1st Sunday in Lent (C) - (Rom 10:8-13)

(Rom 10:8-13)

Romans 10:8 What does it say then? Near you is the word, on your lips and in your heart: that is, the word of faith which we preach.

Romans 10:9 For if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe with your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

"What sayest thou then? Near you is the word, on your mouth and in your heart: that is, the word of faith which we preach." As Moses said that the word, that is, the law of God, was easy to know and to keep, so Paul says the same of the gospel. If the law has Christ as its end, if everything from Christ begins and ends in Christ, if all the word of Scripture conceals Christ, all the word of Scripture conceals the gospel, to which every word of the Old Testament leads and guides. "The word of faith which we preach" are the gospel truths necessary to believe in order to attain salvation, which, through the preaching of the apostles, are within the reach of all, so that all can say that they have them in their mouths and in their hearts, and there is no need to make long journeys or to endure great hardship in order to learn them. Christ is present in the word of faith that is proclaimed by the Church.

There are three truths that we must grasp in this sentence of Paul. The first is this: the word of the gospel, which is the word of Christ, is not foreign to man, it is not distant from him, not in a spatial-temporal sense, but in an existential sense. Man's existence yearns for this word, he seeks it. After all, every human search is a search for truth. Because of sin, this search loses its essence, but it is still a search for one's own being. Man seeks himself, but he does not find himself, and he does not find himself because he cannot find himself in Christ. Only by finding Christ does man find himself, but to find Christ one must find the word of Christ.

The second truth is this: the word must be preached, announced, proclaimed, so that every man hears it and by hearing it adheres to it through faith. If preaching is lacking, then the word remains distant from man, and if the word remains distant, Christ also remains distant. When the Church has done this, it will have helped man in his search for Christ, it will have helped man to find himself, to be himself. The Church exists to give Christ. This is the purpose and mandate the Church has received. That is why preaching is the very essence of the Church. Christ gives himself through the word, and without the word, Christ does not give himself, and if he does not give himself, those who seek him seek him in vain. For this the Church is responsible. The true sin of the Church, the only one she must always repent of, is the failure to evangelise, the failure to proclaim, the failure to preach the word of Jesus.

The third truth directs us instead to 'the word of faith'. The word is of faith because it announces a mystery that only by faith can be accepted and only by faith can one adhere to it. Without faith, the word remains a mute word. Faith and word are an inseparable unity. There could be the word without faith, but faith does not reveal the mystery, because the mystery is not revealed by the word, but by the Spirit who reveals himself to the heart and only manifests himself if there is faith in the heart.

What do we see today? One observes that Christ is as if forgotten. Traces of him are being lost. The word of preaching is purged of all content inherent in Christ, his truth and grace. What prevails in many today is the proposition of an entirely human, earthly, sometimes even diabolical justice. If the preaching of faith is omitted, Christ is omitted, righteousness according to faith is omitted, grace and truth are omitted. What remains? Man and his sin remains.

"For if thou shalt confess with thy mouth that Jesus is Lord, and shalt believe with thy heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." He who is professed in faith is Jesus Lord. Professing with one's mouth that Jesus is Lord and believing in one's heart that God raised him from the dead is the way to salvation. This means not only admitting the historical fact of the resurrection, but also accepting, from the depths of the soul, the whole work of salvation accomplished by Christ.

This confession must be an explicit testimony. Adherence to Christ can never be a private fact, lived intimately in one's own heart, in which it must still be rooted, but it must be publicly witnessed. One cannot be an anonymous Christian, a Christian of silence. The Christian is he who before the world confesses that Jesus is Lord, the Word, the only-begotten of the Father who became flesh in the womb of the Virgin Mary and who in his humanity and not only in his divinity was constituted Lord of every man. The term Kyrios (Lord) was used in the LXX Bible to translate YHWH and what Paul is telling us is that the confession of faith consists in believing that Jesus is the Messiah and that he is 'one' with Yahweh.

This confession must be clear-cut. There can be no gaps. That is why it is necessary for the Christian to confess with his mouth that Jesus is Lord, consubstantial with God by divine nature, consubstantial with man by human nature. If there is no right confession about the person of Jesus, one cannot be saved, because the Jesus we confess would no longer be the Jesus of God, but a Jesus modelled on human thoughts, and therefore an idol. Everything that man constructs with his mind is simply an idol, and the idol does not save. Instead, the Son of God who came in the flesh for the redemption of the world saves, and the Son of God who came in the flesh is the Lord of man.

It is not enough, however, to proclaim righteous faith with the mouth; the heart must also participate in it, and the heart participates in it by making the truth that is professed its own. From the profession of the mouth and the faith of the heart comes salvation for man. The salvation that Paul envisages is not simply deliverance from sin. Salvation is possessing the life of Christ and making this life the guiding principle of our life: actions, words, thoughts. This is why deliverance from sin alone is a very reductive concept of salvation.

Argentino Quintavalle, author of the books:

- Revelation - exegetical commentary

- The Apostle Paul and the Judaizers - Law or Gospel?

Jesus Christ true God and true Man in the Trinitarian mystery

The prophetic discourse of Jesus (Matthew 24-25)

All generations will call me blessed

Catholics and Protestants compared - In defence of the faith

(Buyable on Amazon)

126 Last modified on Tuesday, 04 March 2025 00:10

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Argentino Quintavalle

Argentino Quintavalle è studioso biblico ed esperto in Protestantesimo e Giudaismo. Autore del libro “Apocalisse - commento esegetico” (disponibile su Amazon) e specializzato in catechesi per protestanti che desiderano tornare nella Chiesa Cattolica.

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To enter into communion with God, before observing the laws or satisfying religious precepts, it is necessary to live out a real and concrete relationship with him […] And this “scandalousness” is well represented by the sacrament of the Eucharist: what sense can there be, in the eyes of the world, in kneeling before a piece of bread? Why on earth should someone be nourished assiduously with this bread? The world is scandalized (Pope Francis)

Per entrare in comunione con Dio, prima di osservare delle leggi o soddisfare dei precetti religiosi, occorre vivere una relazione reale e concreta con Lui […] E questa “scandalosità” è ben rappresentata dal sacramento dell’Eucaristia: che senso può avere, agli occhi del mondo, inginocchiarsi davanti a un pezzo di pane? Perché mai nutrirsi assiduamente di questo pane? Il mondo si scandalizza (Papa Francesco)

What is meant by “eat the flesh and drink the blood” of Jesus? Is it just an image, a figure of speech, a symbol, or does it indicate something real? (Pope Francis)

Che significa “mangiare la carne e bere il sangue” di Gesù?, è solo un’immagine, un modo di dire, un simbolo, o indica qualcosa di reale? (Papa Francesco)

What does bread of life mean? We need bread to live. Those who are hungry do not ask for refined and expensive food, they ask for bread. Those who are unemployed do not ask for enormous wages, but the “bread” of employment. Jesus reveals himself as bread, that is, the essential, what is necessary for everyday life; without Him it does not work (Pope Francis)

Che cosa significa pane della vita? Per vivere c’è bisogno di pane. Chi ha fame non chiede cibi raffinati e costosi, chiede pane. Chi è senza lavoro non chiede stipendi enormi, ma il “pane” di un impiego. Gesù si rivela come il pane, cioè l’essenziale, il necessario per la vita di ogni giorno, senza di Lui la cosa non funziona (Papa Francesco)

In addition to physical hunger man carries within him another hunger — all of us have this hunger — a more important hunger, which cannot be satisfied with ordinary food. It is a hunger for life, a hunger for eternity which He alone can satisfy, as he is «the bread of life» (Pope Francis)

Oltre alla fame fisica l’uomo porta in sé un’altra fame – tutti noi abbiamo questa fame – una fame più importante, che non può essere saziata con un cibo ordinario. Si tratta di fame di vita, di fame di eternità che Lui solo può appagare, in quanto è «il pane della vita» (Papa Francesco)

The Eucharist draws us into Jesus' act of self-oblation. More than just statically receiving the incarnate Logos, we enter into the very dynamic of his self-giving [Pope Benedict]

L'Eucaristia ci attira nell'atto oblativo di Gesù. Noi non riceviamo soltanto in modo statico il Logos incarnato, ma veniamo coinvolti nella dinamica della sua donazione [Papa Benedetto]

Jesus, the true bread of life that satisfies our hunger for meaning and for truth, cannot be “earned” with human work; he comes to us only as a gift of God’s love, as a work of God (Pope Benedict)

Gesù, vero pane di vita che sazia la nostra fame di senso, di verità, non si può «guadagnare» con il lavoro umano; viene a noi soltanto come dono dell’amore di Dio, come opera di Dio (Papa Benedetto)

Jesus, who shared his quality as a "stone" in Simon, also communicates to him his mission as a "shepherd". It is a communication that implies an intimate communion, which also transpires from the formulation of Jesus: "Feed my lambs... my sheep" (Pope John Paul II)

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