From the responsorial psalm: “Let your face shine upon your servant; save me in your kindness. Take courage and be stouthearted, all you who hope in the LORD. Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”
A reading from the holy Gospel according to John (Jn 18:1—19:42)
Until the moment of his death, Jesus was aware that he was accomplishing his Father’s will. Throughout the days leading up to his passion and through all its brutality, he never lost sight of it and in the last moment knew when he had fulfilled all he was sent to fulfill. What was it Jesus thirsted for? To be sure, as a man, he thirsted as a man thirsts; as Immanuel, he thirsted not for any created thing but for the salvation of all. In saying “It is finished,” the Son announces to the Father in that moment the finality of life but also the beginning of the end of sin and death in his glorious resurrection to come. Jesus’ death on the cross is not an end but for all who believe in him the full flowering of the hope of the resurrection.
God, in contemplating the death of your Only Begotten Son on the cross, I strive to see the profound depth and breadth of its effects, for the sake of the whole world and for my own sake. Help me weigh the small sacrifices I make today against the weight of your crucifixion. There is no comparison, and it could be that all I can do today is stand in wonder of that. Give me the grace to know more deeply the meaning of the crucifixion; teach me through obedience to your will the meaning of suffering as a means of sanctification. A sinner, I am inclined to want to look away from the crucifixion and what it draws me to—Christ your Son—but I can’t look away. Help me understand who it is I behold and what it means.