Devotion for today: the wound of abandonment

Today we contemplate the Fifth Sorrowful Mystery: The Crucifixion and Death of Jesus on the Cross

Scripture for meditation: Isaiah 53:8

He was cut off from the land of the living.

Christ says: John 12:32
“When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men to Myself, says the Lord.”

Meditation: The Wound of Abandonment
On the Cross Jesus felt completely abandoned. “My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?” Earth didn’t want Him and Heaven wouldn’t have Him. “For our sakes God made Him who did not know sin, to be sin so that in Him we might become the very holiness of God.” Good Friday follows Holy Thursday because Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross was the price He lovingly paid to give us the complete gift of Himself in the Holy Eucharist and to become our Divine Companion in this most Blessed Sacrament.

When we unite ourselves to Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, we love the Father with the perfect love of the Heart of Jesus. The Eucharist is an immolation of love where Jesus continuously “pleads for us” with the seven last words He prayed on the Cross:

“Father forgive them” – for those in most need of mercy;

“Why have You abandoned Me?” – for those who feel forsaken;

“Behold your Mother” – to a world consecrated to her;

“I thirst” - to be loved by all in this most Blessed Sacrament;

“You shall be with Me in paradise” – to those who visit Him here, for the Eucharist is a pledge of glory and a foretaste of heaven;

“Into Your hands I commend My Spirit”- as this time Jesus places each of us into His Sacred Heart and commends us now to His Heavenly Father, that the Father may see and love in us what He sees and loves in His only begotten Son;

“It is finished” – as there is nothing more that Jesus can give us than the complete gift of Himself in this Holy Eucharist which is all that He has and all that He is.

He gave up His body on the Cross for love of us that He may give His body to us in the Holy Eucharist, that we may be one with Him forever in everlasting glory.

Blessed Sacrament Prayer:

On each bead of this mystery, Jesus, we offer You all the comfort of Your Holy Mother who stood by You when You were alone and abandoned on the Cross, for again You are alone and abandoned in so many tabernacles of the world. We beg You, Jesus, to draw all men to Your Eucharistic Heart for You have said: “When I am lifted up from the earth I will draw all men to Myself.”

This selection is taken from the book Come To Me In The Blessed Sacrament by Fr. Vincent Martin Lucia, Apostolate for Perpetual Adoration, Mt. Clemens, Michigan.