26th Day — Mary Sees Jesus Laid in the Sepulcher
Where thy treasure is, there is thy heart also. (St. Matt. vi. 21.)
I. When Mary had finished the mournful task of preparing the sacred body of her Son for burial, the disciples carried Him to the sepulcher in the garden of Joseph of Arimathea. Watch that mournful procession, and realize, if you can, the desolation of Mary's sacred heart. AH her hopes, all her joys, all her affections, were buried with Jesus. He was her one and only treasure, and where her treasure was laid, there was her heart also.
2. Mary amid all her anguish had experienced a strange and melancholy pleasure in embracing the dead body of her Son and performing for it the last offices of love. She knew, too, that though the human soul was parted from it, the divinity was still there. She could adore with the highest worship that mangled form, those limbs livid and cold. But now she was separated even from that sacred body. How empty, how blank, was all around without Jesus!
3. Yet Mary, in spite of her desolation, was never dejected, never gloomy. .She was full of joy and peace. In the angui.sh of her separation from Jesus she was more than comforted by the knowledge that all His sufferings were past, and that He had already begun to see the fruit of His travail. Those who love God more than themselves have always a fount of consolation in every sorrow.
By the hope thy name inspires,
By our doom reversed through thee,
Bring us, Queen of angel choirs,
To a blest eternity!
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