think That The Heart Can Pray By Itself.

Let Him Who Cannot Be Alone Beware Of Community. Let Him Who Is Not In Community Beware Of Being Alone.

Christian Community

By His Willingly Renouncing Self-defence, The Christian Affirms His Absolute Adherence To Jesus, And His Freedom From The Tyranny Of His Own Ego. The Exclusiveness Of This Adherence Is The Only Power Which Can Overcome Evil.

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.

Once Again, Jesus Calls Those Who Follow Him To Share His Passion.

If You Set Out To Seek Freedom, Then Learn Above All Things To Govern Your Soul And Your Senses . . . Only Through Discipline May A Man Learn To Be Free.

We Should Find God In What We Do Know, Not In What We Don't; Not In Outstanding Problems, But In Those We Have Already Solved.

God Wants To See Human Beings, Not Ghosts Who Shun The World. . . . Our Marriage Must Be A 'yes' To God's Earth. It Must Strengthen Our Resolve To Do And Accomplish Something On Earth. I Fear That Christians Who Venture To Stand On Earth On Only One Leg Will Stand In Heaven On Only One Leg Too.

Judging Others Makes Us Blind, Whereas Love Is Illuminating.

Judging Yourself

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.

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.

It Is Much Easier For Me To Imagine A Praying Murderer, A Praying Prostitute, Than A Vain Person Praying. Nothing Is So At Odds With Prayer As Vanity.

God Has Willed That We Should Seek And Find God's Living Word In The Testimony Of Other Christians, In The Mouths Of Human Beings.

But They All Stood Beneath The Cross, Enemies And Believers, Doubters And Cowards, Revilers And Devoted Followers. His Prayer, In That Hour, And His Forgiveness, Was Meant For Them All, And For All Their Sins. The Mercy And Love Of God Are At Work Even In The Midst Of His Enemies. It Is The Same Jesus Christ, Who Of His Grace Calls Us To Follow Him, And Whose Grace Saves The Murderer Who Mocks Him On The Cross In His Last Hour.

Time Is The Most Precious Gift In Our Possession, For It Is The Most Irrevocable. This Is What Makes It So Disturbing To Look Back Upon The Time Which We Have Lost. Time Lost Is Time When We Have Not Lived A Full Human Life, Time Unenriched By Experience, Creative Endeavor, Enjoyment, And Suffering. Time Lost Is Time Not Filled, Time Left Empty.

The Church Is Not A Religious Community Of Worshippers Of Christ But Is Christ Himself Who Has Taken Form Among People.

The Exclusion Of The Weak And Insignificant, The Seemingly Useless People, From A Christian Community May Actually Mean The Exclusion Of Christ; In The Poor Brother Christ Is Knocking At The Door.

Prayer Is The Supreme Instance Of The Hidden Character Of The Christian Life.

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

What We Shall Need Is Not Geniuses, Or Cynics, Or Misanthropes, Or Clever Tacticians, But Plain, Honest, Straghtforward Men.

Only The Believer Obeys — Obedience Follows Faith, The Way Good Fruit Comes From A Good Tree. Only The Obedient Believe.

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.

Who Stands Firm? Only The One For Whom The Final Standard Is Not His Reason, His Principles, His Conscience, His Freedom, His Virtue, But Who Is Ready To Sacrifice All These, When In Faith And Sole Allegiance To God He Is Called To Obedient And Responsible Action: The Responsible Person, Whose Life Will Be Nothing But An Answer To God's Question And Call.

To Deny Oneself Is To Be Aware Only Of Christ And No More Of Self, To See Only Him Who Goes Before And No More The Road Which Is Too Hard For Us. Once More, All That Self-denial Can Say Is, 'he Leads The Way, Keep Close To Him.'

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.

Where A People Prays, There Is The Church; And Where The Church Is; There Is Never Loneliness.

We Are Separated From One Another By An Unbridgeable Gulf Of Otherness And Strangeness Which Resists All Our Attempts To Overcome It By Means Of Natural Association Or Emotional Or Spiritual Union. There Is No Way From One Person To Another. However Loving And Sympathetic We Try To Be, However Sound Our Psychology However Frank And Open Our Behaviour We Cannot Penetrate The Incognito Of The Other Man, For There Are No Direct Relationships, Not Even Between Soul And Soul. Christ Stands Between Us, And We Can Only Get Into Touch With Our Neighbors Through Him.

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.

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

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

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.

... 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.

I Need The Christ That Is In You, And You Need The Christ That Is In Me.

Christianity Without Discipleship Is Always Christianity Without Christ.

Following Christ

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.

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.

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

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

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.

Discipleship Is Not An Offer That Man Makes To Christ.

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.

In Jesus, The Service Of God And The Service Of The Least Of The Brethren Were One.

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

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

But The Christian Also Knows That He Not Only Cannot And Dare Not Be Anxious, But That There Is No Need For Him To Be So. Neither Anxiety Now Work Can Secure His Daily Bread, For Bread Is The Gift Of The Father.

The Cross Is Suffering With Christ.

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.

Politics Are Not The Task Of A Christian.

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.

It Is The Voice Of The Church That Is Heard In Singing Together. It Is Not You That Sings, It Is The Church That Is Singing, And You, As A Member Of The Church, May Share In Its Song.

Only The Suffering God Can Help.

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

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.

There Is Nothing That Can Replace The Absence Of Someone Dear To Us, And One Should Not Even Attempt To Do So. One Must Simply Hold Out And Endure It. At First That Sounds Very Hard, But At The Same Time It Is Also A Great Comfort. For To The Extent The Emptiness Truly Remains Unfilled One Remains Connected To The Other Person Through It. It Is Wrong To Say That God Fills The Emptiness. God In No Way Fills It But Much More Leaves It Precisely Unfilled And Thus Helps Us Preserve -- Even In Pain -- The Authentic Relationship.

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.

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.

A Home Is A Kingdom Of It's Own In The Midst Of The World, A Stronghold Amid Life's Storms And Stresses, A Refuge, Even A Sanctuary.

The Will Of God, To Which The Law Gives Expression, Is That Men Should Defeat Their Enemies By Loving Them.

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

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

If Jesus Christ Is Not True God, How Could He Help Us? If He Is Not True Man, How Could He Help Us?

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

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

Nothing Can Be More Cruel Than The Leniency Which Abandons Others To Their Sin. Nothing Can Be More Compassionate Than The Severe Reprimand Which Calls Another Christian In One’s Community Back From The Path Of Sin.

It Seems To Me More Important Actually To Share Someones Distress Than To Use Smooth Words About It.

The Beginning Of Love For The Brethren Is Learning To Listen To Them.

Every Sermon Must Contain A Certain Shot Of Heresy.

Human Love Is Directed To The Other Person For His Own Sake, Spiritual Love Loves Him For Christ's Sake. Therefore, Human Love Seeks Direct Contact With The Other Person; It Loves Him Not As A Free Person But As One Whom It Binds To Itself.

The Church Is Her True Self Only When She Exists For Humanity.

God Is Not Free From Human Beings But For Them.

The Right Way To Pray Is To Stretch Out Our Hands And Ask Of One Who We Know Has The Heart Of A Father.

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

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 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.

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 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.

Christian Marriage Is Marked By Discipline And Self-denial...c Hristianity Does Not Therefore Depreciate Marriage, It Sanctifies It.

Christianity Preaches The Infinite Worth Of That Which Is Seemingly Worthless And The Infinite Worthlessness Of That Which Is Seemingly So Valued.

Jesus Christ Has To Suffer And Be Rejected... Suffering And Being Rejected Are Not The Same.

Right Speech Comes Out Of Silence And Right Silence Comes Out Of Speech.

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

Who Is Pure In Heart? Only Those Who Have Surrendered Their Hearts Completely To Jesus That He May Reign In Them Alone. Only Those Whose Hearts Are Undefiled By Their Own Evil--and By Their Own Virtues Too. The Pure In Heart Have A Child-like Simplicity Like Adam Before The Fall, Innocent Alike Of Good And Evil: Their Hearts Are Not Ruled By Their Conscience, But By The Will Of Jesus.

Who Am I? This Or The Other? Am I One Person Today And Tomorrow Another? Am I Both At Once? A Hypocrite Before Others, And Before Myself A Contemptible Woebegone Weakling? Or Is Something Within Me Still Like A Beaten Army Fleeing In Disorder From A Victory Already Achieved? Who Am I? They Mock Me, These Lonely Questions Of Mine. Whoever I Am, Thou Knowest, O God, I Am Thine!

The Church Is Her True Self Only When She Exists For Humanity. As A Fresh Start, She Should Give Away All Her Endowments To The Poor And Needy. The Clergy Should Live Solely On The Freewill Offerings Of Their Congregations, Or Possibly Engage In Some Secular Calling.

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.

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.

A Pastor Who Does Not Pray Daily For His Congregation Is Not A Pastor.

Whenever Christ Calls Us, His Call Leads Us To Death.

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.

There Remains An Experience Of Incomparable Value.

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

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

Battles Are Won, Not With Weapons, But With God. They Are Won Where The Way Leads To The Cross.

The Church Is Only The Church When It Exists For Others. To Make A Start, It Should Give Away All Its Property To Those In Need. The Clergy Must Live Solely On The Free-will Offerings Of Their Congregations, Or Possibly Engage In Some Secular Calling. The Church Must Share In The Secular Problems Of Ordinary Human Life, Not Dominating, But Helping And Serving. It Must Tell Men Of Every Calling What It Means To Live In Christ, To Exist For Others.

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

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

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.

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.

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.

Do Not Try To Make The Bible Relevant. Its Relevance Is Axiomatic.

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

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.

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.

Time Is Lost When We Have Not Lived A Full Human Life, Time Unenriched By Experience, Creative Endeavor, Enjoyment, And Suffering.

If There Is No Element Of Asceticism In Our Lives, If We Give Free Rein To The Desires Of The Flesh (taking Care Of Course To Keep Within The Limits Of What Seems Permissible To The World), We Shall Find It Hard To Train For The Service Of Christ. When The Flesh Is Satisfied It Is Hard To Pray With Cheerfulness Or To Devote Oneself To A Life Of Service Which Calls For Much Self-renunciation.

The Question Of Why Evil Exists Is Not A Theological Question, For It Assumes That It Is Possible To Go Behind The Existence Forced Upon Us As Sinners. If We Could Answer It Then We Would Not Be Sinners. We Could Make Something Else Responsible...the Theological Question Does Not Arise About The Origin Of Evil But About The Real Overcoming Of Evil On The Cross; It Ask For The Forgiveness Of Guilt, For The Reconciliation Of The Fallen World

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

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.

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

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

Things Do Exist That Are Worth Standing Up For Without Compromise. To Me It Seems That Peace And Social Justice Are Such Things, As Is Christ Himself.

The Word Of Cheap Grace Has Been The Ruin Of More Christians Than Any Commandment Of Works.

True Prayer Is Done In Secret, But This Does Not Rule Out The Fellowship Of Prayer Altogether, However Clearly We May Be Aware Of Its Dangers. In The Last Resort It Is Immaterial Whether We Pray In The Open Street Or In The Secrecy Of Our Chambers, Whether Briefly Or Lenghtily, In The Litany Of The Church, Or With The Sigh Of One Who Knows Not What He Should Pray For. True Prayer Does Not Depend Either On The Individual Or The Whole Body Of The Faithful, But Solely Upon The Knowledge That Our Heavenly Father Knows Our Needs.

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

God Loves Human Beings. God Loves The World. Not An Ideal Human, But Human Beings As They Are; Not An Ideal World, But The Real World. What We Find Repulsive In Their Opposition To God, What We Shrink Back From With Pain And Hostility, Namely, Real Human Beings, The Real World, This Is For God The Ground Of Unfathomable Love.

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.

I Can No Longer Condemn Or Hate A Brother For Whom I Pray, No Matter How Much Trouble He Causes Me.

The Preaching Of Grace Can Only Be Protected By The Preaching Of Repentance.

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.

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.

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 Life Of Discipleship Is Not The Hero-worship We Would Pay To A Good Master, But Obedience To The Son Of God.

It Is Very Easy To Overestimate The Importance Of Our Own Achievements In Comparison With What We Owe Others.

A Community Of Jesus Which Seeks To Hide Itself Has Ceased To Follow Him.

There Is No Way To Peace Along The Way Of Safety. For Peace Must Be Dared. It Is Itself The Great Venture And Can Never Be Safe. Peace Is The Opposite Of Security. To Demand Guarantees Is To Want To Protect Oneself. Peace Means Giving Oneself Completely To God's Commandment. Wanting No Security, But In Faith And Obedience Laying The Destiny Of The Nations In The Hand Of Almighty God. Not Trying To Direct It For Selfish Purposes. Battles Are Won Not With Weapons, But With God. They Are Won When The Way Leads To The Cross.

When Christ Calls A Man, He Bids Him Come And Die.

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.

Do Not Worry! Earthly Goods Deceive The Human Heart Into Believing That They Give It Security And Freedom From Worry. But In Truth, They Are What Cause Anxiety. The Heart Which Clings To Goods Receives With Them The Choking Burden Of Worry. Worry Collects Treasures, And Treasures Produce More Worries. We Desire To Secure Our Lives With Earthly Goods; We Want Our Worrying To Make Us Worry-free, But The Truth Is The Opposite. The Chains Which Bind Us To Earthly Goods, The Clutches Which Hold The Goods Tight, Are Themselves Worries.

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.

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

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.

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

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

Innumerable Times A Whole Christian Community Has Broken Down Because It Had Sprung From A Wish Dream… Every Human Wish Dream That Is Injected Into The Christian Community Is A Hindrance To Genuine Community And Must Be Banished If Genuine Community Is To Survive. He Who Loves His Dream Of A Community More Than The Christian Community Itself Becomes A Destroyer Of The Latter, Even Though His Personal Intentions May Be Ever So Honest And Earnest And Sacrificial.

Cheap Grace Is The Deadly Enemy Of Our Church. We Are Fighting Today For Costly Grace.

The Deep Meaning Of The Cross Of Christ Is That There Is No Suffering On Earth That Is Not Borne By God.

Christ Became Our Brother In Order To Help Us. Through Him Our Brother Has Become Christ For Us In The Power And Authority Of The Commission Christ Has Given Him. Our Brother Stands Before Us The Sign Of The Truth And The Grace Of God. He Has Been Given To Us To Help Us. He Hears The Confession Of Our Sins In Christ's Stead And He Forgives Our Sins In Christ's Name. He Keeps The Secret Of Our Confession As God Keeps It. When I Go To My Brother To Confess, I Am Going To God.

Your Life As A Christian Should Make Non Believers Question Their Disbelief In God.

The Incarnation Is The Ultimate Reason Why The Service Of God Cannot Be Divorced From The Service Of Man.

It Is God's Earth Out Of Which Man Is Taken. From It He Has His Body. His Body Belongs To His Essential Being. Man's Body Is Not His Prison, His Shell His Exterior, But Man Himself. Man Does Not "have" A Body; He Does Not "have" A Soul; Rather He "is" Body And Soul. Man In The Beginning Is Really His Body. He Is One. He Is His Body, As Christ Is Completely His Body, As The Church Is The Body Of Christ

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.

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

We Are So Afraid Of Silence That We Chase Ourselves From One Event To The Next In Order Not To Have To Spend A Moment Alone With Ourselves, In Order Not To Have To Look At Ourselves In The Mirror.

Death Is The Supreme Festival On The Road To Freedom.

In Ordinary Life We Hardly Realize That We Receive A Great Deal More Than We Give, And That It Is Only With Gratitude That Life Becomes Rich.

We Must Be Ready To Allow Ourselves To Be Interrupted By God. God Will Be Constantly Crossing Our Paths And Canceling Our Plans By Sending Us People With Claims And Petitions.

Death Is Hell And Night And Cold, If It Is Not Transformed By Our Faith. But That Is Just What Is So Marvelous, That We Can Transform Death.

To Endure The Cross Is Not Tragedy; It Is The Suffering Which Is The Fruit Of An Exclusive Allegiance To Jesus Christ.

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.

Costly Grace Is The Treasure Hidden In The Field; For The Sake Of It A Man Will Gladly Go And Sell All He Has. It Is The Pearl Of Great Price To By Which The Merchant Will Sell All His Goods.

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.

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.

Still More Pathetic Is The Total Collapse Of Moral Fanaticism. Fanatics Think That Their Single-minded Principles Qualify Them To Do Battle With The Powers Of Evil; But Like A Bull They Rush At The Red Cloak Instead Of The Person Who Is Holding It; He Exhausts Himself And Is Beaten. He Gets Entangled In Non-essentials And Falls Into The Trap Set By Cleverer People.

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

What We Are In Ourselves, And What We Owe To Others Makes Us A Complete Whole.

It Is Only Because He Became Like Us That We Can Become Like Him.

Spiritual Wisdom

I Saw Pastor Bonhoeffer, Before Taking Off His Prison Garb, Kneeling On The Floor Praying Fervently To His God. I Was Most Deeply Moved By The Way This Lovable Man Prayed, So Devout And So Certain That God Heard His Prayer. At The Place Of Execution, He Again Said A Prayer And Then Climbed The Steps To The Gallows, Brave And Composed. His Death Ensued In A Few Seconds. In The Almost 50 Years That I Have Worked As A Doctor, I Have Hardly Ever Seen A Man Die So Entirely Submissive To The Will Of God.

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

If The Heart Is Devoted To The Mirage Of The World, To The Creature Instead Of The Creator, The Disciple Is Lost... However Urgently Jesus May Call Us, His Call Fails To Find Access To Our Hearts... For They Have Already Been Given To Another.

God Comes Into The Very Midst Of Evil And Of Death, And Judges The Evil In Us And In The World. And By Judging Us, He Cleanses And Sanctifies Us, Comes To Us With His Grace And Love. He Makes Us Happy As Only Children Can Be Happy.

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

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