The Righteousness that Surpasses

At the moment of his death Christ was certainly annihilated in his soul, without any consolation or relief, since the Father left him that way in innermost aridity in the lower part.  He was thereby compelled to cry out:  "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Mt 27: 46).  This was the most extreme abandonment, sensitively, that he had suffered in his life.  And by it he accomplished the most marvelous work of his whole life, surpassing all the works and deeds and miracles that he had ever performed on earth or in heaven.  That is, he brought about reconciliation and union of the human race with God through grace.  The Lord achieved this, as I say, at the moment in which he was most annihilated in all things:  in his reputation before men, since beholding him die they mocked him instead of esteeming him; in his human nature, by dying; and in spiritual help and consolation from his Father, for he was forsaken by his Father at the time so as to pay the debt fully and bring man to union with God.  David says of him:  Ad nihilum redactus sum et nescivi (Ps 72: 22), that the true spiritual person might understand the mystery of the door and way (which is Christ) leading to union with God, and that he might realize that his union with God and the greatness of the work he accomplishes will be measured by his annihilation for God in the sensory and spiritual parts of his soul.  When he is brought to nothing, the highest degree of humility, the spiritual union between his soul and God will be effected.  This union is the most noble and sublime state attainable in this life.  The journey, then, does not consist in recreations, experiences, and spiritual feelings, but in the living, sensory, and spiritual exterior and interior dead of the cross.

-Saint John of the Cross