Bonhoffer Chapter 4

In the middle of this chapter, Bonhoffer states, 

“One who worries about the loss of the time such petty, outward acts of hopefulness entail is usually taking the importance of his own career too solemnly” (99). 

This point is really important to think about, as we live in such a time-oriented culture, it can be easy to forget that God already has a plan for each day, and his plan trumps our plans. Bonhoffer goes on to make a bold statement that really struck me while I was reading and forced me to think through if I allow God’s plans to trump my own. He says, 

“We must be ready to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God” (99).

 Bonhoffer explains that there are often times That God sends us interruptions in order to fulfill His plan for that day, but we as Christians often get frustrated and work to push against that plan. I know that I have done this before. I may even know that things are changing because God wants a different outcome, but selfishly in the moment I feel like my plan is better, so I would do everything I can to stop God’s plan. There are times that God continues to push back, and I could see why once his plan is fulfilled. Other times I think God was providing an opportunity to further His kingdom, and because I did not follow his lead, the “plan” went on as I lead it. Unfortunately, those times were a missed opportunity to have conversations about the Lord with non-believers who were showing interest, and I was more afraid of saying the wrong thing than following God’s lead and trusting that He would put the words in my mouth. When Bonhoffer says,

 “we need to allow ourselves to be interrupted by God”, 

he is making a powerful and truthful statement. We are often so wrapped up in time and where we need to get to next, that we forget time doesn’t matter when God wants to interrupt us. Why is it that we think our work and our own plans are better than Gods plans? I wish I had a direct answer for that. however, I do believe that our desire to push against God’s interruptions has to do with the enemy speaking lies that we aren’t good enough to follow through with His plan, that we won’t say the right words, or simply that our plan is better than God’s. When it’s put into words, it sounds silly. In the moment though, the enemy has a way with words, and with lies. On a happy note, when we follow God’s lead when He interrupts us, I know it bears fruit. The times I’ve followed through with what may seem like difficult conversations about God with non-believers, and trust that God’s desire will be done in said conversation, these times have been the most fruitful and memorable.  I love to hear other people’s hearts and try to understand where their beliefs are coming from. When we build relationships with non-believers, it opens up doors for God to interrupt and do His work.

Bonhoffer Chapter 3

In the middle of this chapter, Bonhoffer states, 

“Intercessory prayer is the purifying bath into which the individual and the fellowship must enter every day” (86). 

He later explains that being in a state of intercession means that we bring ourselves or our brothers and sisters into the presence of God, bringing all that we are to the foot of the cross. Being in a state of intercession is so much more than just saying a simple prayer. It means being in a deeply spiritual state and in communion with God. It’s a feeling that is so refreshing and brings an overwhelming amount of joy.

When I am in a state of intercession, I can literally feel weights being lifted off of my shoulders and chains being broken. Being in an intercessional state means something different for everyone. Some people become very charismatic and express their state through walking around, raising their hands, crying, speaking in tongues, and various other ways. For myself, when I am in a deep intercessory state, I am often overwhelmed by God’s grace and the ways that he has provided for me and I often become very emotional.

I can always tell when I am about to have a really deep encounter with the Lord, because shortly before the encounter I will have a weird sense of others judging me. Usually when someone cries, it means there is something wrong. The enemy has a way of trying to destroy my encounter with the Lord by telling me lies that no one will believe me when they see me crying and I tell them it was a good thing. He will try to make me feel fear about having this encounter, that something bad is going to happen. As much as I hate to admit it, there are sometimes when I have that feeling, and I know it’s a lie from the enemy, but I’d rather listen to the lie of the enemy and avoid people looking at me for crying, than enter into an intercessional state and let God work on my heart. When it’s put into words, this sounds awful, but in the moment, it is so easy to take the bait and not listen to my heart.

When I choose not to take the “bait” that I mentioned previously, I never regret it. By the end of the intercessional time I was able to have with God, I could care less what people think about the fact that I became emotional. In fact, I am always excited to explain what God was doing in my heart at the time. I appreciate Bonhoffer's attempt to explain intercession throughout this chapter.  

Bonhoffer: Chapter 2

In chapter 2, Bonhoffer states that Christians praying for one another is very common. When Christians gather together to pray, we can intercede for one another and for our brothers and sisters outside of the prayer circle as well. From my understanding, Bonhoffer explains that when we spend time with one another in fellowship, it often leads to being upheld in prayer for one another naturally. When we pray for one another, words of criticism turn into intercession for help for one another. Bonhoffer states, 

“Prayer, even though it be free, will be determined by certain internal order. It is not a chaotic outburst of a human heart but the prayer of an inwardly ordered fellowship” (64). He goes on to explain that there is freedom in praying for one another, and not solely praying for ourselves. He encourages his readers to pray from our hearts, rather than our “moods which have nothing to do with spiritual life” (64).

All of these points that Bonhoffer makes sparked something in my heart while I was reading it. First, there is so much power in prayer for one another. I personally have felt the positive effects of simply asking a group of my friends to be praying about something that is going on in my life. For example, my husband, Aaron, is from Ontario, Canada, and he ran into some trouble at the boarder when he was getting ready to move to the U.S. It was two weeks before our wedding, and the border patrol officer was very obviously having a bad day and for various reasons that did not make sense, turned around and did not let him cross into the U.S. He called me in a panic, unsure of what to do and knowing that a lot of work needed to be done before our wedding day. I sent out a mass text message to all our close friends and family to be praying about this, as we knew very clearly that God wanted us to get married when we did (that’s a whole story in itself!), and this situation felt like an obvious attack from the enemy. Long story short, he went back into Canada, talked to a Canadian border patrol officer about the issue, and the officer checked his passport to see if anyone flagged it (which they did not), and advised him to turn back around and try going through the U.S. border and hope for a different officer. He did as he was advised, got a new officer as we had hoped for, and crossed the border with no issues at all. I firmly believe that this was because of all our friends and family interceding for us in prayer. We trusted that God’s plan was the best plan. This situation was completely out of our hands, as the border has its own (very interesting) way of working. In some ways it feels like your life is in the hands of this officer who does not know you. They have the power to turn you around for no reason at all. They do not care if your married or getting married to someone from a different country. All we could do was pray about it and trust Him, and that’s exactly what we did. Sometimes I wonder if the outcome would have been different if we didn’t choose to trust God’s plan. All I know is, I’m thankful we did, and I’m thankful for the people who stood behind us and interceded as well,

Life Together: Dietrich Bonhoffer, Chapter 1

            In the beginning of chapter 1, Bonhoffer states, 

“It is by the grace of God that a congregation is permitted to gather visibly in this world to share God’s Word and sacrament. Not all Christians receive this blessing" (180). 

 I really appreciated that he stated this, because it is a very true statement. Between high school and college, I had the privilege of participating in a gap year program called STEP through the Brethren in Christ church denomination. This program was very similar to YWAM, but much smaller. I was able to serve as an intern and ESL teacher in Thailand for six months. During this time, I learned a lot about what it looks like to practice my beliefs outwardly and not be afraid of what others might think of me while doing this. While Thailand does not necessarily discriminate against Christian’s, about 98% of people living in this country are Buddhist. Those who were Christians that I spent time with were first generation Christians and grew up with a Buddhist background. This means that they receive a lot of persecution from their friends and families because they are not practicing Buddhism. The area that I served in is called the Isaan region of Thailand, and many people also practice animism, which is heavily focused on “good” and “bad” spirits, very similar to witchcraft. The way that the Thai Christians worshiped was unlike anything I had ever witnessed before. they were so excited to have the privilege of knowing who God was and what it looked like to serve him, that they had no fear of speaking about their experience with God to anyone. They did not care if their families disowned them, because they knew they were safe in God’s hands, and He would guide them. Fast forward six months to when I came back to the States and participated in an American church service after spending so long amongst Christians who were truly thankful for the freedom to worship God and praise Him for all the ways he had blessed them in their lives. I have to be honest, the American church service was the biggest reverse- culture shock that I experienced in my return home. People did not seem to care that we had the privilege to worship God freely without our friends and families persecuting us for this action. As I looked around the church, I noticed that people were on their phones texting, moving their lips to the songs but not understanding what they were saying, and barely in a state of worship at all. I can honestly say that the house church of six people that I attended while in Thailand was louder and more excited to worship Jesus than the 300 people combined that attended my parents church upon my return home. all this being said, When Bonhoffer say’s we are lucky to be able to freely worship the Lord with everything in our being, he’s right. So often we take our freedom to worship for granted. There are so many Christians being persecuted, or even killed for their obedience in worshiping our savior. Why is it that American’s often lose sight of this truth and take our freedom for granted? I wish I knew the answer.