THE DESOLATION OF JESUS’ HEART

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mathew 27: 46). What did Jesus mean? Was He just borrowing that phrase Psalm 22? Had God the Father really abandoned the Son? Or was Jesus showing the desolation that had overtaken Him?

In order to redeem us, Jesus wished to go through everything that sin entails. Now, the most serious consequence of sin is the breaking of the union that exists between God and each individual. While dying on the Cross, Jesus felt in the depths of His most loving Heart, the breaking of the union between the Man Jesus and God the Father. That is why He felt forsaken by the Father. He really did! Such was His desolation at this crucial moment.

And that goes to show how serious sin is! In sin we abandon God, we separate ourselves from God. Sin tears the bond that exists between our heart and our Lord’s Heart. And it is a real rupture! It actually breaks the union that exists between God and each individual.

Just as mere human love tends, not only to maintain the bond, but to make it stronger, God’s Love wishes the same but in an infinite measure. He wants to make that bond stronger every minute, every hour, every day.

But what do we do when we continue to sin? We reject that bonding Love.

Some of us have had a taste of what that desolation could mean. Some have suffered it in conjugal love. But also have parents of rebellious teenagers. Did we not feel desolation when our partner broke away? Have we not felt that sadness when our teenage child rejects us, choosing the wrong path?

Don’t we feel that rejection tearing our hearts? Don’t we feel impotent for their choices, wishing we could change them?

Now, just imagine Jesus’ torn Heart when so many human beings -past, present and future- reject Him.

The horrendous physical suffering that Jesus went through in His passion pales in comparison to the desolation that Jesus’ Heart feels when we sin. And that desolation caused by our sins is what made Him suffer the rupture from His Father.

Should we not then remember every time we sin or when we are about to sin that we are contributing to that pain? Why not try to imitate Jesus’s Love and console His Heart?

THE LAST SEVEN WORDS FROM THE CROSS - Series:

First Word: "Father forgive them for they know not what they do"

Second Word: "Truly, I say to you, today you will be with Me in Paradise"

Third Word: "Jesus said to his mother: "Woman, this is your son." Then he said to the disciple: "This is your mother."

Fourth Word - "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me"

Fifth Word: "I Thirst"

Sixth Word: "It is finished"

Seventh Word: "Father, into Thy Hands I commend My Spirit"