Dietrich Bonhoeffer - Life Together 3

Bonhoeffer moves on to talk about being alone. He recognises that many people become part of a church community out of fear of being alone. However, he believes that this is unhealthy for the individual and the community. In order for an individual and a community to be fully who they are meant to be every member of that community must have the correct balance between fellowship and solitude. This is something that I find difficult as I naturally prefer having people around. However, I am starting to value times alone and having periods of silence with no music and no tv on.

Bonhoeffer tells us that Christ calls each of us as individuals and that we die as individuals and face God as individuals. However, he also states that we are not the only one who is called, that we are supported by our community even to death, and that we will stand with the whole company of heaven.

Finally, Bonhoeffer instructs on daily personal devotions. Although sounding quite prescriptive and dry - much like the previous chapter on corporate devotions - he does raise an interesting point on perseverance. So often we are led to believe that if we are 'doing our devotions right' that we will have amazing spiritual experiences every day. This has done a lot of damage to me over the years as I quite often gave up for periods when I didn't experience what others say they experienced. I presumed I obviously wasn't doing it correctly - or maybe I wasn't a Christian at all. But Bonhoeffer encourages us to continue, whatever our experience because we are doing it to honour God and not to gain something ourselves. He also includes a real challenge to pray for members of our fellowship as much as for ourselves. This is certainly a habit I want to try and get into.

So - I shall endeavour to spend a bit more time in silence and alone each day and see what happens.