Top 500 Dietrich Bonhoeffer Quotes (2026 Update)
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201. “The first call which every Christian experiences is the call to abandon the attachments of this world.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

202. “When our will wholeheartedly enters into the prayer of Christ, then we pray correctly.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

203. “Who stands fast? Only the man whose final standard is not his reason, his principles, his conscience, his freedom, or his virtue, but who is ready to sacrifice all this when he is called to obedient and responsible action in faith and in exclusive allegiance to God- the responsible man, who tries to make his whole life an answer to the question and call of God. Where are these responsible people?”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

204. “The gift of Christ is not the Christian religion, but the grace and love of God which culminate in the cross.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

205. “Nevertheless, it is the free grace of the resurrected One that now also goes after the individual, overcomes the doubter, and creates in him the Easter faith.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

206. “How is it possible to live the life of faith when we grow weary of prayer, when we lose our taste for reading the Bible, and when sleep, food and sensuality deprive us of the joy of communion with God?”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

207. “A pastor who does not pray daily for his congregation is not a pastor.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

208. “How can I possibly serve another person in unfeigned humility if I seriously regard his sinfulness as worse than my own?”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

209. “Through our daily meals He is calling us to rejoice, to keep holiday in the midst of our working day.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

210. “The Psalter is the great school of prayer.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

211. “It will always be true that the wisest course for the disciple is... to abide solely by the Word of God in all simplicity.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

212. “Christianity preaches the infinite worth of that which is seemingly worthless and the infinite worthlessness of that which is seemingly so valued.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

213. “Time is lost when we have not lived a full human life, time unenriched by experience, creative endeavor, enjoyment, and suffering.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

214. “Right speech comes out of silence and right silence comes out of speech.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

216. “The richness of God’s Word ought to determine our prayer, not the poverty of our heart.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

217. “Christian marriage is marked by discipline and self-denial. Christ is the Lord even of marriage.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

218. “Most people have forgotten nowadays what a house can mean, though some of us have come to realize it as never before. It is a kingdom of its own in the midst of the world, a stronghold amid life’s storms and stresses, a refuge, even a sanctuary.” – Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Letters and Papers from Prison.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

219. “The renewal of the Church will come from a new type of monasticism which only has in common with the old an uncompromising allegiance to the Sermon on the Mount. It is high time people banded together to do this.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

220. “Anyone who thinks that his time is too valuable to spend keeping quiet will eventually have no time for God and his brother, but only for himself and for his own follies.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

221. “Discipleship is commitment to Christ. Because Christ exists, he must be followed.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

222. “Whoever does not know the austere blessedness of waiting – that is, of hopefully doing without – will never experience the full blessing of fulfillment.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

223. “Perception, knowledge, and truth without love are nothing. They are not truth, for truth is God, and God is love. Therefore, truth without love is a lie.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

224. “If you do a good job for others, you heal yourself at the same time, because a dose of joy is a spiritual cure.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

225. “Whenever the Psalter is abandoned, an incomparable treasure is lost to the Christian church. With its recovery will come unexpected power.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

226. “Human love has little regard for the truth. It makes the truth relative, since nothing, not even the truth, must come between it and the beloved person.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

227. “So the fool, as distinct from the scoundrel, is completely self- satisfied; in fact, he can easily become dangerous, as it does not take much to make him aggressive. A fool must therefore be treated more cautiously than a scoundrel.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

228. “Christ is not gloriously transported from earth into heaven. He must instead go to the cross. And precisely there, where the cross stands, the resurrection is near. Precisely here, where all lose faith in God, where all despair about the power of God, God is fully there, and Christ is alive and near.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

229. “I can no longer condemn or hate a brother for whom I pray, no matter how much trouble he causes me.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

230. “There is no truth towards Jesus without truth towards man. Untruthfulness destroys fellowship, but truth cuts false fellowship to pieces and establishes genuine brotherhood.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

231. “Monastic life thus became a living protest against the secularization of Christianity, against the cheapening of grace.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

232. “Ultimately all authority on earth must serve only the authority of Jesus Christ over humankind.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

233. “Every moment and every situation challenges us to action and to obedience. We have literally no time to sit down and ask ourselves whether so-and-so is our neighbour or not. We must get into action and obey – we must behave like a neighbour to him.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

234. “The wasted time we are ashamed of, the temptations we succumb to, the weakness and discouragement in our work, the disorder and lack of discipline in our thinking and in our dealings with other people – all these very frequently have their cause in our neglect of morning prayer.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

235. “In religion, as in art and science, there are – in addition to times of great excitement – times of sober work and practice. Interaction with God must be practiced; otherwise we will not find the right tone, the right word, the right language, when he surprises us. We must learn God’s language, laboriously learn it. And we must work at it, so that we will be able to talk with him.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

236. “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

237. “Being free means “being free for the other,” because the other has bound me to him. Only in relationship with the other am I free.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

238. “It is the characteristic excellence of the strong man that he can bring momentous issues to the fore and make a decision about them. The weak are always forced to decide between alternatives they have not chosen themselves.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Featured in: Strong Quotes

239. “To be silent does not mean to be inactive; rather it means to breathe in the will of God, to listen attentively and be ready to obey.4 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Meditating on the Word.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

240. “My past life is abundantly full of God’s mercy, and, above all sin, stands the forgiving love of the Crucified.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

241. “That shows how the very notion of a suffering Messiah was a scandal to the Church, even in its earliest days. That is not the kind of Lord it wants, and as the Church of Christ it does not like to have the law of suffering imposed upon it by its Lord. Peter’s protest displays his own unwillingness to suffer, and that means that Satan has gained entry into the Church, and is trying to tear it away from the cross of its Lord.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

242. “Many persons seek community because they are afraid of loneliness... those who take refuge in community while fleeing from themselves are misuing it to indulge in empty talk and distraction, no matter how spiritual this idle talk and distraction may appear... it is precisely such misuse of community that creates deadly isolation of human beings.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

243. “So the call to discipleship is a commitment solely to the person of Jesus Christ, a breaking through of all legalisms by the grace of him who calls.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

244. “According to our text, there is no road to faith or discipleship, no other road – only obedience to the call of Jesus.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

245. “It is only by living completely in this world that one learns to have faith.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

246. “As Christ is Christ only as the suffering and rejected one, so the disciple is a disciple only as one who suffers and is rejected, as one crucified with Jesus. Discipleship, understood as being bound to the person of Jesus Christ, places the disciple under the law of Christ, that is, under the cross.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

247. “Absolute seriousness is never without a dash of humor.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

248. “God cleanses and sanctifies us, comes to us with grace and love. God makes us happy, as only children can be happy.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

249. “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.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer

250. “And so the unseen Lord of the eternal kingdom and of the church sends out ambassadors into this world, giving them a mission that is greater than that of any other, just as heaven is greater than earth, and eternity is greater than time. And the authority that this Lord gives these ambassadors is that much greater than all the authorities in this world.”

— Dietrich Bonhoeffer