The third of the Suffering Servant songs again uses the voice of the servant himself. Through his voice, we learn the true meaning of his suffering, the suffering that comes through humiliation and shame. While the people of the Western World tend to accentuate the pain that Jesus endured through the torture of his passion, the people of the Middle East would have found the humiliation he endured at the hands of his torturers to be far more painful.
Yet we hear the Servant declare in a strong voice, “The Lord GOD is my help, therefore I am not disgraced.” A few verses later, he amplifies his declaration when he states, “He is near who upholds my right.” While we tend to make a great deal of the fact that Jesus utters the words of Psalm 22 while hanging on the cross, perhaps even more importantly, Jesus also says, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.” Indeed, he never lost sight of the fact that God was with him in his suffering because the Father and he were one.
Every one of us would like nothing less than to escape this life without physical pain and suffering. At the same time, none of us wants to endure humiliation and scorn. However, it is important that we remember that no matter what suffering we may be asked to endure, God is always with us in those moments. The Lord God is our help. We have nothing to fear.
Once again we see this fact in our daily Eucharist as God comes among us and feeds us. God’s strength becomes ours when we consume the Body and Blood of Jesus, the very presence of God in our midst.
Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator