Ninety-nine years ago, on February 4, 1906, German pastor and theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was born into a rapidly changing world. His thirty-nine years of life were shaped by and in response to the cumulative forces of the First World War, the Spanish Flu pandemic, Germany’s economic collapse, increasing political polarization, the ascendency of fascism, and the resulting onset of another global war.
Bonhoeffer was born into an aristocratic family with power and position, status and money, all of which insulated them from much of the suffering others were experiencing. As Germany took its totalitarian turn in the 1930s, Bonhoeffer no doubt could have dodged that bullet by taking a stipend from the state and curtailing his critique of the regime. Instead, informed by youth work in German slums, engagement with the global ecumenical movement, transformative experiences of a resilient Black Church while studying in New York, Bonhoeffer’s theology took an incredibly practical and relational turn.
Much has been made of Bonhoeffer’s life. Indeed, each interpreter of his life is always in danger of recreating this Christian martyr in their own image. One recent film conveniently casts Dietrich as a decisive moral agent (in contradiction to his own searching writings and the ambiguity of his actions). The authors of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership co-opt Bonhoeffer’s words and legacy to justify their vision for Christian nationalism in the United States.
How did we end up here?
Throughout this series of articles, I have repeatedly returned to what I believe this moment demands of us. As I have framed it, fidelity, imagination, and bravery are contemporary ways of understanding St. Paul’s invitation to imitate what Jesus’ laid out in 1 Corinthians 13. For Paul, Jesus’ self-giving “kenosis” path, the one to which you and I are called, can be summarized in this way: “And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.”
We hear these words at weddings. In the revised common lectionary’s cycle of readings, we encounter them on the fourth Sunday after the Epiphany. In each setting, they remind the gathered community what we talk about when we talk about the love of Christ. They are, of course, more than talk. They are grounded in relationships and embodied in the ambiguity of daily life.
For love to be patient and kind (as St. Paul articulates it); for love not to insist on its own way, not to be irritable or resentful; for love to bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, and endure all things; love must be more than a feeling, a concept, or a passing fancy.
The Christ-shaped conception of love, as we continue to explore its contours, is embodied somewhere in the paradoxical space between my flourishing and yours. It is found in the paradoxical contrast between the fulfilment of my needs and the needs of others. Love is lived when we do not treat each other as a means to an end, or as a barrier to our desired end, but rather, when we receive our encounters with others as divine gifts.
Love requires discernment. Love demands that we make decisions about how to live and relate in this world–decisions that cut off one possible future in favour of another. Love, in the Christian sense, is built on the foundation of God’s fidelity and buoyed by a prophetic imagination for a flourishing future for all of Creation. In embodying such love, God makes way for a future that we can’t yet (and might never) see. As stewards of and members of Christ’s church in 2025, this begs a question:
- How are we acting in this moment to make way for a future, including a church that we can’t yet (and might never) see?
It’s a difficult question, the answer to which requires discernment both personal and corporate. This is another way of saying that to love as Jesus loves, requires bravery.
When Bonhoeffer writes “The Cost of Discipleship” in 1937, he makes clear distinctions between grace that is cheap and grace that is costly. Cheap grace demands that God “forgive us our sins,” without any reciprocal demands that we forgive those who sin against us. Costly grace, on the other hand yokes us–aligns us, calls us, marries us–to the costly way of Christ. How are we to understand the way of Christ? Bonhoeffer puts it starkly: “When Christ calls a [sic] man, he bids him come and die.”
Fidelity to Christ and his call requires discernment, imagination, and bravery. Thankfully, this is not something we are left to do alone. This is the realm of Christ’s body, the church–that together we might act in loving response to the God who first loved us.
What’s troubling in this context, then, is the ratio of time spent discussing dwindling numbers and costly buildings to time cultivating practices of discipleship. This isn’t a plea to ignore buildings or numbers. Instead, I’m wondering what might happen if we put discipleship and worship at the top of our priority list, and restricted the doomsday talk to (I dunno) a couple of hours, every fourth Tuesday.
I haven’t been on this earth very long. It’ll be 45 years this month. But all of this reflection on Bonhoeffer and his challenge makes me wonder: in what ways have the structures and practices of the church over its last eighty-odd years challenged and equipped us to live on this brave path of discipleship? In what ways have these same structures and practices stood in the way?
And so I wonder, this month, if you’d consider responding to this small invitation to reflect, and possibly even share some of these reflections with another person, perhaps even me.
As you reflect on your life in the church (however long that’s been), how have you been equipped to:
- Live faithfully in relationship to God and your neighbours?
- Imagine, with God, a world where all have enough and know that they are enough?
- Step bravely into God’s future, as part of a community that embodies and bears witness to God’s love?
I’d love for you to take time with these questions. To remember the stories of the people and the moments that have challenged and inspired you in this journey with Jesus. To walk faithfully, imaginatively, and bravely, in seeking to embody the divine life on earth as it is in heaven. Give thanks for these saints; offer prayers of thanksgiving; and if they’re still alive, write them, call them, share your gratitude.
One of the things I love the most about my job is the chance to visit communities, and hear the stories of how God is present and at work in their lives. So consider this an invitation to reflect, and then to share. How has your church community been brave in calling its members to live faithfully in the way of Jesus? How is your community growing into such bravery? And what, in this moment, do you think God might be calling you and your community to do?
