50 — “I AM THE TRUTH”

Presence of God. — O Jesus, Incarnate Word, splendor and light of the Father, instruct and enlighten my soul.

Meditation

1 — Jesus came to give us life and He also came to teach us the way that leads to life; He, source of life, is also Master of life.

Thus the heavenly Father presented Him to the world from the very beginning of His apostolate; the Holy Spirit who, immediately after Jesus’ baptism, descended upon Him in the form of a dove, and the voice heard from heaven: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3, 17), are, so to speak, the credentials that guarantee His teaching and are its profound reason. Who would not have faith in His word, if He is the Son of God and if the Holy Spirit is with Him? Two years later, on Tabor, the same presentation is renewed: same voice, same words: “This is my beloved Son,” but in addition we are given the explicit recommendation: “listen to Him!” (ibid., 17, 5), which brings His function as Master into even clearer light.

And Jesus Himself revealed Himself as Master, indeed as the only Master: “You call me Master... and you are right, for so I am” (Jn. 13, 13); “Do not let yourselves be called masters, for one alone is your Master, the Christ” (Mt. 23, 10). When Jesus affirmed that He is the Life, He also affirmed that He is the “Truth”; indeed, before Pilate who questioned Him about His origin and His mission, He declared: “I was born and came into the world to bear witness to the truth” (Jn. 18, 37). Whoever listens to His word listens to the truth: “If you remain in my word... you will know the truth and the truth will make you free” (Jn. 8, 31-32).

2 — Man may be a master, but he may also not be one, and yet he always remains man. Jesus, however, is Master by nature, precisely because He is the Incarnate Word. God is truth; all the truth that is in the Father is communicated to the Word and reaches us through Christ. Jesus is Master inasmuch as He is the Word, the Father’s substantial Word, who therefore contains and manifests all truth, all wisdom, all knowledge that can exist; indeed He Himself is the truth, is the wisdom, is the splendor, is the light of the Father. This is why Jesus was able to say that He is the only Master. Other masters know only a part of the truth; Jesus not only knows all truth but, as the Word, is the truth. Other masters teach truths that are superior to themselves and exist outside themselves, and therefore they always know them imperfectly; Jesus, on the other hand, teaches the truth that He Himself is by nature, and therefore His teaching is, in an absolute sense, unique and infallible. For this reason Jesus was able to say: “I have come as light into the world so that whoever believes in me may not remain in darkness” (Jn. 12, 46); and even more explicitly: “I am the light of the world” (ibid., 8, 12). Only Jesus can declare Himself light of the world, because only the Word is the light, is the word of God.

Jesus’ teaching is therefore not made of merely human words, however sublime and elevated they may be, but reflects the very word of God: to this word He invites us to open mind and heart.

Colloquy

“O divine Father, before us, Your children, You have set and opened that book of life which is Jesus Christ, God-Man, in whom there is found abundantly every thing one may desire to know. Reading in Him we shall be filled with blessed knowledge and we shall find every doctrine necessary for us and for others. Yet, O my soul, if you want to be enlightened and instructed you must read in this book of life not hastily or with light consideration, but calmly, attentively, and then you will be inflamed with divine love and you will know the truth.

“Before all things, O my soul, strive to know truly God and yourself; and you will not obtain this except by reading, contemplating, and acting in the book of life, Christ our Lord” (Blessed Angela of Foligno).

O Jesus, true light, dispel the darkness of my ignorance, the darkness born of my malice, and grant that with sincere heart I may seek the truth, love the truth, because the Truth is You, Incarnate Word.

Be You the only Light that illumines my way, the only Master who guides my steps. I need You, eternal Truth, to be freed from the slavery of so many weaknesses, miseries, passions that more or less blind my interior eye and prevent me from adhering totally to the good, to the truth that You teach me.

Your truth teaches me that You are He who is and I am he who is not, that You alone have worth and I have no worth in myself, that You are all and I am nothing and if anything good is in me, all, absolutely all, is Your gift.

O Jesus, grant that I may know how to seek and love Your truth even when it lashes me, even when for me it is a two-edged sword that lays bare my miseries, my faults, my wrongs. Grant that Your truth may penetrate my whole being and my whole acting; grant that I may know how to courageously reject every light that does not come from You.

Only Master, make me understand the vanity of every knowledge, of every thought that is not a reflection of Your truth. Immerse, O Lord, my soul in Your light, penetrate my mind and my heart with Your Truth; unite me to You, eternal Truth! O Jesus, Incarnate Word, incarnate Word of my God, instruct my soul; I want to learn everything from You, “I want to spend my life listening to You” (E.T. El).