TUESDAY IN HOLY WEEK

Jesus Christ's acceptance of suffering and death

24.1       First Point

It is admirable that at one time Jesus Christ hid from the eyes of his enemies, escaped from their hands, kept away from them, and did not want to appear in public because he knew that they were planning to put him to death,[i] while at another time he went to the place where he knew that those who wanted to kill him would come looking for him. When they came for him, he stepped forward, presented himself before them, and allowed himself to be arrested, bound, and led away, knowing, as the Gospel says, everything that would happen to him,[ii] that he would be delivered into the hands of sinners.[iii]

            Adore these different dispositions of Jesus Christ, which were conformable to the plans God had for him. As he himself said, the will of his Father was his nourishment,[iv] that is, the rule and, as it were, the soul of his conduct.

            Strive after the example of your divine master Jesus Christ to want only what God wants, when he wants it, and in the way he wants it.

24.2       Second Point

The Gospel tells us that the reason for these different dispositions of Jesus Christ was that on the prior occasions his hour had not yet come,[v] and that later, he knew that the time and the hour for leaving this world and going back to the Father had indeed arrived.[vi] That is why, when Judas went out to do what he had agreed upon with the enemies of Jesus, Jesus told him: Be quick about what you are going to do.[vii]

            This was to give us to understand that he had waited to allow himself to be arrested and to deliver himself up to death until the hour that had been determined by his Eternal Father. This shows us that Jesus Christ followed in detail his orders from heaven and wanted everything he had to do and suffer to be prescribed for him by his Father.

            Imitate this admirable example given you by Jesus Christ; do nothing on your own initiative, but let everything you have to do, down to the slightest details, be ruled and prescribed by your superiors.

24.3       Third Point[viii]

This is how Jesus Christ abandoned himself entirely to the will of his Father, to suffer and die when and in the way God willed. He did this when he was preparing himself for his passion and death, while he waited and prayed in the garden of olives. He declared to his Father that despite the repugnance he felt for the death which he knew was imminent, he desired nonetheless that no account be taken of his own will, but that of his Father's,[ix] to which he gave himself entirely, just as he had always been abandoned to his Father's will during his life, not coming into the world as he says in several places in the Gospel, to do his own will, but the will of the One who sent him.[x]

            O lovable abandon of Jesus' human will, submitting to the divine will in all things and having no preference either for life or death, for the time or the way he was to suffer other than what was chosen for him by his Eternal Father. Make yourselves disciples of Jesus in this way in order to have no other will than God's.