Oct 8 Thu
What will I learn by looking at Jesus’ hands?
Jesus, show me your hands, hands of forgiveness and compassion, hands of healing and mercy, hands of anointing and blessing, which impelled you to give yourself into the hands of your brothers.
Open to the events and accepting the difficulties you encountered on your way, Lord, you allowed yourself to be chiseled by the Will of your Father, God, carrying on your shoulders all the consequences of the Gospel, until you saw your own hands full of love, full of forgiveness: “Look at my hands,” you said to Thomas (Jn 20:27), and you are saying it to each one of us.
“You too, friend, may find yourself now hearing His gentle reproach to Thomas: 'Let me have your finger; see, here are my hands. Let me have your hand; put it into my side. Cease your doubting, and believe;' and, with the Apostle, a sincere cry of contrition will rise from your soul: 'My Lord, and my God!' I acknowledge you once and for all as the Master. From now on, with your help, I shall always treasure your teachings, and I shall strive to follow them loyally."
Jesus’ wounded hands are stretched out and never cease to offer themselves, so that you may know the love that God has for you and then believe in him (cf. 1 Jn 4:16).
But now, look at YOUR hands; can Jesus find them busy, engaged in the mission that He has entrusted to you?
“Father, into your hands I commend my spirit;” this is the invitation and the program of life that Jesus whispers and wants to offer to you; He wants to mold you like a potter molds a clay vessel (cf. Is 29:16); to put in you the heart of a shepherd, until you share the same sentiments of Christ Jesus (cf. Phil 2:5), until your heart and his Heart beat in unison.
“Then, you will have this unity of life, this urge for contemplation in the middle of the world – in the middle of the street, in the open air, in the sun and the rain – not only will you be driven by a desire to keep working at your temporal task and not distance yourselves from earthly realities, but you will be spurred on by your apostolic zeal to enter all those secular realities courageously, to reveal the divine demands that they contain. You will teach others that the fraternity of God’s children is the great solution to the world’s problems, because human fraternity has a supernatural meaning. You will draw people out of the shell of their selfishness. At the same time, for those who seem lost in the crowd, you will guarantee the personality and true freedom they need. In short, you will open up the divine paths of the earth to all men and women."
Jesus, help me to give an apostolic meaning to my life, becoming like a pool of clear water, from which a river flows to irrigate the fields, but not like a stagnant pool, a swamp of egoism. Help me to be your hands.