The Quotable Kaesemann #2: On Faith and Discipleship

More vintage Kaesemann…

“believing” quite simply and irreversibly means to rely on this word [of Christ’s lordly ownership of those disciples of faith and surrender in Baptism] when it comes to blows, to throw everything else to the winds that is offered to us as salvation or threatened as damnation (p. 158).

…we must understand the first commandment [of the Decalogue] as the sum of Scripture. All other words, pages, and books in it form, as it were, a commentary on it, and in the NT this summary is repeated Christologically, unequivocally defined and made concrete: “I am the Lord your God…you shall have no other gods before me!” (p. 159)

NB: From On Being a Disciple of the Crucified Nazarene (Eerdmans)