Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoefferwas a German Lutheran pastor, theologian, anti-Nazi dissident, and key founding member of the Confessing Church. His writings on Christianity's role in the secular world have become widely influential, and his book The Cost of Discipleship became a modern classic...
NationalityGerman
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth4 February 1906
CountryGermany
people path petitions
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.
people waiting satisfied
Not everyone can wait: neither the sated nor the satisfied nor those without respect can wait. The only ones who can wait are people who carry restlessness around with them.
new-beginnings past people
God can make a new beginning with people whenever God pleases, but not people with God. Therefore, people cannot make a new beginning at all; they can only pray for one. Where people are on their own and live by their own devices, there is only the old, the past.
community done christ
Our community with one another consists solely in what Christ has done to each of us.
jesus suffering tragedy
To endure the cross is not tragedy; it is the suffering which is the fruit of an exclusive allegiance to Jesus Christ.
desire bread doe
Not until one person desires to keep his own bread for himself does hunger ensue.
sad running depressing
If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction.
deep-water helping where-you-are
[God says] 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.
gratitude memories being-thankful
Gratitude changes the pangs of memory into a tranquil joy.
christmas doors cells
A prison cell, in which one waits, hopes...and is completely dependent on the fact that the door of freedom has to be opened from the outside, is not a bad picture of Advent.
christian father anxiety
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.
nature children accountability
The ultimate test of a moral society is the kind of world that it leaves to its children.
men expression law
The will of God, to which the law gives expression, is that men should defeat their enemies by loving them.
life happiness success
The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children.