Lumen Fidei - page 18

18
The fullness of Christian faith
15. “Abraham rejoiced that he would see my
day; he saw it and was glad” ( Jn 8:56). According
to these words of Jesus, Abraham’s faith point-
ed to him; in some sense it foresaw his mystery.
So Saint Augustine understood it when he stated
that the patriarchs were saved by faith, not faith
in Christ who had come but in Christ who was
yet to come, a faith pressing towards the future
of Jesus. 13 Christian faith is centred on Christ;
it is the confession that Jesus is Lord and that
God has raised him from the dead (cf. Rom 10:9).
All the threads of the Old Testament converge
on Christ; he becomes the definitive “Yes” to all
the promises, the ultimate basis of our “Amen”
to God (cf. 2 Cor 1:20). The history of Jesus is
the complete manifestation of God’s reliability.
If Israel continued to recall God’s great acts of
love, which formed the core of its confession of
faith and broadened its gaze in faith, the life of
Jesus now appears as the locus of God’s defin-
itive intervention, the supreme manifestation of
his love for us. The word which God speaks to
us in Jesus is not simply one word among many,
but his eternal Word (cf. Heb 1:1-2). God can give
no greater guarantee of his love, as Saint Paul
reminds us (cf. Rom 8:31-39). Christian faith is
thus faith in a perfect love, in its decisive power,
in its ability to transform the world and to unfold
its history. “We know and believe the love that
13 Cf. In Ioh. Evang., 45, 9: PL 35, 1722-1723.