The Cost of Discipleship - Influence

Influence

Eberhard Bethge has argued that Bonhoeffer's writings, which culminated in the Ethics and Letters and Papers from Prison, form a seamless continuity, stretching back at least as far as The Cost of Discipleship.

Unlike Bonhoeffer's later writings, The Cost of Discipleship has been widely read by both conservative and liberal Christians and is still widely read and quoted today.

The term "cheap grace" was coined by The Rev. Adam Clayton Powell, Sr., then-pastor of Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, N.Y.. Bonhoeffer attended the church when at Union Theological Seminary, and for a season taught Sunday School there. Bonhoeffer benefited from the protest culture of the African American church and gleaned from it social gospel elements that he would take with him back to Germany. The anti-temporal power ethic would aid him to resist the Nazi regime.

Read more about this topic:  The Cost Of Discipleship

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