Beeson podcast, Episode 409
Dr. Michael Pasquarello III
September 11, 2018

Announcer:          Welcome to the Beeson Podcast coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University in Birmingham, Alabama. Now your host Timothy George.

Timothy George:     Welcome to today's Beeson Podcast. Well, today we have the privilege of hearing a new colleague at Beeson, Dr. Michael Pasquarello has come to Beeson Divinity School. He's been teaching at Fuller Theological Seminary, before then at Asbury Theological Seminary. Distinguished scholar in the field of preaching, and he comes to us as our new Methodist Chair of Divinity and the Director of the Robert Smith Jr. Institute for Preaching. We're so excited to welcome him to our school, to our community. Dr. Robert Smith Jr. is here with me in the studio. What do you think about this new appointment?

Robert Smith Jr:    I am very, very happy that Dr. Michael Pasquarello has come. He's come in flesh, and I'm grateful that he epitomizes and personifies what we're about at Beeson, training pastors who can preach. Here is a person who was is pastor and he can preach.

Timothy George:     Yeah.

Robert Smith Jr:    And he has come out of a background of the pastorate and teaching. He's a wonderful theoretician, but he's also a practitioner. So he marries both together. And when he steps in that classroom to teach, he has instant credibility because in your words, he has been there and done that. The history of preaching is huge for him. He understands the breadth of it, and is able to take, if you will, the word that was in the history of preaching and translate it into the word that is, to turn ink in the blood so that people can understand exactly what he's talking about in helping us to stay close to the history of preaching and yet to understand that the history of preaching is about his story, that is the story of Christ. 

Timothy George:     And you know, he does something that you do so well, and that is, he thinks of preaching as a theological discipline, and weaves these together. Preaching without theology is just mere rhetoric in the bad sense of that word, but he infuses it with a theological vision and purpose and you do the same thing. So he's a perfect person I think to lead out in the Robert Smith Institute for preaching because he'll bring that emphasis to us. 

Timothy George:     Now, Dr. Smith, a lecture we're going to hear actually was given here at Beeson as a part of our William E. Conger Jr. Lectures on biblical preaching. It's on Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Bonhoeffer has been the subject of Mike Pasquarello's recent scholarship, he's written on many other things, but he loves Bonhoeffer and he's going to speak to us in this lecture on becoming a pastor who can preach, scenes from the life and ministry of Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Let's go to Hodges Chapel and here are our new colleague, Dr. Michael Pasquarello.

M. Pasquarello:     Yesterday's lecture looked at Dietrich Bonhoeffer as a learner in pastoral ministry in preaching. Having completed his theological education at the University of Berlin, he found himself on a path of conversion and formation that we continue for the remainder of his life. This morning's lecture moves forward to look at Bonhoeffer as a teacher and mentor responsible for preparing pastors who can preach to the end that the church is conformed to Jesus Christ. To the end that the church is conformed to Jesus Christ. I think a growing conviction for Bonhoeffer was that the visibility of the church is a necessary condition for the proclamation of the gospel with integrity in the whole of life. 

M. Pasquarello:     Now, if we had gone to Germany in 1933, we would see a Lutheran Church on every corner. There was no shortage of physical spaces. But the visibility of the church as Christ himself taking human form in the world was in rather short supply. And so, it was to that end that Bonhoeffer ordered their life together Finkenwalde. The chaotic time of the early 1930s was arguably the busiest in Dietrich Bonhoeffer's life in ministry. This period in German history is remembered for Adolf Hitler's stunning rise to power, a political triumph that prompted and extended struggle to determine how the church in Germany would be structured, relate to and be affected by the national socialist vision of the Nazis.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer is typically remember for his role in the church struggle for his leadership of the opposition, then in 1934 constituted itself as the Confessing Church at the Synod of Barmen. Bonhoeffer was in London at this time and indirectly involved with Karl Barth, as you know, taking the lead. 

M. Pasquarello:     However, not as familiar as Bonhoeffer his role in the struggle for truthful proclamation of the gospel against a Nazi message of good news that was aggressively proclaimed to promote Hitler's Third Reich, the superiority of the Aryan race and the restoration of the German nation to its past glory. Bonhoeffer saw this nationalist socialist message of good news as seeking nothing less than a total icing claim on the hearts, minds and allegiance of the German people and the German church. He believed this idolatrous power would only be countered by faithful confession and proclamation of the gospel made visible in the obedience and if necessary, public resistance of the church. 

M. Pasquarello:     Now here I think it's really important that in learning from Bonhoeffer that we recognize that the primary challenge that faces the church always is idolatry. False gods and false gospels. In America, we tend to think the primary challenge maybe the numerical decline of the church or the decline of its social influence in our culture. The primary challenge we always face is living fully into the first commandment. I am the Lord your God, and you will have no other gods before me. Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. 

M. Pasquarello:     In the summer of 1935, Bonhoeffer was compelled to become director of one of five illegal seminaries established by the Confessing Church. The preacher seminaries as they were called had as their primary purpose the training and formation of pastors for parish ministry. They were independent of state control and support funded only by freewill offerings and donations. This meant the decision to become a member of the seminary community directed by Bonhoeffer which was located in the remote region of Finkenwalde on the Baltic coast was not easily made. In addition to having illegal status according to the laws of the Nazi state Reich Church, Bonhoeffer's pastoral candidates lived under constant threat of interrogation and imprisonment, as well as physical and psychological punishment, and even torture.

M. Pasquarello:     Students entered Finkenwalde without any guarantee of pastoral position or support, fully aware they could be removed or prevented from serving in the leadership of the church. Every aspect of the community's daily life and work together was tempered by Bonhoeffer's conviction that Christianity and Nazism were absolutely incompatible. Such a combination would be theologically impossible for a church constituted by confessing the gospel in conformity to the way of Jesus Christ.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer was concerned that a disembodied legalism of orthodoxy, a form of theological abstraction had replaced the decision of faith and confession made visible and courageous public witness. The Preacher Seminary at Finkenwalde was thus established to address the urgent need for congregations whose life was constituted by confessing the truth of Christ in the whole of life. Approximately 30 young theologians had initially come together for this purpose whom Bonhoeffer described as in his words, betting their entire future solely on the cause of Christ. We depend on only one thing, in the word and the help of God and our strongest weapon remains our daily prayer. 

M. Pasquarello:     He viewed the situation in Germany in light of Luther struggle for the reform of the late medieval church, he states, "Our disruption from the Reich church should be spurious and godless indeed if ours were not the same strong faith which Martin Luther's once was." Bonhoeffer can fight it to a friend that although the rise of Hitler in national socialism had shattered Christendom in Germany, that's something we're thinking about, it shattered Christendom in Germany, the situation should be seen as a reason for gratitude. He looked to the future, viewing the church struggle as a transitional phase that would lead to a very different kind of opposition. A struggle that would mean in his words resisting to the point of shedding blood by people who would be capable of simply suffering through in faith. And perhaps he says, "God will acknowledge the church with his word, but until thing a great deal must be believed, prayed and suffer."

M. Pasquarello:     It's a very unAmerican way of thinking, isn't it? We who are so, we're activists, we want to fix it. We want to change it. We want to do something about it right now. Bonhoeffer says we need to believe, pray and suffer and then perhaps God will be pleased to give us his word and guide us further along. 

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer perceived Christianity in Europe had been thoroughly westernized. So permeated by civilized behavior and values that it was all bit lost. In addition, he doubted the strength and resolve of the Confessing Church to withstand the relentless pressure to accommodate itself to Hitler's nationalist racist program. He wrote, "Many people still seem incapable of realizing or believing that we are really here purely as Christians. Only the complete truth and complete truthfulness can help us now."

M. Pasquarello:     During the 1933 semester in Berlin, Bonhoeffer had lectured on the subject of Christology. The lectures articulated a robust theological vision that would guide his work in Finkenwalde. He began the lectures by announcing the doxological nature of Christian doctrine. Orthodoxy is not only right confession, it is prayer and praise evoked by wonder and beholding the glory of Christ. And he said, "The silence of the church is silence before the word. In proclaiming Christ, the church falls on its knees and silence before the inexpressible. To speak of Christ is to be silent, and to be silent about Christ is to speak. That is obedient affirmation of God's revelation, which takes place through the word. The church is speech through silence is the right way to proclaim Christ."

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer clarified the meaning of silence. To pray is to keep silence and at the same time is to cry out before God in both cases. It is the light of God's word. Because proclaiming Christ as an act of worship, Christology, speaking of Christ is from and to a person who has transcended. He says, "The fact that the logos became flesh, a human being is the prerequisite not the proof. Because Christology is the center of the church's knowledge, proclamation begins by asking who rather than how. The question of being who are you, Jesus Christ calls human beings into question and reveals who they truly are in the encounter with Christ. Neither an ideal nor super human, Christ is the god human person, humiliated by his suffering and death on the cross. Exalted by His resurrection from the dead."

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer's Christological convictions inform the training of preachers within a daily rhythm of silence and speech. I can't emphasize enough how his work as a theologian informs the substance and the shape of preaching. To be a preacher is to be a theologian. You cannot get around that. I've talked to pastors who say, well, I'm not a theologian, I'm just a preacher. That is not true. When you open your mouth to preach, someone's theology is informing who you are, what you say and how you say it. The question is, whether it's truthful or not, and whether it's faithful or not to the gospel. 

M. Pasquarello:     That was Bonhoeffer's concern at Finkenwalde. Student sermons were heard with respect and appropriate reverence for the Word of God without being picked apart by peers. Sermon study was practiced in groups or circles that prepared full sermons or sermon drafts that were read aloud and discussed attentive to content and arrangement in light of fidelity to Scripture. Those who listened would then attempt a sermon draft of their own, with Bonhoeffer concluding the exercise by presenting a prepared sermon draft. In addition, students were given ample opportunities for preaching through frequent visits with Confessing Church congregations and in times of worship within the Finkenwalde community.

M. Pasquarello:     Robert, he says that we need to preach in class to show students that we can do it too, and invite them to join us in learning together, which is a never ending process. In his teaching, Bonhoeffer turned to Martin Luther as an exemplar of preaching from the whole of Scripture which has the person of Christ as its core. Following Luther, Bonhoeffer situated preaching within the union of Christology and ecclesiology, offering a remarkable vision of the sacramental nature of preaching. That the sermon derives from the incarnation of Jesus Christ and is determined by the incarnation of Jesus Christ.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer's stunning homiletical vision affirm Christ present in the content, form and efficacy of the sermon. He states, "Christ who walks through the church community. The word of the sermon is the incarnate Lord who seeks to take up people to bear sinful human nature." Remembering the past provided a critical perspective for making theological and pastoral judgments to address the challenges that were confronting the Confessing Church. Luther's influence is reflected in the practical and pastoral direction of Bonhoeffer's instruction. Biblical exegesis and exposition united the hermeneutical and homiletical tasks of ministry. Biblical exit exegesis and exposition united the hermeneutics and homiletical tasks of ministry. Through both prayerful and rigorous study, seminarians were formed to read scripture as a spoken summons to hear, believe and obey the call of Christ Himself.

M. Pasquarello:     Like Luther, Bonhoeffer began with a presupposition that scripture is the living word of God, an active voice whose enlivening power is let loose in preaching. This requires, moreover, a disposition on the preacher's part of reverent receptivity toward God who freely speaks the word in Christ. Exegesis then is both a holy calling and a concrete act of obedience to the word echoed in the sermon and embodied by the church through faith that comes by hearing. Exegesis is both a holy calling and concrete act of obedience to the word echoed in the sermon and embodied by the church through faith that comes by hearing.

M. Pasquarello:     As demonstrated by the cross, God speaks a word that takes on a body to create a community borne by Christ Himself. The word has become incarnate. It desires to have a body and thus moves inherently toward the church by its own initiative and power. I think this is amazing. When we stand up and begin to preach, the word is already at work. preachers are called to follow the free and gracious movement of the word through the scripture witness into the life of the church. Bonhoeffer offers this remarkable affirmation. In the proclaimed word, Christ steps into the congregation, which is waiting for and calling upon Christ, worshiping and celebrating Christ. In the proclaimed word, Christ gathers and takes up the congregation.

M. Pasquarello:     The center of Bonhoeffer's homiletical wisdom is the mystery of Christ present in the paradoxical nature of preaching. Is an act an event dependent upon God whose pleasure is to speak the word in the spoken words of preaching. He states this conviction eloquently. His presence is present in the word of the church. His presence is by nature his existence as preaching. If this were not so, the sermon would not have the exclusive status that the reformation gives it. The sermon is the poverty and riches of our church. The sermon is the form of the present Christ to whom we are committed, whom we are to follow. If Christ is not wholly present in the sermon, the church breaks down. Luther says, this is the human being to whom you should point and say, this is God. We say, this is the human word to which you should point and say, this is God.

M. Pasquarello:     Now, this conviction is grounded in the Chalcedonian formula that Jesus Christ, the incarnate Son of God is one person and who is fully divine and fully human. Finkenwalde then was a residential community in which the Ministry of preaching was strengthened by cultivating habits of Christian faith life and ministry. Bonhoeffer writes, "The goal is not monastic isolation, but rather the most intensive concentration for ministry in the world." He envisioned a community of freely committed pastors, ordered for the sake of decision and discernment of the spirit and the present and future struggles of the church. A group prepared for immediate service and proclamation wherever new emergency situations might arise. 

M. Pasquarello:     For Bonhoeffer, this vocation would immerse them in a sacrificial way of life and a particular kind of formation. He says they must be prepared to make themselves available wherever their services are needed, under any circumstances and without consideration of financial or the privileges otherwise associated with the Ministry. 

M. Pasquarello:     The Preacher's Seminary was a community formed by and for the ministry of the word. Learning was participatory and self involving. A curriculum comprising exegetical, doctrinal, historical, ethical, catechetical, pastoral, liturgical, and cultural subjects studied in close proximity with preaching as an integrative focus. Now, what I mean by that is not that the subjects are taught so that you might find something in them that you can talk about in a sermon. Rather, the subjects are taught in a way that serve to form the preacher and form preaching in a way that will be faithful to the gospel in its fullness. 

M. Pasquarello:     The community was itself the living context for understanding Christian faith in light of doctrinal confession, training and discipleship and preparation for credible Christian witness. Bonhoeffer identified the central focus of the community in this way. The Bible stands at the center of our work. It has once again become the point of departure and at the center of our theological work and of all our Christian activity. He summarized the significance of the Bible for candidates preparing to assume the pastoral office and the commission of preaching. The goal of a Protestant pastor is to come of age in dealing with the Holy Scripture. The goal of a Protestant pastor is to come of age in dealing with the Holy Scripture.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer placed the highest degree of importance on listening to Scripture as constituents of a community of preachers. He described this practice in a letter to a friend who had raised questions about how preachers must accommodate their sermons to address the questions, concerns and interest of listeners, which was the primary aim of modern preaching. Bonhoeffer acknowledged that while preaching cannot provide answers to every question or solutions to every problem, it does engage people in the more important activity of listening to God who speaks in Scripture. He writes, I believe that the Bible alone is the answer to all our questions and that we merely need ask perpetually and with a bit of humility in order to get the answer from it. 

M. Pasquarello:     One cannot simply read the Bible like any other books. One must be prepared genuinely to query it. Only thus does it reveal itself. Only if we're really expecting an ultimate answer from it will it give us that answer. The reason is that God is speaking to us in the Bible and one cannot simply reflect on God on one's own, one must ask God. Only if we seek God will God answer. 

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer was convinced the biblical interpretation that follows the rules of textual critical methodology only can I get to the real substance of Scripture. Reading scripture for the church is done best according to the way followed by Mary. Ponder it in your heart. This means approaching the Bible by presupposing the one speaking is, Bonhoeffer says, the God who loves us and has no intention of abandoning us with our questions. To presuppose God speaking in the Bible means listening for a word which exceeds what is already known. Searching for God is not an end in itself, a self serving activity, but is the desire to find God wherever God says he is to be found. And although God does give himself to be found in Christ, God is not determined by our prior experience, opinions, or convenience. Moreover, the place where God gives himself most fully is the cross, where God is encountered in God's Son.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer's way of reading offered a hermeneutics of Scripture which turns the reader away from his or herself in order to inquire of the Bible. What is God saying to us here? To this, he adds, God does not speak in universal eternal truths. But instead reveals His will concretely in ways that according to Bonhoeffer are alien and repugnant to us. God has concealed beneath the sign of the cross where human thoughts and desires come to an end.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer did not see this as a sacrifice of the intellect, a failure to seek understanding or a failure to do the work of serious exegesis. He acknowledged, however, the experience of reading as an act of faith had become increasingly miraculous to him. Reading the Bible was indispensable to living and believing, and much to his surprise, had been practiced by Christians for centuries in living a genuine life of faith. He had also come to see the superficiality of modern people who assume they're different or better than their predecessors. He writes, "Christian people continue to be dependent upon God speaking in Scripture." He continues, "Perhaps this is a rather primitive consideration, but you cannot imagine what a joyous thing it is when one finds one's way back to these primitive things after losing one's way along the false paths of so many theologies. And I do believe that in matters of faith, we are always consistently primitive."

M. Pasquarello:     Here's the paradox, and here this, that we come of age in the use of Scripture by means of acknowledging our dependence upon God always. Homiletical instruction at Finkenwalde occurred within a community of preachers in which Bonhoeffer served as a teacher, exemplar and mentor. This way of teaching and learning was necessary for cultivating faithfulness and integrity in preaching. Bonhoeffer had seen how many young pastors suffered from isolation, of their need for help and fellowship with others in grasping the purpose and way of preaching. He had observed the desire among young theological students for a more ordered and accountable life and community since, he writes, "Proclamation that derives from a community that is lived and experienced in a more practical fashion will in its own term be more objective and less likely to run aground."

M. Pasquarello:     In other words, if preaching emerges from my own individual subjectivity, I probably am in trouble. In a letter to Karl Barth, Bonhoeffer shared his concern that the important questions of young theologians and seminarians were not being addressed. When they were, answers tended to be either abstract or dismissive. He was convinced the answers they sought would be attained by living, praying, learning and reflecting together on the commandment and promise of the gospel. This way of vocational formation would find legitimacy only if its practice was accompanied and guided by serious theological, exegetical and dogmatic work.

M. Pasquarello:     The whole of Bonhoeffer's Finkenwalde experiment in life together, lectures, sermon discussions, preaching exercises, biblical meditations, corporate prayer, singing, Bible reading, mutual confession and celebration of Holy Communion provided extended practice in attending to God's concrete address in the person of Christ for building up the church's prophetic witness. 

M. Pasquarello:     For Bonhoeffer, the call of discipleship informed everything related to the life and work of preachers. What I refer to as the preaching life. In 1937, soon after the Gestapo shuttered the seminary at Finkenwalde, Bonhoeffer published a book on the way of simple obedience to Christ based on the Sermon on the Mount. Discipleship or the Cost of Discipleship as it is widely known is Bonhoeffer's most popular book and rightly described as a devotional classic. It's the first Bonhoeffer book I read when I was an undergraduate. What is often forgotten, however, is the circumstances of its publication. The content of Discipleship is largely derived from Bonhoeffer's lectures to preachers preparing for pastoral ministry in a church which was fighting for survival. Struggling to proclaim and obey the claim of Christ under the dark shadow cast by Hitler's national socialism and its totalizing claims.

M. Pasquarello:     In our time, I doubt that very many readers of Discipleship take it up in order to be able to resist the temptation of idolatry. And yet that's the reason it was written. Discipleship is a handbook of homiletical wisdom, a manual for preachers that weaves together hearing, proclaiming and obeying the call of Christ. Based on Bonhoeffer's reading of the Gospel of Matthew, particularly the Sermon on the Mount, discipleship provides preachers with a truthful and subversive counter narrative to the gospel promoted by national socialism. There's a profound theology of preaching embedded in Bonhoeffer's exposition of Christ calling command that begins with a remembrance of scripture's significance in times of church renewal.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer perceived that behind the church struggle in Germany was a deeper concern for Jesus. A desire to hear him speaking to the church in the present. He writes, "When we go to hear a sermon, his own word is what we want to hear. However, Jesus is not heard. And if he were actually prison among churches in their preaching, a quite different group of people would be present and a quite different set of people would go away." Preaching the gospel in Germany had been overwhelmed by many dissonant sounds, conflicting views, false hopes, and deceptive promises which had obscured the Word of God. 

M. Pasquarello:     Discipleship addresses challenges to preaching the gospel in Germany. Some preaching was too harsh and too difficult, weighted down with incomprehensible concepts and formulations. Bonhoeffer considered such criticism of preaching as valid. He believed many people sincerely desired to hear the word of Jesus but found listening too difficult, in that much preaching consisted of human opinions, institutional defensiveness and was too doctrinaire. In addition, there was the problem of formulaic preaching, excessive repetition, preaching which was overly contextualized or too German. On the other hand, there was preaching which did not speak to life because it was too abstract. He viewed the problem as being much deeper than homiletical method or style, but that Christ Himself was either crowded out of sermons by preachers' opinions and convictions or displaced by the weight of moralistic rules and principles.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer's Christological interpretation of discipleship conveys a depth of homiletical wisdom. The call of Christ must not be muted by preaching which effectively drives people away, but must be proclaimed as a compelling story and attractive way of life that leads to the end following Jesus. Becoming a preacher entails having once whole being and life oriented as Bonhoeffer says, to the word and call of Jesus Christ Himself. 

M. Pasquarello:     Discipleship then calls preachers back to the source of their calling. He writes, "Away from the poverty and narrowness of our own conviction in questions, here is where we seek the breadth and riches which are bestowed on us in Jesus. To proclaim the call to follow Jesus is not a heavy burden, a set of rules, the inducement of guilt." He says, "A spiritual reign of terror or the exercise of tyranny and abuse of people. Proclaiming the call of Jesus is the announcement of freedom, release and strength for joyful obedience to Him." An essential part of preaching then requires reflecting on what the call to follow Jesus means concretely for Christians who live and work in the world.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer acknowledges that while all people are called by grace, the call to follow Jesus is a path known only by him. He writes, "A path full of mercy beyond measure, a path which is joy. In fact, to proclaim Christ is the joy of preaching. To proclaim Christ is the joy of preaching." Although following Christ is not an easy way, it is the narrow path which leads to Christ's great love of all people, particularly the week and godless. So the paradox of preaching is the Christ narrow way opens up to the wideness of God's patience, mercy and loving kindness. Bonhoeffer says, "May God grant us joy in all seriousness and discipleship, affirmation of sinners and all rejection of sin, and the overflowing and living word of the gospel and all defense against our enemies."

M. Pasquarello:     He discerned that distinguishing between cheap grace and costly grace was the fundamental challenge of preaching. He was concerned that preaching must be truthful, and the costly grace must be proclaimed and obeyed. Moreover, the life and speech of preachers must too be formed by hearing and believing costly grace. As he defines this, cheap grace means grace as a doctrine, principle or system. Cheap Grace means forgiveness of sins as a general truth. It means God's love is merely a Christian idea of God. Cheap grace is an abstraction creating a church which forfeits concrete visible witness in the world. 

M. Pasquarello:     On the other hand, he writes, "Costly grace is the call of Jesus Christ, which causes a disciple to leave his nets and follow Him. It is costly because it calls to discipleship, but it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. Thus it is grace as a living word. The word of God which speaks as God pleases." The powerful lore of cheap grace as a commodity with all its enticing rewards evokes Bonhoeffer's sharp criticism. He writes, "Cheap grace is bargain basement goods, cut rate forgiveness. Grace is the church's inexhaustible pantry, from which it is handed out by careless hands without hesitation or limit. It is Grace without a price, without costs. It is said that the essence of grace is that the bill is paid in advance for all time. Everything can be had for free courtesy of that paid bill. The price paid is infinitely great. What would grace be if it were not cheap grace?"

M. Pasquarello:     Now, I hope you can hear that the implications of this charge for preaching are staggering. Bonhoeffer writes, "Cheap Grace is a denial of God's Living Word, a denial of the incarnation of the Word of God Himself." Here, continuity within Finkenwalde, homiletical lectures is quite evident. The incarnate word, Christ Himself walking among the church in the sermon. The living word heard in the words of the preacher. Christ present with and for the church is the fullness of costly grace obeyed and visibly embodied in the world. 

M. Pasquarello:     Discipleship does not seek to communicate timeless truth. The way of discipleship, following after Jesus is both the content and shape of preaching. Its message and response which is discerned daily in answering the call of Christ. The end and purpose of preaching is the grace of discipleship. And while costly grace is its concrete outcome invisible result, it is not its presupposition. And here, Bonhoeffer points back to Luther, who by acknowledging the reality of grace made the radical break from a self-willed life which cannot be justified by grace. He writes, "The acknowledgement of grace was his first serious call to discipleship." 

M. Pasquarello:     For Bonhoeffer, grace is not a principle given in advanced to validate one's life as it is. And here he offers a mock confession that illustrates cheap grace. He writes, "I can now sin on the basis of grace. The world is in principle justified by grace. I can this remain as before in my bourgeois secular existence, everything remains and I can be sure that God's grace will take care of me." It gives us good reason to think a little bit about what we mean when we sing Amazing Grace, doesn't it? 

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer viewed the calling a preachers to proclaim the word of Christ as truly amazing and seemingly inconceivable. To speak of grace and to speak from grace is to speak on behalf of people tempted by despair for whom preaching has become in his words dishearteningly empty. I think that's a good description of a lot of people in our time. He describes the nature of this task for integrity's sake, someone has to speak up for those among us who confess that cheap grace has made them give up on following Christ, and that seeking to follow Christ has made them give up on costly grace. A pure doctrine of grace will not be sufficient since discipleship requires a community that welcomes the presence of Christ by hearing and following him by as what Bonhoeffer says, living in the world without losing themselves in it.

M. Pasquarello:     Central to the work of ministry then and particularly preaching is the gift and summons of costly grace. Bonhoeffer again, "Blessed are those who by simply following Jesus Christ are overcome by this grace so with a humble spirit they may praise the grace of Christ which alone is effective." Bonhoeffer lamented the Christianization of the world which had contributed in his opinion to a secularization of Christianity. This would take an entirely different lecture to go into it. But think about it with me. Being Christian in Germany had become a matter of living in the world and being like the world but with no difference. And presumably for the sake of grace. The church was seen as existing in a separate spiritual sphere where Christian citizens may go to receive the forgiveness of sins. 

M. Pasquarello:     "The effective preaching cheap grace," Bonhoeffer writes, "is that you are forgiven, but without the summons, come, follow me." What it had done was to liberate Christians from costly obedience to Jesus. He therefore viewed cheap grace as the bitterest enemy of discipleship in Germany, since it encouraged Christians to hate and despise discipleship in the name of grace. 

M. Pasquarello:     It's ironic, isn't it? I encounter people in California all the time who are truly bitter towards the church and very angry. If you ask them why, it's not that they say the church was too demanding. They talk about how the church peddled cheap grace and that it basically had nothing to offer for their life. When treated as a principle, a law, a concept or doctrine, grace can take on a life of its own. It becomes like a god. How Grace is proclaimed, not merely that it is proclaimed, not merely that the word is used makes the difference according to Bonhoeffer. He writes, "It is appalling to see what is at stake in the way which the gospel truth is expressed and used." 

M. Pasquarello:     He was convinced the reformation doctrine of justification by grace could still be spoken with integrity to invite listeners to hear and obey the summons of Christ. The problem was that grace was too often spoken in a manner destructive of the way of Christ. The price of cheap Grace was indeed costly in Germany. The collapse of organized churches was a visible consequence of grace acquired without cost. He writes, "Christianity without the living Jesus Christ remains necessarily a Christianity without discipleship and Christianity without discipleship is always a Christianity without Jesus Christ." A familiar line I know, I think a very important one. A Christianity without discipleship is always a Christianity without Jesus Christ.

M. Pasquarello:     Near the end of Discipleship is a chapter with the title The Messengers. If you haven't read it, I encourage you to look at it. It's often overlooked in Discipleship. It offers an insightful picture of the character required to preach the costly grace of the gospel, that is, Christ Himself. Bonhoeffer knew well the temptation to exceed the limits of Christ's call by the use of preaching strategies that do harm to the credibility of the message and its messengers. Preachers may not force words of forgiveness on people, nor are they free to run after them, seeking to proselytize, using whatever means and powers and methods that are necessary to accomplish something in them. He warned such means and measures are in vain. They defile the words of forgiveness and turn listeners into sinners opposed to God's holy gifts. 

M. Pasquarello:     He writes, "This signifies for the disciples a serious limitation on their work." Because the Ministry of preaching is created and held by Jesus, preachers possess no special right or power of their own. No authority to exceed the limits of human effectiveness, enthusiasm and zeal. If preachers refuse to respect the resistance of listeners, they've confused the word of the gospel with what Bonhoeffer calls a conquering idea or a triumphalistic message, adopting forms of preaching that are in his words, the work of fanatics. 

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer's comments on the limits of preaching introduce a remarkable discussion of the strength and weakness of the word. I must say, this section is one of the most insightful that I've read in anything that Bonhoeffer wrote. He states, "The Word of God is so weak that it suffers to be despised and rejected by people. For the word, there are such things as hardened hearts and locked doors. The word accepts the resistance it encounters and bears it." In a rather astonishing remark, Bonhoeffer admits that it is, in his words, a cruel insight. Nothing is impossible for the idea, but for the gospel, there are impossibilities. The word is weaker than a big idea, a theme, a topic or a concept. Such abstract preaching seeks to avoid the resistance, rejection and suffering that accompany concrete speech and obedience to Christ. Preachers are themselves always disciples, witnesses of the word which is Christ Himself.

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer believed that the life and speech of preachers in the Confessing Church was perceived as weak by many people in Germany, especially when compared with Nazi propagandists who promoted grand ideas and programs for the German people. Bonhoeffer even viewed suffering as a necessary part of preaching, that proclaiming costly grace liberates preachers from self confident enthusiasm for their own powers and capacities. This freedom, though, is only found in Christ. It's not a lack of courage, but rather is the courage to suffer the weakness of the word. He writes, they, preachers, should not want to be strong when the word is weak. The word cannot be forced onto the world since the strength of the word is its loneliness. The strength of mercy that move sinners to repentance from the depths of their hearts" Bonhoeffer adds, "But when the word is misused, it will turn against them."

M. Pasquarello:     Genuine concern for others leads preachers to pray. The promise given to their prayers by Jesus is the greatest power they possess. 

M. Pasquarello:     Bonhoeffer concludes his discussion of the word by joining the work of pastors and the work of preaching, always together. His comments have the sound of wisdom that could have been derived from his early years as a student, a pastoral ministry in preaching. What I shared with you yesterday from his time in Barcelona. He writes, "The flock of God's people needs shepherds. What does it matter that the most orthodox preachers and interpreters of the Word of God were present if they were not filled with all of the mercy and all of the grief over the abused and ill treated people of God." And he continues this line of criticism. "What use are scholars of Scripture, pious followers of the word and preachers of the law if the shepherds of the church themselves are missing."

M. Pasquarello:     He writes that the apostles were not only given doctrine and teaching, they were given effective power greater than the power of the rulers of this world. In their work, they stand with Jesus, united by his call and commission. And their effectiveness does not lie in themselves, in our knowledge, our skill, our passion or our creative ingenuity. The effectiveness of preachers is grounded in the clear commandment of Jesus who wills and determines our life and our work and our message. 

M. Pasquarello:     He concludes with this word of encouragement. "Blessed are they who have such authority given them for their office and are freed from their own discretion in calculations." Well, this morning, I've tried to show something of the wisdom exercised by Dietrich Bonhoeffer in his commitment to preparing pastors who can preach. From his teaching, it is clear that the call to pastoral ministry and preaching are both of God and cannot be conducted with integrity without the costly grace of God that is received by faith in Jesus Christ, the incarnate crucified and risen Lord. The education and formation of preachers is accomplished within a community of the word that is centered on the reality of Christ, the sourcing goal of its learning and its life. 

M. Pasquarello:     In addition, the community is itself the living context for learning Christian life in light of doctrinal confession, training and discipleship and preparation for credible Christian witness, the integration of teaching, formation and practice. Bonhoeffer identified the central focus of the community as follows. The Bible stands at the center of our work. It has once again become the point of departure and at the center of our theological work and of all our Christian activity. I want to conclude this morning by encouraging you to consider seriously the kind of lifelong education and formation that is required to be a pastor who can preach. 

M. Pasquarello:     I cannot think of a better place to begin than with Bonhoeffer's guiding conviction for his work at Finkenwalde. The goal of a Protestant pastor is to come of age in dealing with the Holy Scripture. Coming of age, being mature, whole, blameless, undivided, complete, mature, is the work of the Holy Spirit and requires a lifetime of prayer, study, practice and suffering for the sake of the gospel. This is the high calling and the great joy of preaching.

M. Pasquarello:     The last thing I want to say is a quote from Eberhard Bethge's wonderful biography of Bonhoeffer that caught my eye and inspired me to study him and write a book about him. And this is what he writes about Bonhoeffer. "Preaching was the great event in his life. The heart theologizing and all the critical love for the church were all for its sake. For in it, the message of Christ, the bringer of peace was proclaimed. To Bonhoeffer, nothing in his calling competed in importance with preaching." God bless you and thank you.

Announcer:          You've been listening to the Beeson Podcast with host Timothy George. You can subscribe to the Beeson Podcast at our website beesondivinity.com. Beeson Divinity School is an interdenominational evangelical divinity School training men and women in the service of Jesus Christ. We pray that this podcast will aid and encourage your hope and we hope you will listen to each upcoming edition of the Beeson Podcast.