The Beginning of Life

O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 CORINTHIANS 15:55–57

Bonhoeffer’s life ended at dawn in a concentration camp, at the hands of a regime that was days from collapse. Nothing about the manner of it was dignified or just. And yet the Christians who have read his story have almost always come away from it not in despair but in hope. That is not because his death was made to look noble in the retelling, but because of what he believed, and wrote, and apparently said, about what lay on the other side of it. This last teaching chapter is about that hope.

Hope that sends us back

It is worth beginning with something Bonhoeffer said that may surprise readers. In his prison letters he warned against a certain kind of Christian hope — one that treats the next world as an escape from this one, a way of turning away from earthly tasks and sorrows. He thought that the Old Testament, with its concern for land, family, justice and the blessing of ordinary life, was a needed corrective. The Christian hope of resurrection, he wrote in effect, does not lift a person out of the world, but sends him back into it in a new way — to love, to work, to suffer and to serve, as Christ did.

This was not a denial of the life to come. It was a warning against using that life as an escape hatch. The hope that leaves the world to its fate is not the hope of the gospel. The hope that comes from the risen Christ gives courage to take on the tasks of this world, because we know they are not the end.

For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end. JEREMIAH 29:11

He lived that way himself. In the middle of the war, with his own future uncertain, he became engaged to be married. It was an act of hope in the goodness of ordinary life, made in the teeth of the times. It recalls the prophet Jeremiah, who, while Jerusalem was under siege, bought a field, because God had promised that fields and vineyards would one day be bought again in that land.

For thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land. JEREMIAH 32:15

Sheltered by good powers

In December 1944, in the Gestapo prison in Berlin, Bonhoeffer wrote a poem and sent it as a New Year’s greeting to those he loved. It has since been set to music and is sung in German churches to this day. Its theme is simple: that he and they were held, even then, by the kindness of God — surrounded and sheltered by good powers they could not see — and that whatever the coming year held, even if it held suffering, could be received from the hand of a Father who is good.

These are not the words of a man who expected rescue. By then he knew his situation was grave. They are the words of a man who had learned to trust God in the dark.

He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust. PSALM 91:1–2

Death as freedom

Another prison poem traces what he called the stations on the road to freedom: discipline, action, suffering and, last of all, death. He pictured death not as the enemy that has the final word, but as the last stage of the journey, the moment when a believer is at last set free to see God. He did not speak of death lightly. He loved life, and he was young. But he had learned to see the grave as a door rather than a wall.

For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better. PHILIPPIANS 1:23

The last Sunday

On Sunday 8 April 1945, in the schoolhouse at Schönberg where a group of prisoners was being held, Bonhoeffer was asked to lead a short service. He did so, reading and speaking on two texts. One was from the prophecy of the suffering servant.

But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. ISAIAH 53:5

The other was from the first letter of Peter.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. 1 PETER 1:3

The cross and the resurrection: the whole of his theology, in two verses, preached to fellow prisoners on the last full day of his life. Soon after, two men came to take him away.

According to the recollection of Captain Payne Best, a British prisoner who was with him, Bonhoeffer asked Best to pass on a message to his friend Bishop George Bell in England — the substance of which was that this was the end, but for him the beginning of life. Best wrote this down some years later, and it is right to treat it as his memory of the words rather than an exact record. But it fits everything Bonhoeffer had written. He was hanged at Flossenbürg early the next morning.

A lively hope

What does his hope teach us? First, that Christian hope is not wishful thinking. It rests on a fact: the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Bonhoeffer did not hope in human progress, or in his own survival, or even in the defeat of the regime. He hoped in the God who raises the dead.

But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel. 2 TIMOTHY 1:10

Second, that Christian hope does not make us careless of this world. It makes us brave in it. Bonhoeffer went back to Germany, served, resisted, loved, got engaged, wrote letters of comfort, led a service for frightened men — all because he believed that death was not the last word.

Third, that Christian hope can be held in weakness. Bonhoeffer was afraid at times. He did not always know who he was. He did not know whether he would live. But he knew whose he was, and he trusted that nothing could separate him from God’s love.

For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. ROMANS 8:38–39

That is the hope into which every Christian is born again. For Bonhoeffer the end came early and violently. For most of us it will come more quietly. But for all who are in Christ, the end is the beginning of life.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Ask whether your hope of heaven makes you braver in this world or more careless of it. Take one step of faithful action in the world this week because of your hope.

2. Do one act of hope in dark times — plant something, plan something, commit to something — as a sign that God’s future is good.

3. Read Romans 8:31–39 aloud and name, one by one, the things you fear might separate you from God’s love.

4. Think about your own death. Write a short prayer committing it into God’s hands, and keep it.

5. Read 1 Peter 1:3–9 each morning this week, and give thanks for the living hope of the resurrection.

A PRAYER

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has begotten us again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus from the dead.

Lord, keep me from a hope that runs away from the world. Give me a hope that sends me back into it, to love and serve and suffer, as You did.

Shelter me with Your good powers in every dark hour. Let me receive from Your hand whatever You give, trusting that it comes from love.

And when my own end comes, let it be for me, as it was for Your servant, the beginning of life, through Jesus Christ, who was wounded for my sins and raised for my hope. Amen.