"people who are well do not need a doctor but only those who are sick" (Matthew 9: 12). He is that great healer of all seasons. The greatest healing that he administered to us is healing us from death; thereby making death not to be a serious bother. As Martin Luther King captured this idea,
Death is (now) not the end. Death is (now) not a period that ends the great sentence of life, but a comma that punctuates it to a more lofty significance, Death is not a blind alley that leads man into life eternal... (King 1986:101),
These words get their affirmation from St. Paul's (Philippians 1: 21) words when he says, "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain .. ,." Thus Christ, the African guest brings many gifts including the gifts of healing us from death, thereby making it necessary to receive him with great anticipation.
demonstrate that enonnous potential capable of transfonning strangers into rightful and respectable citizens" (Udoh 1988:200). Thus, through the initiation by ritual process, Christ is dedicated to new benefits and to new commitments.
2.Christas a Kin
Christ now enjoys the same citizenship as his host whose history and destiny he now shares. His new status is characterised as participatory, relational and friendly tenns.
3.Christ as divine Lord and King
Christ as Lord means, " he is the head of the household, of our lives and our daily deliberations"
(Udoh 1988:254). Udoh also brings out some interesting scriptural parallels:
The idea of Jesus as a guest is not totally new. The N.T. is particularly familiar with this portrait. Thus John observed that Christ was in the world, but the world failed to recognise him adding that he entered his own cultural realm and his own would not receive him (John 1: 1-10). Jesus was not only an unknown. On many public occasions he was publicly rejected .... Already aware of his alien image in the world, Jesus once warned an aspiring attorney who may have misread the sign of the kingdom, thus: 'Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests; but the son of man has nowhere to lay his head' (Matthew 8:20)) (Udoh 1988:229- 230).
In trying to interpret Udoh, we find that he has a point in asserting the foreignness in Christ of the 19th century missionaries to Africa. Though they did a commendable job in introducing Christianity, commerce, modem fonn of education and medicine, their Christological
than the less disease-resistant cola nidita, which the Igbo call gworo-a Hausa word for Kola-nut. The Igbo Kola-nut (cola acuminata) is so unique that every component part seems to carry a symbolic charge, ranging from its structure to its colour and taste. In attempting to show the importance of the Kola-nut among the Igbo, Ekwunife (1990: 109) writes,
Kola-nut expresses, communicates and unifies Igbo ideas of friendship, acceptance and approval, achievement, productivity and wealth; joy and sorrow; family, village and clan;
royalty and diversity of the Igbo world; hierarchy, authority, royalty and purity; wholeness of the human being; fullness of life and the perpetual presence of the spirits among men (sic).
presentation was faulty. The Christ of the missionary is, therefore, a stranger in Africa. He remains too often a western Christ. His status, no doubt, is then similar to that of an illegal alien;
for in Africa, one remains an outsider until initiated into the beliefs and practices of African societies and communities (see Healey and Sybertz 1988: 188-189).
After being initiated into Africa, the African believer realises that he is the actual host and the Master of hospitality (John 1: 1). He was there from the beginning and he fits into the beliefs and practices of African societies and communities as discussed above. In any case, hospitality is genuinely African (Kenyatta 1938: 41-52). In East Africa, for instance, the word Karibu (Swahili for welcome) is more often spoken. It symbolises and embodies African life; for the true African is always a host. An indigenised African Christ is, therefore, also a host; indeed a host par excellence, a Master of hospitality.
The image of Christ as the perfect host or Master of hospitality carries with it the connotation of an indigenised Christ, a native to Africa. This should be the actual interpretation of Bediako's (1995) emphasis on Christianity as no longer a western religion. African Christology will no doubt contend with the fact that Christ is as African as anything else; yet he is not only African, he is universal host (see Mugambi 1995:90). He is a pan-ethnic host, a host to Africans and also to non-Africans. He is particularly host to the poor (Luke 4: 18-20), those without status in society, and to women (Luke 24: 1-12). Thus Christ the host is not only an inculturated Christ but a liberating Christ. He welcomes all into the realm of God (Mathew 11 :28-31, Matthew 6:
33). He welcomes all to share in God's dream for humanity (Matthew 28: 18-20).
Christ as host is a biblical image, and various scholars in Africa have stressed the importance of the scriptures for doing theology in Africa.151 Indeed, the earthly Jesus was always in solidarity with people-which was one of his fundamental characteristics (Mugambi 1995: 90). He welcomed them and in turn, they felt welcomed by him; for as he says, " I am the true vine ...
remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me" (John 15: 1-4). By declaring that he is
151See The Bible in African Christianity, essays in Biblical Theology, eds. Hannah Kinoti and John M.
the vine and" you are the branches" (John 15:5), Christ confirms himself as the host-the Master of hospitality. No meaningful development can take place without him, as we would be operating on a deficit rather than the asset.
Christ's parables in which a meal to which many were invited played a significant role in his teaching about God and God's kingdom. In particular, the parable of the wedding feast (Matthew 22: 2-10, Luke 14: 15-20); plays a significant role in addressing the above point. In multiplying the fish and loaves, he played host to the crowds, not only nourishing them with a word of exhortation but also by providing for them with food (Matthew 14: 13-21). Indeed he is noted for the meals he shared.
St. Paul addresses this theme when he later put it this way, " in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither slave nor free, neither male nor female" (Galatians 3: 28). This shows that we must grapple with the tension between the fact that Christ was Jewish and yet in another sense, he transcended Judaism while still remaining thoroughly Jewish. So Christ must also be indigenously African, although not only African, for he transcends our human categories. This view is borrowed from Abbey (2001:151) and Nasimiyu-Wasike (1992: 76) when tackling the gender of Christ when they insist that Jesus was a man whose mission pointed towards humanity and not necessarily revolving around man for indeed, " Jesus was a man, a masculine being; but as messiah, Christ supersedes humanity" (Abbey 2001:151). Indeed, Jesus is African, initiated in all our rites of passage but on the other hand as messiah, he supersedes our Africanness. In Christ therefore, there is neither Zulu nor Xhosa, neither, Pedi nor Tswana, neither Shona, nor Kikuyu, neither Blacks nor whites, neither African nor European. In African Christian hospitality, therefore, we all experience both our dignity and our equality. Since Christ has made us equal, we ought to discard both inferiority and superiority status (Mark 10: 44). In any case, Christ the African host, also hosts all of Africa respecting, while at the same time relativising tribal and ethnic identities, affirming our identities and yet challenging us to see our human identity and solidarity as well. Christ is thus, the universal host of all peoples.
In evaluating the question of Christ as the host/master of hospitality, we realise that the image of host manifests both the generosity of God (through Christ) and the generosity ethic of Africans.
Itcalls forth from us a response of gratitude. We must be grateful to Christ who has come to us and welcomes us in spite of the destructive ways in which he was preached among us, by the pioneers of Christianity in this part of the world. We must be grateful that as host/Master of hospitality, he has come to us as Africans. And through the invitation to follow Christ or to dine with him, we are invited into a living relationship with God, to dine with God, both now and at the eschatological banquet (Matthew 22: 1-22). Thus Africa's Christ goes back to the question:
"Who do you say I am?" (Luke 9: 18-21). And the obvious answer to Christ is: " yes Jesus, we know that you are our host and we are your guests."