01/19/2018
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It is time to have a BONHOEFFER MOMENT!!!
In every generation when EVIL RISES up to destroy ALL that is GOOD in a country, GOD will rise up an ARMY of BELIEVERS to bring SPIRITUAL BATTLE against it.
During the RISE of the NAZI REGIME lead by an EVIL MAN named Adolf Hitler, God put a fire in the heart of a man to organize against the EVIL that was rising to power – SUPPORTED by almost EVERY CHURCH in Germany at that time.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a young priest whom God had put this fire deep in his soul to promote the TRUTH of GOD’S WORD and to STAND AGAINST the EVIL that was rising with the blessing of the CHURCH.
This anti-Nazi theologian and pastor during World War II is best remembered for authoring the Christian classics The Cost of Discipleship and Life Together. Bonhoeffer was born in 1906 in Germany and began his journey in church leadership during the rise of the Nazi regime.
Although Bonhoeffer did not grow up in church, he announced at the young age of 14 that he was joining the church. Once he obtained his doctorate in theology and worked in churches abroad, Bonhoeffer became a priest and lecturer in Berlin at the age of twenty-five.
During the first couple of years of Bonhoeffer’s career, Hitler rose to power. This marked a turning point in Bonhoeffer’s career that despite the rising cost would cause Bonhoeffer to speak out even more against the Fuhrer’s Influence. Finding it frustrating that the “CHURCH” leaders were refusing to oppose Hitler’s anti-Antisemitism caused Bonhoeffer to create the “Confessing Church”, with the help of Martin Niemoller and Karl Barth. Bonhoeffer taught seminary students for several years until even the Confessing Church grew reluctant to contradict Nazi Leadership. At this time Bonhoeffer decided to take asylum in the United States, then felt bad for leaving family and friends behind, returned to Nazi Germany. Bonhoeffer was no longer a pacifist, Dietrich Bonhoeffer became persuaded of the need for violence against the Nazi regime and joined a group called the Abwehr, whose primary mission was to assassinate Hitler.
Eventually, Bonhoeffer was arrested for his involvement in helping the Jews flee the country. He continued teaching through the help of the guards who smuggled out his writings, until he was transferred to a concentration camp. Bonhoeffer was sentenced to death when it was found out about his association with other Abwehr agents. In April 1945, just one month before Germany surrendered, Bonhoeffer was hanged.
All these years later since his death, his life and writings continue to encourage all who want to have a deeper understanding of the Christian’s responsibility in the face of INJUSTICE and as an encouragement to serve NO MATTER HOW GREAT THE COST.
Let these few quotes encourage you as a “Christian” in the USA, to want better for ALL HUMAN LIFE. It is my prayer that your EYES have been OPENED at least a little to how much HISTORY seems to be repeating itself today, in AMERICA like it did in Germany in 1930’s and 1940’s.
I am giving the CHURCH A WARNING – OPEN YOUR EYES before it is TOO LATE and we have to live with AN EVIL RULER instead of letting GOD bring a good leader in to head this country. It is the CHURCH that has allowed this EVIL in by tuning out and NOT paying attention to the details that were WARNING SIGNS of the EVIL that would come if Donald J. Trump were put in the White House alongside the EVIL MEN and WOMEN of the GOP.
I encourage you CHURCH to experience a BONHOEFFER MOMENT and realize we must STAND UP AGAINST this EVIL!!!
In Christ Service,
Inspiring Dietrich Bonhoeffer Quotes
“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... this is for God the ground of unfathomable love.”
“Christianity preaches the infinite worth of that which is seemingly worthless and the infinite worthlessness of that which is seemingly so valued.”
“The first service one owes to others in a community involves listening to them. Just as our love for God begins with listening to God’s Word, the beginning of love for others is learning to listen to them. God’s love for us is shown by the fact that God not only gives God’s Word, but also lends us God’s ear. . . . We do God’s work for our brothers and sisters when we learn to listen to them."
"May we be enabled to say 'No' to sin and 'Yes' to the sinner.”
“Judging others makes us blind, whereas love is illuminating. By judging others we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as we are.”
“Nothing that we despise in other men is inherently absent from ourselves. We must learn to regard people less in the light of what they do or don't do, and more in light of what they suffer.”
“We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God.”
"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 figure of the Crucified invalidates all thought that takes success for its standard.”
“The Church is the Church only when it exists for others . . . not dominating, but helping and serving. It must tell men of every calling what it means to live for Christ, to exist for others.”
“The ultimate test of a moral society is the kind of world that it leaves to its children.”
“Seek God, not happiness - this is the fundamental rule of all meditation. If you seek God alone, you will gain happiness: that is its promise.”
“There is meaning in every journey that is unknown to the traveler.”
“We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts. How can God entrust great things to one who will not thankfully receive from Him the little things?"
“The blessedness of waiting is lost on those who cannot wait, and the fulfillment of promise is never theirs. They want quick answers to the deepest questions of life and miss the value of those times of anxious waiting, seeking with patient uncertainties until the answers come. They lose the moment when the answers are revealed in dazzling clarity.”
“One act of obedience is worth a hundred sermons.”
“The awareness of a spiritual tradition that reaches through the centuries gives one a certain feeling of security in the face of all transitory difficulties.”
"It is grace, nothing but grace that we are allowed to live in community with Christian brethren.”
“The community of the saints is not an 'ideal' community consisting of perfect and sinless men and women, where there is no need of further repentance. No, it is a community which proves that it is worthy of the gospel of forgiveness by constantly and sincerely proclaiming God's forgiveness.”
“Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.”
“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.”
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