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In His own body He brought your sins to the cross, so that all of us, dead to sin, could live in accord with God's will. By His wounds you were healed. (1 Pet 2:24) |
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In His own body He brought your sins to the cross, so that all of us, dead to sin, could live in accord with God's will. By His wounds you were healed. (1 Pet 2:24) |
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In the cross we find healing. Always we must remember that the reason Jesus went through the great sufferings of the cross was that we might be healed. Our loving Father knows the weakness, the sickness and the sufferings of each one of us. No matter how big or how small our need, Jesus is there for us. Our sicknesses, our pains, our suffering both of soul and body can all be taken care of through the cross. Instead of being fearful of it, like a small child who is afraid of a vaccination needle we must open our hearts to embrace the cross as the remedy for our sufferings. Jesus is our physician. As we put our whole trust in Him, we cast aside our natural aversion to the cross and accept it as readily as we would trust a medical doctor who might have to cause us some pain in order to make us well. A few weeks ago one of our sisters had some visiting family with two small boys. Although the two boys got along wonderfully together they were as different in their characters as night and day. School was starting and so they had to go to the doctor to get a shot from the nurse. The oldest one got his shot first and became almost hysterical with his crying and wailing. It took a long time to love and quiet him down. The second boy, marched up to the nurse and pointed to the needle she was holding and said, "What's that?" The nurse said, "This is a needle and I am going to give you a vaccination". He said, "Oh". And held out his arm like he had seen his brother do and the nurse carefully gave him a shot. Once done, he went marching off to his dad and held out his arm proudly and said, "Look Dad, I got a vaccination!" Same nurse, same shot and two different reactions! The only way we are going to get into Heaven is through the door that Jesus has opened for us. The door that contains the Cross. We can be afraid of it or embrace it. Our healing both now and forever is found through it. Jesus said, "People who are healthy do not need a doctor; sick people do" (Mk 2:17). All of us are sick and know friends, family and loved ones who are sick. As we pray this final day of the novena for the Stigmata of Saint Francis - let us place our sickness and sins before the cross, before our loving Saviour Jesus Christ who embraced it to bring us healing.
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