Bonhoeffer: We Are Sinners

 Confess your faults to one another

In the book of James, we have the following Scripture. It is from James chapter 5 and is found in verses 13-18. The version is the New American Standard Bible.

 Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises.  Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much. Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. Then he prayed again, and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit.

The fact is that we are sinners

The fact that we are sinners comes from a quote in Bonhoeffer's book Life Together: The Classic Explanation of Faith in Community (pg. 112):

“He who is alone with his sin is utterly alone. It may be that Christians, notwithstanding corporate worship, common prayer, and all their fellowship in service, may still be left to their loneliness. The final breakthrough to fellowship does not occur, because, though they have fellowship with one another as believers and as devout people, they do not have fellowship as the undevout, as sinners. The pious fellowship permits no one to be a sinner. So everybody must conceal his sin from himself and from the fellowship. We dare not be sinners. Many Christians are unthinkably horrified when a real sinner is suddenly discovered among the righteous. So we remain alone with our sin, living in lies and hypocrisy. The fact is that we are sinners…All sham has ended in the presence of Christ. The misery of the sinner and the mercy of God – this is the truth of the Gospel in Jesus Christ.”

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The bold in both the Scripture and book that are bolded are my bolds. I have them "marked" because they are the words and phrases that I used for the meme.