Lectio divina

Lectio divina

What are these commandments?

The Lord said to Moses, "Come up to me on the mountain and stay there; I will give you the tablets of stone, the law and the commandments that I have written to teach them." (Exodus 24:12). "... on Mount Sinai, he gave him the two tablets of the testimony, tablets of stone, written by the finger of God"
(Exodus 31:18)

There are ten commandments and in them there are rules that preserve man from unhappiness. Naturally, since they are prescriptions, non-observance determines sanctions that, depending on the severity, can determine eternal condemnation.

We must keep in mind the snares that Satan prepares for those who wish to walk towards the light and escape from his clutches: "Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, those who keep the commandments of God and hold fast the testimony of Jesus."
(Rev 12:17)

By observing the Commandments it is possible, as we have seen, to enter eternal life. Not only because: "Whoever receives my commandments and keeps them, he loves me. Whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him."
(Jn 14:21).

In every love there is the need for natural submission to the loved one. To love someone means to please him, to respond to his smallest desires, or rather, even more, to try to guess them, to anticipate them in order to satisfy them. Love chains .... binds to the loved one.

Jesus teaches us that to love him means to observe his commandments. The divine word excludes a priori contrasting errors. In fact, to those who make love for Jesus consist in a movement of sensitivity. Jesus teaches that on the contrary it resides in the act of the spirit and of the will that manifests itself with the practical observance of the commandments. Others instead claim that love for Jesus consists only in submission to his doctrine. Perhaps they are not far from affirming that, as the ancient religion was summarized in the observance of the Law, so the new one consists only in the observance of the commandments of the Gospel. Jesus, however, specified both the relationships of obedience and those of charity. He placed love at the origin, at the center and at the end of this order.

At the beginning, because it wants love to inspire obedience; at the center, because for all the commandments imposed there must be the law of charity; at the end, because it is through the triumph of love that He wants to be obeyed...

Obedience does not dry up love, rather it is the noblest and most effective proof that expresses it, manifests it, proves it and guarantees it. Love dominates it because it has other means to express itself. It is distinguished from it because it is addressed to an individual, while obedience aims at the commandment. There can be obedience without love, but there is no sincere love without submission, especially when the beloved being is Jesus Christ.

In addition to obedience to the commandments, love requires total submission to the Person of Jesus, both as God and as the Son of God.

"Through Him all things were made, and without Him was not anything made that was made." Total dependence of the finite being that, at every moment receives from God, through continuous creation, not only existence, but the very substance of created being, activity and all that is being in him. One can deny, ignore, forget or rebel against this dependence, however it exists.

When human intelligence glimpses to what extent it keeps man in absolute dependence on the necessary being, on "He who is", as God himself defined himself in the Old Testament, when, enlightened by faith, the soul understands in the brilliance of the light it receives, as a confidence made to it personally by Jesus, that this God, creator and Father, reveals himself as infinite Love, that "God is love" and that all his creative work is a work of charity, then the conviction of its dependence must necessarily blossom into boundless love of gratitude. Indeed, it pushes it to proclaim this dependence, to translate it effectively into spontaneous, free and happy submission.

The soul extends its dependence of love also to the holy Humanity of Jesus, today glorious, triumphant and rich in all the greatness and all the powers that befit the Head to govern the Mystical Body, to vivify it, to lead it to the full constitution of the total Christ.

But it is not enough, we must go further. What a change in the vision of things for the one who has understood his own vocation as a member! He knows that he was created for Jesus, to belong to him through all the fibers of his being of grace, to become part of him, in the unity of his Body. Without Jesus he cannot do anything ... outside of Jesus he cannot live true life: he is something only in Jesus and for Jesus!

Then Jesus is no longer only for the creature the absolute Master who is above her, and, from a distance, dominates and directs all things. He becomes the good Lord, the interior Master who, through the constant influence of his life, supports the supernatural being of the member and with the impulse of his Spirit, pushes him to fulfill, in the Mystical Body, his specific mission in the service of the Total Christ.

Loving Jesus does not therefore mean only accepting dependence: on the contrary, it means joyfully wanting his permanent and total dependence, for the expression of the Total Christ.

It is a great deception and, therefore, we are to be pitied when we want to maintain independence in our relationships with Jesus, to save our own freedom: because we suffocate love! Charity does not suffer dependence, but demands it! To love means to refuse to dispose of ourselves, to find happiness in letting ourselves be led docilely by Him!.