By Clement Harrold

April 17, 2025

“Father, into your hands, I commit my spirit” 

Luke 23:46

The Savior’s breathing becomes labored. His heart begins to fail. He has run the race to the finish. He has nothing more to give.

His final words are a cry from the heart, adapted from Psalm 31: “Into your hands I commend my spirit; you will redeem me, LORD, God of truth” (Ps 31:6, NABRE).

The psalm, thought to have been written by King David when he was fleeing from Saul, begins in lament and ends in praise.

As we saw with Jesus’s cry of abandonment, the Old Testament verses that He cites while He hangs upon the Cross must not be read in isolation.

Gasping for breath, Jesus only has the strength to quote a single line from the psalm. Yet in doing so, He invokes its wider context, including its affirmation of God’s goodness and its closing exhortation: “Be strong and take heart, all who hope in the LORD” (Ps 31:25, NABRE).

On the Cross, Jesus reveals that His relationship with His Father is unshakeable.

Remember that in Luke’s Gospel, the very first words we hear from the Savior’s mouth highlight the depths of this relationship: “How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Lk 2:49).

Now, as darkness covers the earth, the faithful and obedient Son commits His spirit—His life breath (see Gen 2:7)—to the Father whom He loves.

In that moment, the veil of the Temple is torn in two.

Because of the God-man’s perfect sacrifice, the dividing line between God and man is overcome (see Heb 10:19-20). And because of what the Son has done for us, we too can become sons and daughters of the Father.

Challenge:

• Prayerfully read through Psalm 31 today. Ask yourself what this psalm reveals about the unshakeable trust that Jesus has in His heavenly Father, even as He hangs upon the Cross.

About Clement Harrold

Clement Harrold earned his master’s degree in theology from the University of Notre Dame in 2024, and his bachelor’s from Franciscan University of Steubenville in 2021. His writings have appeared in First Things, Church Life Journal, Crisis Magazine, and the Washington Examiner.