Dietrich Bonhoeffer Quotes

278 Sourced Quotes

Gratitude changes the pangs of memory into a tranquil joy.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
To endure the cross is not tragedy; it is the suffering which is the fruit of an exclusive allegiance to Jesus Christ.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
It is very easy to overestimate the importance of our own achievements in comparison with what we owe others.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
God's truth judges created things out of love, and Satan's truth judges them out of envy and hatred.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Man has learned to cope with all questions of importance without recourse to God as a working hypothesis.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
We have grown so accustomed to the idea of divine love...that we no longer sense the awe that God's coming should awaken in us.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
We are so afraid of silence that we chase ourselves from one event to the next in order not to have to spend a moment alone with ourselves, in order not to have to look at ourselves in the mirror.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Reformation theology … pretends to prefer to Pharasaic ostentation a modest invisibility, which in practice means conformity to the world. When that happens, the hallmark of the Church becomes justitia civilis instead of extraordinary visibility. The very failure of the light to shine becomes the touchstone of our Christianity.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Those who love their dream of a Christian community more than the Christian community itself become destroyers of that Christian community even though their personal intentions may be ever so honest, earnest, and sacrificial.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Self-justification and judging others go together, as justification by grace and serving others go together.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
We pray for the big things and forget to give thanks for the ordinary, small (and yet really not small) gifts.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Jesus bluntly calls the evil person evil. If I am assailed, I am not to condone or justify aggression. Patient endurance of evil does not mean a recognition of its rights. That is sheer sentimentality, and Jesus will have nothing to do with it. The shameful assault, the deed of violence and the act of exploitation are still evil. … The very fact that the evil which assaults him is unjustifiable makes it imperative that he should not resist it, but play it out and overcome it by patiently enduring the evil person. Suffering willingly endured is stronger than evil, it spells death to evil.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Jesus' commandment never wishes to destroy life, but rather to preserve, strengthen, and heal life.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Beside the staff of life,
taken and fashioned from the heavy earth,
beside our marriage, work, and war
the free man, too, will live and grow towards the sun.
Not the ripe fruit alone —
blossom is lovely, too.
Does blossom only serve the fruit,
or does fruit only serve the blossom —
who knows?
But both are given to us.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
The consciousness of being borne up by a spiritual tradition that goes back for centuries gives one a feeling of confidence and security in the face of all passing strains and stresses.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
A king who dies on the cross must be the king of a rather strange kingdom.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Still more pathetic is the total collapse of moral fanaticism. Fanatics think that their single-minded principles qualify them to do battle with the powers of evil; but like a bull they rush at the red cloak instead of the person who is holding it; he exhausts himself and is beaten. He gets entangled in non-essentials and falls into the trap set by cleverer people.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
The time is short. Eternity is long. It is the time of decision.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
It is not simply to be taken for granted that the Christian has the privilege of living among other Christians. Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies.
…
So the Christian, too, belongs not in the seclusion of a cloistered life but in the thick of foes. There is his commission, his work.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer
If you want my goodness to stay with you then serve your neighbor, for that is where God comes to you.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer