The passion of Jesus: a God made man

God's word
"In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God ... And the Word became flesh and came to dwell among us; and we saw his glory, glory as the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth "(Jn 1,1.14).

“Therefore he had to make himself similar to his brothers in all things, to become a merciful and faithful high priest in things concerning God, in order to atone for the sins of the people. In fact just for being tested and suffering personally, he is able to come to the aid of those who undergo the test ... In fact we do not have a high priest who does not know how to pity our infirmities, having been tried himself in everything, in the likeness of us, excluding sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with full confidence "(Heb 2,17: 18-4,15; 16: XNUMX-XNUMX).

For comprehension
- By approaching to meditate on his Passion, we must always keep in mind who Jesus is: true God and true man. We must avoid the risk of looking only at man, dwelling only on his physical sufferings and falling into a vague sentimentalism; or look only at God, without being able to understand the man of pain.

- It would be good, before starting a cycle of meditations on the Passion of Jesus, to reread the "Letter to the Hebrews" and the first great encyclical of John Paul Il, "Redemptor Hominis" (The Redeemer of man, 1979), to understand the mystery of Jesus and approach him with a true devotion, illuminated by faith.

Reflect
- Jesus asked the Apostles: "Who do you say I am?" Simon Peter replied: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Mt 16,15: 16-50). Jesus is truly the Son of God in all equal to the Father, he is the Word, the Creator of all things. Only Jesus can say: "The Father and I are one". But Jesus, Son of God, in the Gospels loves to call himself "Son of man" about 4,15 times, to make us understand that he is a real man, son of Adam, like all of us, in all similar to us, except sin (Cf. Heb XNUMX:XNUMX).

- "Although Jesus was of a divine nature, he stripped himself, assuming the condition of a servant and becoming like men" (Phil 2,5-8). Jesus "stripped himself", almost emptied himself of the greatness and glory that he had as God, to be similar in everything to us; he accepted kenosis, that is, he lowered himself, to raise us; came down to us, to lift us up to God.

- If we want to fully understand the mystery of his Passion, we must fully know the man Christ Jesus, his divine and human nature and above all his feelings. Jesus had a perfect human nature, a fully human heart, a full human sensitivity, with all those feelings that are found in a human soul not polluted by sin.

- Jesus was the man with strong, strong and tender feelings, which made his person fascinating. It radiated sympathy, joy, trust and dragged the crowds. But the summit of Jesus' feelings was manifested before children, the weak, the poor, the sick; in such situations he revealed all his tenderness, compassion, delicacy of feelings: he embraces children like a mother; he feels compassion before the dead young man, son of a widow, before the hungry and scattered crowds; he cries in front of the tomb of his friend Lazarus; she bends over every pain she encounters on her way.

- Precisely because of this great human sensitivity we can say that Jesus suffered more than any other man. There have been men who have suffered greater and longer physical pain than Him; but no man has had his delicacy and his physical and inner sensitivity, therefore no one has ever suffered like Him. Isaiah rightly calls him "the man of pain who knows well to suffer" (Is 53: 3).

Compare
- Jesus, Son of God, is my brother. Removed the sin, he had my feelings, he met my difficulties, he knows my problems. For this reason, "I will approach the throne of grace with full confidence", confident that he will understand and sympathize with me.

- In meditating on the Passion of the Lord, I will try above all to reflect on the inner feelings of Jesus, to enter his heart and explore the immensity of his pain. St. Paul of the Cross often asked himself: "Jesus, how was your heart while you were suffering those torments?".

Thought of Saint Paul of the Cross: “I wish that in these days of the sacred Advent the soul would rise to the contemplation of the ineffable mystery of the mysteries, of the Incarnation of the Divine Word… Let the soul remain absorbed in that highest wonder and amorous amazement, seeing with faith the immaculate impiccolito, the infinite greatness humiliated for the love of man "(LI, 248).