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Job 14:22 "He feels only the pain of his own body, and he mourns only for himself."

 

Let's stop doing this! I am as guilty of it as anyone at times. When we are suffering, there is a great temptation to turn inward and focus on our own pain, failing to merge it with Jesus' suffering, failing to use it for our own good and the good of humanity.

 

Jesus didn't focus on His pain, He took it to the Father and offered it as a sacrifice for our salvation. He looked on those who were torturing Him with such love they did not know how to react (as Luisa Piccarreta reveals in The 24 Hours of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ). He was always looking outward, even in His agony.

 

That is how we should face suffering. We can think of the people with whom it is bringing us into communion, people who have suffered what we are going through, or worse; we can grow in love and empathy for all of humanity, realizing that everyone suffers in some way and needs support; we can use it as currency with the Father, asking in return for forgiveness for those who are hurting us; and we can offer it up, giving it to God just as Jesus did, merging it with His sufferings to "complete what is lacking" in them (that being our own individual crosses, willingly accepted).