Born in 1906, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of 8 children born to a prominent German psychiatrist in Breslau, Silesia. Early in life, he sensed God's call upon his life.

By the age of 24, after attending college in Tübingen, he received his doctorate in theology from the University of Berlin. After several years in the ministry, he along with Karl Barth and Martin Niemöller formed the German Confessing Church, essentially an underground church which actively resisted the authority of the Nazi party.

He wrote and spoke extensively on the perils and demise of western Christianity in an atmosphere of compromised and man-centered churches and theology. Bonhoeffer described the dangers of "Cheap grace" and the nominal form of Christianity found throughout Europe and Germany. In one of his most important and widely read writings, "The Cost of Discipleship", he articulated (particularly through an interpretation of the Sermon on the Mount) the concept of costly grace and of faith that demanded the sacrifice and obedience of the believer in Christ.

Ultimately, Bonhoeffer was a practical theologian who put into action what he taught. He lived and died a life much like the early apostles until he was executed at the hands of his Nazi imprisoners in 1945. It was only in the years following his martyrdom that many of his writings have become published and treasured by many thousands - and perhaps millions - of 20th and 21st century believers.