Here Bonhoeffer answers a question raised in For the Life of the World: Letters to the Exiles (FLOW), particularly in the episode on “The Economy of Love.” In this episode, we ask “What is saying ”˜yes’ to another person really all about?” For Bonhoeffer, saying “yes” to another person is an affirmation of God’s world and his purposes therein.
Bonhoeffer invokes the example of Jeremiah, another inspiration for the theme of exile that permeates FLOW. In Jeremiah 32 we read about how, with the Babylonian exile looming, the prophet buys a plot of land and passes along this promise: “This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Houses, fields and vineyards will again be bought in this land.” Marriage is a “yes” to God’s creation, even in the midst of exile, and a “yes” to God’s purposes for the life of the world.