What Exactly Is That?

On the last day of Christmas liturgical period, as we celebrate the Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord, I've been questioning myself, after meditating on the mystery of Christ Incarnation, His earthly life, Passion Mystery and what followed further on...


It hit me hard during Christmas time, how Christ stripped Himself of - first, His Divine Glory, becoming a man, born in a manger among animals, while His rightful place was the House of the Father in Jerusalem, becoming a fugitive in Egypt, then living absolutely ordinary life in a poor family in Nazareth, reaching out with Good News to His people, who ultimately rejected Him and put Him through horrible suffering to death; second, inspite of His ordeal and the way He was treated by us, He still loved us infinitely and stripped Himself of His humanity, coming up with a breathtaking plan of staying with us in a form of a bread. He instituted the Sacrament of the Most Holy Eucharist, giving chosen men the power to bring Him among us during the Eucharistic consecration...

Simply, out of the infinite love and passion to us, out of desire to bring us back home to His Father, out of the utmost care for us to make sure we travel safely in this world, under His protection and with His help, Jesus stripped Himself of everything for us...

This thought is mesmerizing...

And what exactly is that I stripped myself of for Him and for His Church and His people in my life?

This question bothers me. I cannot find justifiable answer. Because I do not think that I stripped myself of anything particular that could be remotely compared to the extent of Christ abandonment and sacrifice!

What is that exactly that I would claim I stripped myself of for Christ's love and for others? Something that is valuable and praiseworthy? I do not know... Anything I try to think of and come up with pales in comparison with Jesus' abandonment of His divinity and then humanity, becoming the Eucharist, lonely for so long in tabernacles of catholic churches across the world...

What is that exactly I stripped myself of for Him? Even if I wanted to try to measure my life with 10% rule of what I supposed to give to the Lord, I fail badly. Taking for instance my time for prayer. Do I commit 10% of my time daily for prayer, meditation, spiritual reading? This would mean more than two hours on any given day. Yeah, maybe on some days, like Friday retreats, Sunday Masses etc. But normally, on a weekday other than Friday? I don't think so...

What is that exactly I am willing to strip myself of for the sake of Jesus and His Church, for others?

And He asks us for so little... Just to be faithful in small things... And still He promises to put us in charge of big things...

Tomorrow we will enter the ordinary time of the liturgical year. Not that ordinary. It is the time to work on the special graces and blessings we received in such an abundance in Advent and Christmas time. It is time to make sure they flourish and bear more fruit...

It is also time to question ourselves seriously - what is exactly that I strip myself of for Christ and for His folks? What is exactly He wants me to abandon, to get rid from my life, to strip myself of?...

I wish we face this question in full truth and work on it.