Another short reading of baptism, this time from the theologian and martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer. The book Nachfolge, from which today's quotation can be found, was published in German in 1937, in the years of Nazi government of Germany.
Baptism thus implies a break. Christ invades the realm of Satan and lays hold of those who belong to him thereby creating his church-community. Past and present are torn asunder. The old has passed away, all things have become new. The break does not come about by our breaking our chains out of an unquenchable thirst to see our life and all things ordered in a new and free away. Long ago, Christ himself has already bought about that break. In baptism this break now also takes effect in our own lives.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship (SCM, 2015 [1937, ET= 1948]), p.170.
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