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Reading
Romans 6:11
So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.
Devotion
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| Photo by friend of the author |
Today is the feast day of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945). The picture is of a statue of him at Westminster Abbey in London. The statue stands in the Gallery of 20th Century Martyrs. More on this statue and the gallery may be found here: Modern Martyrs | Westminster Abbey. The primary sculptor was Tim Crawley (1955-present), who led a team of about a dozen carvers to create the gallery sculptures.
To see Bonhoeffer as a stone statue, resolute, hard, inflexible, seems somehow appropriate. He was uncompromising on the cost of discipleship--he wrote a book entitled, in English, The Cost of Discipleship. If you don't know the story of Bonhoeffer it is a compelling one, and worthy of at least looking at the Wikipedia page Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Wikipedia. His faith compelled him to stand fast against the Nazi party from its rise to power in 1932 through until his death in a concentration camp in 1945.
I marvel at a faith that compels. Most of my contact with activism these days seems rather shallow in comparison with that of Bonhoeffer...it consists of #hashtag activism or seeks to avoid consequences of non-violent civil disobedience, embodying the 'cheap grace' Bonhoeffer would have no truck with. All of us, dear Reader, are people of some sort of faith. To what sort of life does your faith compel you? What is the cost associated with it? Is it cheap? Or costly?
"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. 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 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" (from The Cost of Discipleship).
Prayer
Embolden our lives, O Lord, and inspire our faiths, that we, following the example of your servant Dietrich Bonhoeffer, might embrace your call with undivided hearts; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen. (Lesser Feasts and Fasts)