A Model of Surrender

I once heard a story of a six-year-old boy, a non-Catholic, who was sent to a parochial school. Upon going to church for the first time and seeing the suffering Jesus hanging on the crucifix, he started to cry and said, “What happened to him?” An older child put his arm around him and said, “Don’t worry. It comes out okay in the end.”

It is not easy to remember the death of Jesus. However, commemorating his death is important, because just as Jesus modeled how to serve through washing the disciples’ feet, he modeled how to surrender to death. As Ronald Rolheiser notes, “In his passivity and dying he was able to give us something deeper than what he gave us through his strength and activity.” For some mysterious reason, human life ends in death, which makes it all the more astounding that God chose to become human in the person of Jesus. Perhaps one reason we must die is because it is the only way to learn how to totally surrender our lives to our Creator. Jesus came to show us that doing so leads to new life beyond our imagining.

When we were children, it was always easier to do something brave, like jump into the deep end of the swimming pool, after we saw someone else do it. Thanks to Jesus, letting go of our attachments, loves, work, and the pleasures of being human when we die will be a little easier because he showed us the way, and because we now know it will be okay in the end.