Bonhoeffer Says

Bonhoeffer on Christian action (you must put these words in the context of Nazi Germany to get their full power):

If we want to be Christians, we must have some share in Christ's large-heartedness by acting with responsibility and in freedom when the hour of danger comes, and by showing a real sympathy that springs, not from fear, but from the liberating and redeeming love of Christ for all who suffer. Mere waiting and looking is not Christian behavior. The Christian is called to sympathy and action, not in the first place by his own sufferings, but by the sufferings of his brethren, for who sake Christ suffered.

Bonhoeffer on Success:

In a world where success is the measure and justification of all things the figure of Him who was sentenced and crucified remains a stranger and is at best the object of pity. The world will allow itself to be subdued only by success. It is not ideas or opinions which decide, but deeds. Success alone justifies wrongs done . . . With a frankness and off-handedness which no other earthly power could permit itself, history appeals in its own cause to the dictum that the end justifies the means. . . . The figure of the Crucified invalidates all thought which takes success for its standard.

Bonhoeffer on Cheap Grace:

Cheap grace means the justification of sin without the justification of the sinner. Grace alone does everything, they say, and so everything can remain as it was before.

Bonhoeffer on Costly Grace:

It is costly because 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 because it cost God the life of his Son . . . and above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us.

Bonhoeffer on Marriage (to his fiance from prison):

May God grant us this faith daily. I don't mean the faith that flees the world, but the faith that endures in the world and loves and remains true to that world in spite of all the hardships it brings us. 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.

Nastiest Election Ever

Joe Carter:

Whenever I hear a pundit or politician say—as they do every two years—that this season has seen the nastiest, most negative electoral campaigning in American history, I wonder: “Who was their history teacher?” Because the midterm elections of 2010 ain’t got nothing on the election of 1800.

The Twins of Science and Magic

C.S. Lewis from The Abolition of Man

You will even find people who write about the sixteenth century as if Magic were a medieval survival and Science the new thing that came in to sweep it away. Those who have studied the period know better. There was very little magic in the Middle Ages: the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries are the high noon of magic. The serious magical endeavour and the serious scientific endeavour are twins: one was sickly and died, the other strong and throve. But they were twins. They were born of the same impulse. I allow that some (certainly not all) of the early scientists were actuated by a pure love of knowledge. But if we consider the temper of that age as a whole we can discern the impulse of which I speak.

There is something which unites magic and applied science while separating both from the wisdom of earlier ages. For the wise men of old the cardinal problem had been how to conform the soul to reality, and the solution had been knowledge, self-discipline, and virtue. For magic and applied science alike the problem is how to subdue reality to the wishes of men: the solution is a technique; and both, in the practice of this technique, are ready to do things hitherto regarded as disgusting and impious—such as digging up and mutilating the dead.

Amazing Church Plant

Gay Bar and church planting. What do they have in common? Watch this video and find out.

Bonhoeffer Says

I've begun reading Eric Metaxas' excellent biography on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer's writing is not new to me, but as I now read of his thoughts and life I find my heart increasingly knit to his. Through routes of my own, I have come to share many of his thoughts. Only his convictions run deeper, and he expresses them far better. Here is one quote that hit me.

Every day I am getting to know people, at any rate their circumstances, and sometimes one is able to see through their stories into themselves--and at the same time one thing continues to impress me: here I meet people as they are, far from the masquerade of "the Christian world"; people with passions, criminal types, small people with small aims, small wages and small sins--all in all they are people who feel homeless in both senses, and who begin to thaw when one speaks to them with kindness--real people; I can only say that I have gained the impression that it is just these people who are much more under grace than under wrath, and that it is the Christian world which is more under wrath than grace.

How To Miss Jesus

Dave Dorr at the Resurgence lists some sure fire ways to miss Jesus when you read your Bible

• You read the Bible to reinforce what you believe, not challenge what you believe.
• You imagine yourself as the type of person who believes the things you read about.
• You think the things you read are especially applicable for people you know, but not for you.
• You imagine yourself as the hero of the story, not the person or people who are unbelieving. You frequently ask in your heart, “How could these people be so unbelieving?” For instance, when you read the story of the Israelites wandering in the desert you might say, “How could those Israelites grumble about food and drink when they just saw God part the Red Sea?” But you are completely blind to how you grumble at work or home when you’re afraid of losing something.
• You love the attention garnered from your knowledge of the Bible, but give little thought to how you have applied what you have read.

Being Missional May Kill Your Church

I found this post from the Resurgence strangely comforting.