Cheap Grace

 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the great German pastor, theologian, martyr, and accused as a spy, was asked in 1943 how it was possible for the Church to sit back and let Hitler seize absolute power. His firm answer: "It was the teaching of cheap grace." 

 

"Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ."                                              - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

 

We live in a time and culture that not only teaches cheap grace but praises it.