MEDITATION Of The Birth Of Our Savior Christ In A Stable In Bethlehem
THE II POINT.
1. Secondly, I am to consider what the blessed Virgin did, when by those jubilees she knew that the hour of her delivery was come, pondering her affections, her actions, and her words. For recollecting herself in a corner of the stable, and settled in a very high contemplation, she brought forth her only begotten Son, and forth she took him in her arms. O what content, and joy received she at that first view, not staying upon the outward beauty of the body, but passing to the beauty of the soul, and of the Deity! On the one side she embraced him and kissed him lovingly as her Son: and on the other side she shrunk back, and humbly retired, considering that he was almighty God: for with these two arms God desert to be embraced; with charity, and humility; with love, and reverence: and the like am I to do spiritually, taking him as it were in my arms, loving him, and reverencing him, approaching to him with love, and retiring myself with humility.
2.This done the Virgin swathed her Son in such swathing clothes, and mantles as she had prepared, and with an affection of humility she laid him in a manger, esteeming herself unworthily to hold him in her arms: and falling on her knees she adored him as her God, and her Lord, and very lovingly she spake unto him, for she was assured that he understood her. She humbly thanked him for the great favors he had done to mankind, coming to redeem him. She likewise gave him thanks for having taken her for his mother, without any merits of hers: and there she offered to serve him with body, and soul, and with all her forces, employing them all in his holy service: And all this she uttered with such loving words, and tender affections, as they are rather to be imagined then possible to be explicated. The like did St. Joseph, adoring the child, humbly thanking him for taking him for his foster father, acknowledging it for a great favor, and offering himself truly, and really to serve him. The like am I to do, accompanying these Saints in hearty thankfulness, offering unto him my body, and soul, and all my faculties.
O most sweet, and most sovereign Lord, what thanks may I give thee, for this great favor thou hast done me, in coming to redeem me, as a child and in so extreme poverty? O that I might have been present at that time to serve thee in thine infancy! I here present myself in spirit before thy divine majesty, and I offer unto thee all that I am, or may be able to be, to employees it wholly, in thy service: accept (o Lord) this my good will, and give me thy grace to effect it, Amen.
Luis de la Puente
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