CHRISTOCENTRISM IN PREACHING

Preaching is always more than just a problem to be solved by theology.

Indeed, one can raise the important objection that Jesus’ own preaching was not
“Christocentric” but, rather, revolved entirely around the announcement that the “reign and
kingdom of God” was near. This, however, is of decisive importance both for our understanding
of the “kingdom” as well as for our comprehension of the biblical message about Christ. In other
words: in apostolic preaching Christ stands in the middle of the proclamation because he is the
presence of divine action toward mankind.
Now, is Christocentrism something that can be actually accomplished? It will always fail,
ultimately, when it degenerates into the attempt to make a person from the past into a thrilling
ideal for the present dressing him up in contemporary garb. What makes Christ important is God,
his Divine Sonship. For our inquiry, this means: the Christian is not alone in his search for God
and Christ; rather, he knows that he is supported by the comprehensive “I” of the Church, which
makes him a contemporary of Jesus Christ and thereby conveys God into time and him into
eternity.
Christocentrism, then, presupposes the event of God becoming man and is, therefore, at
bottom nothing other than Theocentrism. It assumes the presence of the Risen Christ in the Church
and, therefore, demands very personal obedience to Christ just as much as it requires unity with
the faith, prayer, and liturgy of the Church.
If God is to be preached in terms of Christ and Christ in terms of God, then this means that
God must be preached in a Trinitarian manner – for without the Spirit, who unites the historical
Jesus with the historical Church and who is the unity of the Son with the Father, one cannot speak
about Christ and God, either. When we recognize that Scripture is the foundation for all
proclamation, then that implies for our inquiry that proclamation of the Trinity must be
proclamation of salvation history.
Trinitarian preaching means one and the same thing as Christocentric preaching, namely,
the exposition of the way of Christian existence through Christ in the Spirit to the Father.
We found the formula from the letter to the Ephesians, “through Christ in the Spirit to the
Father” (2:18), to be the basic formula of Trinitarian proclamation which does not intend to make
a purely doctrinal statement, but rather, express the essential legitimacy of Christian divine
worship. Consequently, if the specific starting point of all Christocentrism is reached in the
Christian liturgy, then this means that preaching that intends to be Christocentric must start out
from this reality and lead back to it again and again. Christian preaching is not the presentation of
a doctrinal system but, rather, training in Christian reality, the crystallization point of which is the
Eucharistic celebration.
Dogma is scriptural interpretation. Thus there is a necessary mutual relationship and a
priority between Scripture and dogma. As far as Christology and Trinitarian doctrine are
concerned, dogma has put its finger on the ontological character of the event: the Bible depicts
what happened; dogma indicates the relative importance of what happened by uncovering the
previously discussed root cause of the event – the fact that God has become man, that God Himself
is the Father, Son, and Spirit and does not just appear that way. Dogmatic theology aims to unify
the individual thoughts into the context of a logical structure of thought in view of the intellectual
situation of the given era; preaching tries to seize upon the logic of human existence and, thus, to
orient man toward faith and lead him into it.
But then, that also means that preaching, being Christocentric, is also preaching about
salvation history. Christian preaching does not just tell stories; rather, it proclaims a history,
namely, the history of God with mankind, the process of transitus, of the holy Passover, which
began with God’s call to Abraham (cf. Gen 12:1).
In conclusion, subjective truthfulness should accompany objective truth so that the latter
may be effective. Certainly, personal holiness remains the obligatory role of every preacher, as it
is of every Christian; certainly, one will be able to tell from a man’s word the extent to which it is
fulfilled by his life and to what extent it is merely words. The subjective holiness of the preacher
will always fall short of the objective holiness of the message he has to convey. What must be
demanded, however, of this acting subject who claims to preach the objective truth is truthfulness.
But that will not do. The first duty of the preacher is not to be on the look-out for foreign models
and to expect relevance from them but, rather, to start by becoming personally a hearer of the Word
and welcoming its reality.
GOD: CONTEMPORARY MAN FACING THE QUESTION OF GOD
Man facing the question of God today finds himself in a situation of questioning and
uncertainty, unless God is already reckoned as one of the outmoded questions that human
consciousness has just shrugged off. Hence to question along with man who seeks is an
indispensable part of preaching itself, because only in this way can the Word become an answer.
Until then God had his fixed place in the gradated structure of the world: the firmament;
metaphysics was tangible, as it were, in the hierarchy that led from the nethermost and dullest
level, the earth to even higher and more spiritual spheres and finally to the pure light, to the Mover
of the universe. The earth is neither a center nor a foundation, nor is the sky a heaven – everything
is just “world”.
The areas reserved to theology and to a metaphysical-philosophical inquiry fuse together
more and more, and even psychological and social processes become increasingly accessible to
positivistic enlightenment. Corresponding to this development in the area of natural science, there
is a similar line of development in the area of history and anthropology. Just as “heaven” became
“earth” through scientific research, so too historical research and the progressive encounter of
religions and cultures is leading to an intellectual climate in which Christianity seems more and
more to be sinking into a general history of religion.
Add to all that the progressive disappearance of an independent philosophy that would give
faith room in which to develop. There is no longer any generally philosophy, unless you mean
positivism, which has been widely adopted but does not even give faith a chance. Through a long
process of thinking and living, the faith had stamped the form of Christian convictions upon the
world view of antiquity, which had not been defined by the Creator God of Christianity at all. As
this synthesis broke down bit by bit in the modern era, Christians persisted all too long in their
efforts to save the old ways of thinking instead of dealing decisively with the new questions.
Appropriating the faith anew in these new intellectual conditions thus remains a task that is to a
great extent uncompleted.
Even though theology may have plenty of time, man must live now and ask about his path.
One can point out that human freedom gives us a glimpse of the original creative freedom, of God;
or that human seeking and questioning cannot come to rest in positivistic findings alone and urges
us on to the creative “Thou” without whom the “I” remains inexplicable.
This eloquence of creation still exists today, and we should persistently try to awaken the
ability to see the world again as a meaningful figure that has something to say to us and not just as
an assembly of functions that we can utilize. In the Bible, the experience of God as the God of
history is not related only to the past but, above all, bears within itself the character of hope and
points to the future. This gives the Christian image of God its distinctive coloring, which in practice
we had no doubt pushed too much into the background until now.
Just as Moses received the definition of God in terms of men as God of the fathers, so too
the question “who or what is God?” is defined for the New Testament once again in terms of a
man, Jesus of Nazareth. It does not answer the question about God directly but, rather, by and
through the man Jesus of Nazareth. It signifies:
a. That the man Jesus can be understood only in relation to him whom he calls his Father and
in terms of whom he understands himself as “Son”.
b. Conversely, this of course means also that the New Testament does not speak directly about
God, not about God alone and as such, but rather knows him only concretely as the “God
of someone”: as the God and Father of Jesus, only by and through the Father-Son relation,
mediated by and through the man who knew that he had access to God.
Naturally, one would ask: What does it mean to say that “God is recognized as Person?”
the answer must be: Person is precisely what the New Testament brings to light in the reality of
the Father-Son relation: a consciousness that is essentially relation, creative, loving, knowing
relation. The God of the Bible is not only consciousness, but Word; not only knowledge, but
relation; not only the ground of being, but the supporting strength of all meaning.
In conclusion, God is made known through men who know him, place themselves at his
disposal, and make room for him in the world. God is made known through himself, to be known
in the man Jesus, who belongs divinely to God and is the active self-manifestation of God. Finally,
the knowledge of God is a way; it means discipleship.
THESES FOR CHRISTOLOGY
1. The starting point for Christology in the New Testament is the fact of the Resurrection of
Jesus Christ from the dead: the Resurrection is God’s way of publicly taking the side of
Jesus in the proceedings that Jews and Gentiles had organized against him.
 2. The Resurrection thus makes it possible to interpret the crucifixion of Jesus in terms of the
Old Testament concept of the suffering, just man that finds its climactic expressions in
Psalm 22 (21) and Isaiah 53.
3. The Resurrection of Jesus is the basis of his abiding lordship. It follows that:
a. The Resurrection of Jesus confirms the belief in a general resurrection that had not
yet become a clear part of Israel’s creed, and thus it provides the basis for the
specifically Christian eschatological hope.
b. God’s defense of Jesus against the official interpretation of the Old Testament as
given by the competent Jewish authorities makes possible in principle that freedom
from the letter of the Law that will lead to the Church of the Gentiles.
4. The claim to divinity that the Resurrection of Jesus confirms finds expression in the image
of Jesus sitting at the Father’s right hand.
5. Constitutive for the faith of the growing Church was the consciousness that in this
interpretation of the person of Jesus it was not posthumously bestowing a theological
transfiguration upon a teacher in Israel but was, rather, interpreting the words and work of
Jesus in an objectively correct way.
6. The primary function of the formula “You are my son, today I have begotten you” is to
interpret the event of the Resurrection; it says, that is, that the Resurrection is the elevation
of Jesus to his throne, the proclamation of his kingship and sonship.
7. The implications of all this are brought out with full clarity in the Gospel of John. Here
Jesus does not simply proclaim the Word of God; he is himself God’s Word in the whole
of his existence.
8. Given the increasing reflection on the presuppositions of the Easter event in the person of
the earthly Jesus, it is understandable that the traditions regarding the birth and childhood
of Jesus should become part of the official tradition of the Church.
9. The process of developing Christological creeds begins with the confessions of faith
associated with the first Easter; it reaches a certain completion at the Council of Chalcedon.
10. The concept of redemption thus acquires its ultimate theological depth. The being of man
is incorporated into the being of God.
WHAT DOES JESUS CHRIST MEAN TO ME?
God is not simply infinite distance; he is also infinite nearness. One can confide in him and
speak to him: he hears and sees and loves. He expresses himself in the man Jesus, although not
exhaustively, since Jesus, though one with him, nevertheless addresses him as “Father”. Man is
the creature who is capable of being an expression of God himself. Man is so made that God can
enter into union with him. The fact that for a person Jesus and the Church are not separable, any
more than they are to be simply identified with each other. Jesus is infinitely more than the Church.
One should know that Jesus of the Gospels is the real Jesus and that I can entrust myself to him
with far greater security than I can to the most learned reconstructions; he will outlast them all.
The Gospel tradition, with its great breadth and its range of tone, tells me who Jesus was and is.
In it he is always present to be heard and seen anew.
 In conclusion, the person who believes with the Church encounters Jesus directly in prayer
and in the sacraments – especially in the Eucharist. But anyone who starts talking about prayer and
the sacraments quickly realizes that the early Church’s “discipline of the secret” was far more than
a temporary application of a custom taken over from pagan religions. In its essence, that discipline
points to a realm that can find meaningful expression only in the experience that faith makes
possible.
FOLLOWING CHRIST
What does “the following of Christ” really mean?
In plain terms, it meant that individuals decided to abandon their profession or trade, their
mundane affairs, and the everyday life they had lived until then and, instead, to walk with Jesus.
In other words, it meant a new calling, that of the disciple, whose life now consisted in walking
with the Master and completely trusting in his guidance.
“Following”, in this sense, is something quite external but at the same time something very
interior as well. Something external: an actual walking behind Jesus in his travels through
Palestine. Something interior: a new direction for one’s own wishes and ideas as its central points
of reference but is surrendered to the will of another, so that being with him and being at his
disposal are now the really important content of a human existence. In the course of Jesus’ life,
the meaning of “following” becomes more specific and concrete. Anyone who joins Jesus enters
the company of an outcast and must be prepared to be condemned as Jesus was and to end up on
the Cross.
If we look more closely, however, it soon becomes clear that the outward historical forms
that the following of Jesus assumed at first are not the decisive thing. The decisive thing is rather
the interior existential transformation for which any outward circumstances and activities are only
a preparation. This transformation, which is the real content of the following of Christ, tells us that
this following is possible in every age.
To put it even more clearly: “to follow” means to entrust oneself to the Word of God, to
rate it higher than the laws of money and bread and to live by it. In short, to follow means to
believe, but to “believe” in a sense of making a radical decision between the two and, in the last
analysis, the only two possibilities for human life: bread and the word. To follow Christ, moreover,
is to accept the inner essence of the Cross, namely, the radical love expressed therein, and thus to
imitate God himself.
To follow Christ, then, means to enter into the self-surrender that is the real heart of love.
To follow Christ means to become one who loves as God has loved. God has become man so that
men might become like God. In the last analysis, following Christ is nothing other than man’s
becoming man by integration into the humanity of God.
John Paulo S. Ruedas
Christology
October 3, 2017