The Healing of a Deaf and Mute Man
31Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to the Sea of Galilee and into the region of the Decapolis. 32There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged him to place his hand on the man.
33After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man's ears. Then he spit and touched the man's tongue. 34He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, "Ephphatha!" (which means, "Be opened!" ). 35At this, the man's ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.
36Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone. But the more he did so, the more they kept talking about it. 37People were overwhelmed with amazement. "He has done everything well," they said. "He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak."
BACKGROUND READING:
Isaiah 35
Dig Deeper
I taught in a high school in my town for nearly ten years. A year or so before I left teaching, I felt that God had called me into the ministry. In following that path, I knew that God wanted me to go back to school and to leave my teaching job. I realized that this would have an impact on the school at which I taught, and I knew that the time was not right for that news to become public right away. I told only a very few people and asked them not to tell any students or the administration just yet. I would inform the right people at the right time, but not too soon. Despite my best efforts, the word got out pretty quickly. This created a few difficulties and a few long weeks of my students not understanding why I was leaving them.
This is kind of the situation going on here. Jesus takes a man who was deaf and tongue tied (apparently he wasn’t mute but had a serious speech impediment of some sort) away from the crowd to work a miracle privately. This doesn’t work as the crowds soon learn what has happened. Then he tells the crowd to keep quiet about what they have seen, but that doesn’t work either. Neither the healed man or the crowd can keep a secret.
This raises the question: Why would Jesus want to keep secret a message that he came to proclaim? The answer is, of course, that his message was a difficult and dangerous one. There was all sorts of room for misconceptions, rumors, and danger for Jesus if word of his kingdom movement got to the wrong people too soon. This was, after all, a world where rumor spread fast and prophets didn’t fair very well (think of what happened to John). Despite all the potential dangers, however, the mission must move forward.
Mark describes several times when Jesus makes an effort to get away from the crowds and slow things down, but it never quite works that way. We can speculate that perhaps Jesus wished for a bit slower pace with his ministry; perhaps he hoped for more time to spread the news of the coming of the kingdom to his beloved, but obstinate Jews. Jesus had to realize that a few more miraculous acts would push the rumor mill to critical mass; news of his works would take on a life of its own and go beyond his ability to control it. If things were to keep going like this, the authorities would close in on him pretty quickly. Jesus must keep on with his work that pointed to and ushered in the kingdom of God, but he could not he keep people from talking about. It appears that Jesus must have come to the realization at some point, that his work must carry on but it must become a much more urgent mission than he at first desired.
Mark is laying the ground work for the next chapter in which things come to a head rather quickly. If Jesus’ hand is going to be forced and his time cut short, then the mission is about to get dangerous and his disciples need to know that. Mark also stresses the significance, in the minds of the people, of the healing Jesus has just performed. The people are overwhelmed and announce that he even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak. The crowd, no doubt, had in mind, Isaiah 35:5-6, a passage that describes the time when Israel would be renewed through the work of the Messiah, after long years of exile. This healing was a matter of God’s love for his people breaking through into the present world, pointing ahead to a time when that healing would fix the entire world. That was the time when the present age would be turned fully into the age to come.
Devotional Thought
When we follow Jesus, it is not a boring and mundane life, but rather, astonishing things happen. It is not a life of rote religion, but a lifelong adventure. How is your life when it comes to following Jesus? Is it more like an astonishing adventure, or has it become boring and predictable. What can you do to unleash the power of God throughout your life?
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