by maralewisfan » August 1st, 2010, 7:28 pm
fairfax,
I pulled this information from the FAQ section of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod (LCMS) website. I thought it answered the question well. I don't know if you have read Bonhoefer...
Cheap Grace/Costly Grace
Q. Please comment on cheap grace/costly grace as per Dietrich Bonhoefer's book "Cost of Discipleship."
A. First, allow me to state the Biblical concept of grace. The saving grace of God is His undeserved, unearned favor given freely out of great love in Christ to those who have sinned against Him, who deserve death for their sins, who while still His enemies (Rom. 5) received His grace and were saved. It is God who bestows grace on us. It does not have its origin in us, nor can we demand it.
Cheap grace, according to Dietrich Bonhoefer, is the failure to take seriously, in faith and in the Christian life of discipleship, the depth of human sinfulness and what it cost God to redeem human beings. In the first chapter of his Cost of Discipleship, Bonhoefer summarizes what he means by the concept by stating the following:
"Cheap grace," writes Bonhoefer, "means the justification of sin without the justification of the sinner. Grace alone does everything, they say, and so everything can remain as it was before....Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.
"Costly grace is the hidden treasure in the field; for the sake of it a man will gladly go and sell all that he has....Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because if calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of His Son: 'ye were bought with a price', and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon His Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered Him up for us, Costly grace is the Incarnation of God."