Jesus Christ Is All to Us
Summary of the Morrow’s Meditation
We will meditate tomorrow on a word of St. Paul, which is the conclusion and as it were the summary of all the titles we have admired in Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is all, that is to say: 1st, that Jesus Christ is all for us; 2nd, that without Jesus all the rest is nothing to us. We will then make the resolution: 1st, to produce often during the day aspirations of love toward Jesus Christ; for example, Jesus Christ is all; all that is not God is nothing to me, and I must count it as nothing; God alone suffices me; 2nd, to break every attachment to what is not God or according to God. Our spiritual nosegay shall be the word, the subject of our meditation: Jesus Christ is all to us.
Meditation for the Morning
Let us adore Jesus Christ as the treasure of heaven and earth: with Him one is rich, without Him one is poor. Let us rejoice in Him as the Blessed Virgin, who sings in her canticle: My soul rejoices in God my Saviour.
FIRST POINT
Jesus Is All for Us.
In effect, He unites in His person the titles most proper to interest the heart, to touch it and to win it. He is our Father in the order of nature, since He has created all things; He is our Father in the order of grace, since He calls Himself the life of our soul, and that, without Him, all our works are dead, they have no life by Him. He is our Brother: Man like us, after His resurrection, He calls the apostles His brothers. He is our Lord, our resurrection and master, since He has redeemed us at the price of His own blood; He is our friend, friend of heart and intimacy. He is our benefactor; from Him comes all that we have and all that we are; He is our head who pours upon His members His divine life; He is our good shepherd who nourishes us with His own flesh, our physician who heals all our wounds, our advocate who pleads our cause before His Father; He is the truth which enlightens us, the light which guides us, the wisdom which directs us, the justice, the goodness, the sweetness, the humility, the charity, the holiness which must live and shine in us; the way which leads to heaven and the door through which one enters there. Oh! how right the saints are to say: Who has Jesus has all. “Since I have had the happiness to know Jesus Christ and to see some traits of His beauty,” said St. Thérèse, “all that is on earth is disgusting to me, because I find in Him to an incomparably superior degree all that the heart can desire. He is too avaricious or ignores the value of so great a treasure, who, possessing it, wants to add something else to it.” Hence what pleased St. Francis of Assisi was to repeat for hours on end: My God and my all.
And truly, to desire something outside of Jesus, that would be to injure Him, and to say to Him that He is not sufficient to fill our soul; that would be to chase from our heart Him who wants no heart shared; that would be to lose sense, says the author of the Imitation. Let us enter into ourselves, and see if Jesus is truly all for us, and if some attachment does not dispute with Him a place in our heart.
SECOND POINT
Without Jesus, All the Rest Is Nothing to Us.
Let us ask all those who have riches, pleasures and honors if they are happy: we will receive from all sides only answers of misfortune, boredom and disgust. These are deadly displeasures, crushing contrarieties, tearing remorse. It is that without Jesus all is nothing, all leaves the heart in an awful void. “You have nothing for Yourself, O my God, and outside of You no rest for the heart,” said St. Augustine. “What can the world give you without Jesus?” says on his side the author of the Imitation. To be without Jesus is a hell that loses Jesus loses more than the whole world. If Jesus is not your best friend, you will be profoundly sad and desolate. On the contrary, who has Jesus has all, so much that the possession of the whole universe added to the possession of Jesus would rather be a burden than a joy. For who knows how to find all in Jesus, all the rest is insipid and disgusting. Let us ask pardon of Jesus Christ for having so little tasted Him, so little appreciated Him until now, and let us propose to repair the past by living only for Jesus and desiring nothing else in time and in eternity.
Resolutions and spiritual nosegay as above.
Note on Recovery of Missing Meditation (Second Week after Epiphany: Wednesday)
This meditation (Wednesday of the Second Week after Epiphany) was lost in the original English publication by Benziger Brothers (1894 third edition), where pages 251–282 (and beyond) are missing from the available digitized copy.
The content has been recovered and translated directly from the corresponding section of the original French edition (Méditations pour tous les jours de l'année, by Rev. M. Hamon, 3rd edition equivalent, 1894), preserving the exact meaning, style, tone, and meditative structure of the 1894 English translation as closely as possible.
This recovery ensures continuity of the work while respecting the historical source material.