SEARCHING FOR MEANING AND HAPPINESS:
4. WHO IS CHRIST FOR ME?
FAUSTO B. GOMEZ OP
We are Christians, that is, disciples of Christ, followers of Jesus. Without Christ, the word “Christian” means nothing, just three letters: i a n, which some love to give them a meaning: I am nothing. Indeed, without Christ I am nothing!
What is the place of Christ in our life? All Christians are called to a progressive union with God through Jesus in the Spirit (Vatican II, LG 40-41). Jacques Ellul writes: “The revelation of Christ is primarily Trinitarian.” Our God is the Christian God. Jesus alone reveals to us who God is: Trinity. “Creation by the Father, the incarnation by the Son, and transfiguration by the Spirit are the architecture of revelation” (Essential Spiritual Writings).
Jesus is alive today. As Karl Barth says, “We believe that Jesus is our contemporary.” Hence, the radical question of Jesus to his disciples is also addressed to each one of us: “Who am I for you?” (See Mt 16:13-17). We may answer the question in two ways, objectively and subjectively.
The objective, “orthodox” answer is not difficult. The disciples of Jesus generally know the right answer. Christ is the Prophet who denounced evil and injustice and announced the Good News of the Kingdom of God, the Beatitudes. He is the Teacher who taught with authority, the Suffering Servant who died for the sins of humanity. Christ is the Lamb of God who is especially present in the poor and sick and marginalized: “I was hungry, and you gave me food, sick and you visited me…”
Jesus Christ is the Light of the world (Jn 14:6; 8:12; 9:5), the Good Shepherd (Jn 10:11, 14), the Good Samaritan, the Bread of Life (Jn 6:35-48, 51), the vine (Jn 15:5), the resurrection and the life (Jn 11:25). Through the Holy Spirit, we know Jesus: God-Man, a God who is born like us, who smiles, who cries, who works, who gets tired, who has friends, who is the loving face of God, who dies on the Cross and rises up to a new glorious life. Jesus Christ is the Crucified and Risen Lord.
The objective answer in itself is cold, external, and bookish, perhaps. It may be non-committal, not challenging. We answer objectively when we discuss about the question “Who is Christ?” in a detached, scholarly, scientific, professional manner. We give an objective response when we preach without fire, without personal commitment, when we believers talk about Christ but have not encountered him personally.
We believe that Jesus is looking for our subjective or personal answer. A big poster pasted on the wall of a Subway station in New York shouted to me with its huge red letters written over a painting of Jesus: CHRIST IS THE ANSWER! Someone added in small blue letters: What is the question?
Jesus’ question for each one of us – Christians - is: Who am I for you? Our Christian faith – to be sure - does not mean principally “reciting a creed; it means, knowing a person,” and “showing him” to people. It “does not mean knowing about Christ, it means knowing Christ” (W. Barclay, In Lk 9:18-22 and 10:21-24; In Mth 9:35). Do we really know him? Are we ready to say – like St. Paul -, “I know in whom I have believed” (2 Tim 1:12). This is the continuing task of our Christian lives: to know the Lord in an ever-ascending manner (cf. Phil 3:10-11), and follow him closely.
For the believers in him, Christ is the priority of priorities. “Jesus is everything for us: through his death, he is our savior; through his resurrection, He is our hope” (J. Ellul). For a Christian, Jesus is the ultimate meaning of his/her existence.
Our Father keeps telling us: “This is my beloved Son, my Chosen; listen to him” (Lk 9:35; Mk 9:7). “Fix your eyes on him alone - St. John of the Cross tells us -. for in him [God the Father says] I have revealed all and in him you will find more than you could ever ask for or desire.” Hence – continues the mystic from Fontiveros -, we do not have to seek new visions or revelations; by giving us his Son, his only Word, He has said everything in the one Word.
Certainly, the subjective or personal answer is grounded and fed by the objective answer. Without the true objective and doctrinal answer, my personal answer may be a wrong or unorthodox answer; may be my “truth” but not -as it should be - the Truth.
Truly, Christ is the same yesterday, today and always: the total Christ. We believe in the total Christ: the Christ who was born like us, lived, died and rose from the dead, the Christ who lives. It appears that some among us believe in a partial Christ made according to our wishes: the Santo Niño, the Christ who walked on the sea, the Nazarene, the Risen Christ…We believe truly in the Crucified and Risen Lord, Son of God and Mary, Jesus God-Man.
Once a person believes in Christ, she or he will inevitably face this question: “What should I do” (Cf. Acts 2:37). Undoubtedly, Christian faith is not a morality, but radically an experience of the paschal mystery, that is, an encounter with the Risen Lord. However, Christian faith implies necessarily a morality, a way of being and acting, of being and becoming progressively more and more what we are: creatures in he universe, “images” and children of God, disciples of Jesus Christ, brothers and sisters of one another – of all!
All the saints point to Christ, the only absolute model of our life. Consequently, we ought to practice his teachings, essentially his fundamental Sermon on the Mount, our Magna Carta: The Sermon on the Mount is the most faithful portrait of Christ we possess, and by the same token the most perfect life model we could be given (Servais Pinckaers).
Following Jesus leads us to being seduced by him. The prophet Jeremiah: “You seduced me, Lord, and I let myself be seduced” (Jer 20:7). As God seduced Jeremiah, the authentic followers of Jesus are seduced by him. Hopefully, we all are among them!
After trying to answer the four questions, I have addresses, I come to the general conclusion.
Who am I? I am a human being with a great dignity, but I am also a wounded human being who needs others to live a flourishing life in communion, who needs God and his Son, our Lord and savior Jesus Christ, and the grace of the Holy Spirit, our advocate and consoler. ”
Who are you for me? I am a human person who cannot live a fulfilling human life without others, who are my equals in dignity and rights, my brothers and sisters on the journey of life. I am called by God through Christ to be united to him and to live a life of universal love of all neighbors.
Who is God for me? He is my God and your God, my Father and your Father. God is One and Three Persons -Father, Son nd Holy Spirit. God is love.
Who is Christ for me? The Son of God and the Son of Mary, God-Man, the Crucified and Risen Lord. He is our Savior. Out of love, He died for you and me – for all. He rose from the dead and lives.
When all said and done, what really matters in life – in your life, in my life, in our life - is to love with a genuine love that includes freedom and justice and truthfulness – and a great respect for life. Love is the primary moral principle, value and virtue of life. Happiness in this life is really to love God and all others: “To be is to love” (E. Mounier); “To be a human being is to be a fellow human being” (M. Buber). “Put love where there is none, and you will reap love” (St. John of the Cross).###