Book Review
The
Cost of Discipleship
by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Touchstone, Rockefeller Center, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, NY 10020
Copyright 1959, SCM Press Ltd
Background:
Coming from a family background of Church, he read theology
at the age of 14 and entered university at age. He became a lecturer
in Systematic Theology in Berlin University in 1930 at the age of 24.
His writings won him firm repurtaion in the theological world. He
was one of the first to reject the National Socialism, even before Hitler
rose to power. When Hitler did come to power in 1933, Dietrich abandoned
his academic career, but continued to lecture until he was expelled in
1936. He went to London in 1933 for two years, but returned to Germany
in 1935 to continue as one of the church leaders there. In 1939,
American friends managed to get him out of the country, but his heart yearned
to minister to his own people and he voluntarily returned to Germany knowing
the ordeal that lay ahead of him. Evenutually, he was arrested, along
with his sister and her husband, in 1943. His courage, unselfishness,
and goodness inspired all who came into contact with him, even his captures
who helped smuggle his papers out of prison. His concern was only
to minister to his fellow prisoners. He was transferred from prison
camp to concentration camp, to Berlin and finally to Buchenwald.
Through hardship, torure and many cross-examinations he remaing steadfastly
calm in his faith. At one point, others attempted to free him, but
he decided to reamain rather than endanger their lives. One British
officer who attended the last worship service Dietrich Bonhoeffer conducted
said, "moved all deeply, Catholics and Protestants alike, by his simple
sincerity." The next day, he went calmly and dignified on his way
to be hanged, April 6, 1945, only a few weeks before the end of the war.
Dietrich
Bonhoeffer's story is available on VHS video.
Grace and Discipleship
Costly Grace:
"Cheap grace is the deadly enemy of our Church.
We are fighting to-day for costly grace." p. 43.
"Cheap grace means the justification of sin without
the justification of the sinner." p. 43.
"Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace
without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate." p.
45
"Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field;
for the sake of it a man will gladly go and sell all that he has." p. 45
"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." p. 45
"Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow,
and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly
becaus it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man
the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace
because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly becaus it
cost God the life of his Son." p. 45
The Call to Discipleship:
"Discipleship means adherence to Christ, and, because
Christ is the object of that adherence, it must take the form of discipleship."
p. 59
"Discipleship without Jesus Christ is wa way of
our own choosing. . . . Jesus will certainly reject it." p. 59
"If we would follow Jesus we must take certain definite
steps. The first step, which follows the call, cuts the disciple
off from his previous existence. The call to follow at once produces
a new situation. To stay in the old situation makes discipleship
impossible. p. 62
"Only the obedient believe." p. 64
Single-minded Obedience
"The elimination of single-minded obedience on principle
is but another instance of the perversion of the costly grace of the call
of Christ. By this means a false law is set up which deafens men
to the concrete call of Christ.
Discipleship and the Cross
"Just as Christ is Christ only in virtue of his
suffering and rejection, so the disciple is a disciple only in so far as
he shares his Lord's suffering and rejection and crucifixion. Discipleship
means adherence to the person of Jesus, and therefore submission to the
law of Christ which is the law of the cross." p. 87
"The cross is laid upon every Christian. The
first Christ -- suffering which every man must experience is the call to
abandon the attachments of this world. It is the dying of the old
man which is the result of his encounter with Christ." p. 89
"Suffering, then, is the badge of true discipleship.
The disciple is not above his master." p. 91
"For God is a God who bears. The Son
of God bore our flesh, he bore the cross, he bore our sins, thus making
atonement for us. In the same way his followers are also called upon
to bear, and that is precisely what it means to be a Christian." p. 93.
Discipleship and the Individual
"For the Christian the only God-given realities
are those he receives from Christ.." p. 97
"We cannot rightly acknowledge the gifts of God
unless we acknowledge the Mediator for whose sake alone they are given
to us. There can be no genuine thanksgiving for the blessings of
nation, family, history and nature without that heart-felt penitence which
gives the glory to Christ alone above all else." p. 98
"It is not for us to choose which way we shall follow.
That depends on the will of Christ. But this at least is certain:
in one way or the other we shall have to leave the immediacy of the world
and become individuals. whether secretly or openly." p. 100
"But the same Mediator who makes us individuals
is also the founder of a new fellowship. He stands in the center
between my neighbour and myself." p. 100