60 — JESUS AND THE FATHER’S WILL

Presence of God. — O Jesus, teach me to follow You in Your life of total, most perfect adhesion to the Father’s will.

Meditation

1 — Christ, “coming into the world, says [to the Father]: You did not will sacrifice and offering, but You prepared a body for me... Behold, I come to do, O God, Your will” (Heb. 10, 5 and 7). This is Jesus’ constant disposition before the Father’s will. To the Apostles, who urge Him to take some food, the divine Master answers: “I have food to eat that you do not know... My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to bring His work to completion” (Jn. 4, 32 and 34). What Jesus longs for, what restores Him, is only to accomplish His Father’s will: His interior gaze is always fixed there, and He does not perform the least action, does not speak a word, that is not conformed to the Father’s will. Jesus’ human will is in the fullest and most perfect way transformed, lost in God’s will, so that He acts only under its impulse. “I came down from heaven not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me... I seek not My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me” (Jn. 6, 38; 5, 30). Thus Jesus Himself reveals to us the dispositions of His Soul, the deep motive of His actions, the rule that guides Him through His whole life, even to His most painful Passion when, though feeling the repugnances of His human nature, He repeats: “Father, let not My will but Yours be done” (Lk. 22, 42).

2 — As adopted children of God, for us too the way of holiness, the rule of our conduct, must be the will of the heavenly Father. We must, like Jesus, “feed” on this holy and sanctifying will, and feed on it at every moment, seeking nothing else, desiring only to live by it and make it the one great spring of action in our life. “One must attain full conformity of our will with God’s will, so that” - as St. John of the Cross teaches - “in our thinking and acting there may be nothing contrary to the divine will” (cf. S.I, 11, 2).

Conformity to God’s will and the development in us of grace are the two constitutive elements of holiness, of life of union with God; elements that go hand in hand, because one conditions the other: greater conformity of will corresponds to greater grace. Jesus said: “If anyone loves Me he will keep My word... and We will come to him and make Our dwelling with him” (Jn. 14, 23). Observance of the word, that is, of God’s will manifested in the commandments, is the condition for living in grace and therefore for enjoying the indwelling of the Trinity in our souls. As conformity to the divine will becomes fuller, so as to observe not only grave precepts but every least detail of God’s law, so as to exclude not only mortal sins but also venial sins, up to the smallest voluntary imperfection, as one comes to seek divine good pleasure in everything and to embrace all that God in any way wills and permits for us, the life of grace grows and develops. Correspondingly the Most Holy Trinity gives itself ever more to the soul, comes to make Its dwelling in an ever fuller and deeper way, thus making possible for the soul a greater union with It.

Jesus too said: the Father “is with Me and has not left Me alone, because I always do what pleases Him” (Jn. 8, 29).

Colloquy

O Jesus, how I would like to understand at least a little of Your closest union with the Father’s will! - A union not only profound, but unalterable, because - I know - as God You can have no will other than the Father’s, and as man Your will does not depend on a human self but belongs directly to Your divine Person. Such a union can occur only in You, who are the Incarnate Word, and yet the more I contemplate it, the more I feel driven to reproduce in myself at least some trait of it. It is You, O Jesus, who inspire this desire in me, You who made Yourself our brother, our model, precisely that we might be like You. Was it not You who taught us to say to the heavenly Father: “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”? Oh yes, as this divine will was perfectly fulfilled in the heaven of Your most holy Soul, so may it be fulfilled in the little heaven of my soul!

“O good Master, You know that there is nothing more advantageous for me than to consecrate my will to Your Father; and knowing that by this way one can gain Your Father’s heart, You teach it to me and teach me the way to serve Him. Indeed, You Yourself became my intermediary and in my name too You said to Him: Thy will be done.

“O divine Father, after Your Son, together with everyone’s will, has consecrated mine too to You, it is not reasonable that I should not keep His word...

“O Lord, what power with You is there not in the gift of the will! If it were made with the generosity with which it should be made, it could not fail to draw You, the Almighty, to make Yourself one with our weakness, transforming us in You, the creature in the Creator... O my God, the more You see that the gift of our will is shown not by words of compliment but by works, the more You draw us to Yourself, raising the soul above itself and all earthly things... And, not content with having united it to Yourself, making Yourself one with it, You will begin to place in it Your delights and to disclose to it Your secrets...

“At this instant, O my God, freely and without reserve, I consecrate my will to You!” (cf. T.G. Cam. 32, 4).