Saturday in the Seventh Week of Easter (Eve of Pentecost) (26 May 2012)

Learning to Listen

Just as our love for God begins with listening to God’s Word, the beginning of love for other Christians is learning to listen to them. God’s love for us is shown by the fact that God not only gives us 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. So often Christians, especially preachers, think that their only service is always to have to “offer” something when they are together with other people. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking. Many people seek a sympathetic ear and do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking even when they should be listening. But Christians who can no longer listen to one another will soon no longer be listening to God either; they will always be talking even in the presence of God. The death of the spiritual life starts here, and in the end there is nothing left but empty spiritual chatter and clerical condescension which chokes on pious words. Those who cannot listen long and patiently will always be talking past others, and finally no longer will even notice it. Those who think their time is too precious to spend listening will never really have time for God and others, but only for themselves and for their own words and plans.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 98]

Friday in the Seventh Week of Easter (25 May 2012)

Linked in Service

In a Christian community, everything depends upon whether each individual is an indispensable link in a chain. The chain is unbreakable only when even the smallest link holds tightly with the other. A community which permits within itself members who do nothing will be destroyed by them. Thus it is a good idea that all members receive a definite task to perform for the community, so that they may know in times of doubt that they too are not useless and incapable of doing anything. Every Christian community must know that not only do the weak need the strong, but also that the strong cannot exist without the weak. The elimination of the weak is the death of the community.

The Christian community should not be governed by self-justification, which violates others, but by justification by grace, which serves others. Once individuals have experienced the mercy of God in their lives, from then on they desire only to serve. The proud throne of the judge no longer lures them; instead they want to be down among the wretched and lowly, because God found them down there themselves.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 95-6]

Thursday in the Seventh Week of Easter (24 May 2012)

Being Silence, Speaking

The mark of solitude is silence, just as speech is the mark of community. Silence and speech have the same inner connection and distinction as do being alone  and community. One does not exist without the other. Genuine speech comes out of silence, and genuine silence comes out of speech.

… There is an indifferent or even negative attitude toward silence which sees in it a disparagement of God’s revelation in the Word. Silence is misunderstood as a solemn gesture, as a mystical desire to get beyond the Word. Silence is no longer seen in its essential relationship to the Word, as the simple act of the individual who falls silent under the Word of God. We are silent before hearing the Word because our thoughts are already focused on the Word, as children are quiet when they enter their father’s room. We are silent after hearing the Word because the Word is still speaking and living and dwelling within us. We are silent early in the morning because God should have the first word, and we are silent before going to bed because the last word also belongs to God. We remain silent solely for the sake of the Word, not thereby to dishonour the Word but rather to honour and receive it properly. In the end, silence means nothing other than waiting for God’s Word and coming from God’s Word with a blessing.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 83,84-5]

Wednesday in the Seventh Week of Easter (23 May 2012)

Praying for one another

A Christian community either lives by the intercessory prayers of its members for one another, or the community will be destroyed. I can no longer condemn or hate other Christians for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble they cause me. In intercessory prayer the face that may have been strange and intolerable to me is transformed into the face of one for whom Christ died, the face of a pardoned sinner. That is a blessed discovery for the Christian who is beginning to offer intercessory prayer for others. As far as we are concerned, there is no dislike, no personal tension, no disunity or strife, that cannot be overcome by intercessory prayer. Intercessory prayer is the purifying bath into which the individual and the community must enter every day. We may struggle hard with one another in intercessory prayer, but that struggle has the promise of achieving its goal.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 90]

Tuesday in the Seventh Week of Easter (22 May 2012)

What it means to be baptised

Today you will be baptized a Christian. All those great ancient words of the Christian proclamation will be spoken over you, and the command of Jesus Christ to baptize will be carried out on you, without your knowing anything about it. But we are once again being driven right back to the beginnings of our understanding. Reconciliation and redemption, regeneration and Holy Spirit, love of our enemies, cross and resurrection, life in Christ and Christian discipleship — all these things are so difficult and so remote that we hardly venture any more to speak of them. In the traditional words and acts we suspect that there may be something quite new and revolutionary, though we cannot as yet grasp or express it. That is our own fault. Our church has been fighting during these years only for its self-preservation, as if that were an end in itself. It has become incapable of bringing the word of reconciliation and redemption to humankind and to the world. So the words we used before must lose their power, be silenced, and we can be Christians today in only two ways, through prayer and through doing justice among human beings.

“Thoughts on the Day of Baptism of Dietrich Wilhelm Rüdiger Bethge”,
May 1944, Letters and Papers from Prison (Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works) [DBWE 8, p. 389]

Monday in the Seventh Week of Easter (21 May 2012)

Work and labour until the evening

After the first morning hour, the Christian’s day until evening belongs to work. “People go out to their work and to their labour until the evening” (Ps 104:23)… In most cases a community of Christians living together will separate for the duration of the working hours. Praying and working are two different things. Prayer should not be hindered by work, but neither should work be hindered by prayer. Just as it was God’s will that human beings should work six days and rest and celebrate before the face of God on the seventh, so it is also God’s will that every day should be marked for the Christian both by prayer and work. Prayer also requires its own time. But the longest part of the day belongs to work. The inseparable unity of both will only become clear when work and prayer each receives its undivided due. Without the burden and labour of the day, prayer is not prayer; and without prayer, work is not work. Only the Christian knows that. Thus it is precisely in the clear distinction between them that their oneness becomes apparent.

…The unity of prayer and work, the unity of the day, is found because finding [God] behind the day’s work is what Paul means by his admonition to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess 5:17). The prayer of the Christian reaches, therefore, beyond the time allocated to it and extends into the midst of the work. It surrounds the whole day, and in so doing, it does not hinder the work; it promotes work, affirms work, gives work great significance and joyfulness. Thus every word, every deed, every piece of work of the Christian becomes a prayer… “And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus” (Col 3:17).

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 74,75,76]

The Seventh Sunday of Easter (20 May 2012)

Breaking Bread in the Christian community

We have considered thus far the daily morning worship of Christian communities. God’s Word, the hymns of the church, and the prayers of the community of faith stand at the beginning of the day. Only when the community has been provided and strengthened with the bread of eternal life does it gather together to receive from God earthly bread for this bodily life. Giving thanks and asking God’s blessing, the Christian house church takes its daily bread from the hand of the Lord. Ever since Jesus Christ sat at table with his disciples, the breaking of bread together by Christ’s congregation has been blessed by his presence. …The Scriptures speak of three kinds of community at the table that Jesus keeps with his own: the daily breaking of bread together at meals, the breaking of bread at the Lord’s Supper, and the final breaking of bread together in the Kingdom of God. But in all three, the one thing that counts is that “their eyes were opened and they recognized him.”

…The breaking of bread together has a festive quality. In the midst of the working day given to us again and again, it is a reminder that God rested after God’s work, and that the Sabbath is the meaning and goal of the week with its toil. Our life is not only a great deal of trouble and hard work; it is also refreshment and joy in God’s goodness. We labour, but God nourishes and sustains us. This is a reason to celebrate. …God will not tolerate the unfestive, joyless manner in which we eat our bread with sighs of groaning, with pompous, self-important busyness, or even with shame. Through the daily meal God is calling us to rejoice, to celebrate in the midst of our working day.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 71-2,73]

Saturday after Ascension Day (19 May 2012)

Being Together, Being Alone

Whoever cannot be alone should beware of community. Such people will only do harm to themselves and to the community. Alone you stood before God when God called you. Alone you had to obey God’s voice. Alone you had to take up your cross, struggle, and pray, and alone you will die and give an account to God. You cannot avoid yourself, for it is precisely God who has singled you out. If you do not want to be alone, you are rejecting Christ’s call to you, and you can have no part in the community of those who are called. “The confrontation with death and its demands comes to us all; no one can die for another. All must fight their own battle with death by themselves, alone. I will not be with you then, nor you with me” (Luther).

Whoever cannot stand being in community should beware of being alone. You are called into the community of faith; the call was not meant for you alone. You carry your cross, you struggle, and you pray in the community of faith, the community of those who are called. You are not alone even when you die, and on the day of judgment you will be only one member of the great community of faith in Jesus Christ. If you neglect the community of other Christians, you reject the call of Jesus Christ, and thus your being alone can only become harmful for you. “If I die, then I am not alone in death; if I suffer, they (the community of faith) suffer with me” (Luther).

We recognize, then, that only as we stand within the community can we be alone, and only those who are alone can live in the community. Both belong together. Only in the community do we learn to be properly alone; and only in being alone do we learn to live properly in the community. It is not as if the one preceded the other; rather that both begin at the same time, namely with the call of Jesus Christ.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 82-3]

Friday after Ascension Day (18 May 2012)

Thankfulness in the Christian Life:

Thankfulness works in the Christian community as it usually does in the Christian life. Only those who give thanks for little things receive the great things as well. We prevent God from giving us the great spiritual gifts prepared for us because we do not give thanks for daily gifts. We think that we should not be satisfied with the small measure of spiritual knowledge, experience, and love that has been given to us, and that we must be constantly seeking the great gifts. Then we complain that we lack the deep certainty, the strong faith, and the rich experiences that God has given to other Christians, and we consider these complaints to be pious. We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the small (and yet really not so small!) gifts we receive daily. How can God entrust great things to those who will not gratefully receive the little things from God’s hand? If we do not give thanks daily for the Christian community in which we have been placed, even when there are no great experiences, no noticeable riches, but much weakness, difficulty, and little faith—and if, on the contrary, we only keep complaining to God that everything is so miserable and so insignificant and does not at all live up to our expectations—then we hinder God from letting our community grow according to the measure and riches that are there for us all in Jesus Christ.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer Life Together (1938) [DBWE 5, p. 37]