And they went and woke him up, saying, “Lord, save us! We are perishing!” And he said to them, “Why are you afraid, you of little faith?” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the sea and there was a dead calm. A windstorm arose on the sea, so great that the boat was being swamped by the waves but he was asleep. Matthew 8:23–27: And when he got into the boat, his disciples followed him. his Word unstayed,” Bonhoeffer assured the congregation, quoting a verse from “The Golden Sun,” a beloved hymn by Paul Gerhardt. In the midst of this storm, Bonhoeffer was no more certain of the future than anyone else, but he was sure that followers of Christ should know where to turn. There was fear of Communism-the “Red Tide from the East”-and other extremist movements, and danger from open fighting in the streets. The Hindenburg government was tottering, indeed was about to go under, and with it Germany’s fragile first republic, created at Weimar after World War I. It was a time of great tension in Berlin, and of widespread fear. In January 1933, shortly before Hitler came to power, Bonhoeffer preached this sermon at a vespers service on the evening of the second Sunday after Epiphany. Introduction: Berlin, second sunday after epiphany, January 15, 1933 The sermon below is taken from The Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, edited and introduced by Isabel Best.
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