Bishop Challoner's Meditations - March 17th

FRIDAY, THIRD WEEK IN LENT

ON OTHER CONSIDERATIONS TO EXCITE IN THE SOUL THE LOVE OF OUR SUFFERING JESUS

Consider first, how affectionate is the love that Christ bears us in his passion. It is stronger than deaths; he loves us more than his own life, since he parts with his life for the love of us. It is more tender than the love of the tenderest mother, since he voluntarily embraces the pangs of death to give us life; he sheds his blood to cleanse our souls from sin; he offers his own body in sacrifice to be our victim, our ransom, and our food. At the very time he is suffering amid dying for us, he has every one of us in his heart; he embraces each with an incomparable affection; weeps over each one, prays for each one, and pours out his blood for each one, no less than if he had suffered for that one alone. O my soul, had we then a place in the heart of our Jesus, when he was hanging upon the cross? and shall we ever refuse him a place in our heart? No, dear Saviour, my heart is thine; it desires nothing better than to be for ever a servant of thy love.

Consider 2ndly, how effectual is the love that Christ shows us in his passion; it contents not itself with words or professions of affection, nor with such passing sentiments of tenderness as we imagine we have for him in certain fits of devotion, at times when nothing occurs for us to suffer for his sake; but it shows itself by its effects, by his taking upon himself all our evils, to procure effectually all good for us. His love has made him divest himself of all his beauty and comeliness, and hide all his glory and majesty, that he might become for us, 'despised and the most abject of men, a man of sorrow and acquainted with infirmity.' Isaia iii. 'He hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows' out of pure love. He has made himself for the love of us, 'as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and afflicted. He was wounded for our iniquities, and bruised for our sins. For we like sheep have gone astray, and the Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was offered because it was his own will.' And it was his own will, because he loved us, and desired to transfer to himself the punishment due to us, that he might deliver us from the wrath to come, and open to us the fountains of mercy, grace, and life. This was an effectual love indeed. Does our love for him show itself by the like effects? Are we willing to renounce our own will, to mortify our inclinations and passions, to suffer and to bear our crosses for him? A generous lover is as willing to be with him on mount Calvary, as on mount Thabor. Is this our disposition?

Consider 3rdly, how disinterested is the love that Christ shows us in his passion. He loves us without any merit on our side; we deserved nothing from him but hell. He loves us without any prospect of gain to himself from us, or any return that we can make to him; we can give him nothing but what he must first give us; we can offer him no good thing but what his love has purchased for us; we can have nothing but what is his. He stands in no need at all of us, or our goods. O how truly generous is this love of our Redeemer in his passion! How bountiful is he to us! He makes over to us the infinite treasures of his merits; he wants them not for himself, but bequeaths them all to us. His love for us knows no bounds. It hath possessed his heart from the first instant of his conception: it burned there for every moment of his life; it carried him through all his sufferings, even to death. It is without beginning or end; it endures from eternity to eternity. O bright fire, mayest thou take possession of my soul, for time and eternity!

Conclude, since thou canst make no better return, to offer at least daily thy heart with all its affections to thy loving Saviour. But that it may be worthy of his acceptance, beg that he would cleanse it by his precious blood, and inflame it with his love.