Isaiah 29:17-24/Romans 10:9-17/St Mark 7:31-37
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
The signs signify who Jesus is. The miracles reveal His divinity. He has done all things, not only well, but καλϖσ. Good. Beautiful. Pleasing. Done well in accordance with the good and gracious will of the Father. For example, Jesus isn’t just the Good Shepherd. He is the καλϖσ Shepherd. The noble, beautiful, restorative Shepherd who glorifies the Father’s name by laying down His life for the sheep. He has done all things καλϖσ.
And the Greek speaking Gentiles of the Decapolis would have recognized that word, καλϖσ, because it is the oft repeated conclusion to the day’s work in the creation account of Genesis. And God saw that it was good. Καλϖσ. Then God saw everything that He had made and indeed it was very good. Who is it that does all things καλϖσ? The God whose creation was good became man. He assumed human flesh and blood, taking upon Himself a created body, begotten of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. And in that body, He does all things well. Beautifully. In accordance with the good and gracious will of the Father. And the signs signify His essential divinity; only God can make the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.
And they are of a pair. Hearing and speech. For you learn to speak first by listening, not to yourself, but to others. You learn how to speak the language of faith, to confess, by listening to your Father in heaven as He speaks to you in and by and through His Word.
So it is that Jesus, the eternal Word of the Father, by whom all things were created good in the beginning, comes now, in time, to restore fallen creation which was decidedly not good. For sin has marred the beauty of God’s good creation, sin has disfigured and deformed it. Sin has wrecked havoc on the nobility of God’s very good creation of man and woman. Sin has made us sub-human, less than what God in His goodness made us to be.
You think that to err is human, to sin is human, because you cannot conceive of a perfect humanity completely free from sin and death and the power of the devil. To sin is not human. To sin makes us less than human. For consider Jesus who is truly and completely human, yet without sin. His humanity is not altogether different than yours. His humanity was and is in complete and perfect agreement with the pure and holy Law of God; whereas in this life, your humanity is still marred and stained by sin. It clings to your very bones until the day that you die.
Thus is a child of Adam, one in whom the gruesome effects of sin are keenly seen, brought to the perfect Man, the Second Adam, Jesus. They brought to Him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment.
Now it is important to note here, regarding the effects of sin, that we don’t believe in some sort of karma. Like the foolishness of the disciples’ question in John chapter 9, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? it would not only be foolish, but patently false to suggest that this man is deaf and mute on account of his sin. We do experience temporal consequences for our sins, but we must remember Jesus’ response, It was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. And He added, in concert perhaps with this miracle, As long as I am in the world I am the light of the world (Jn 9:2-3, 5).
But Jesus, upon encountering this dear child in whom the effects of sin were so acutely felt, took him aside, privately from the crowd, and healed him. Note the ceremonies that accompany the restoration of the deaf-mute. Jesus puts His fingers in His ears, He spits, He touches His tongue, He looks up to heaven, He sighs. God the Son who has taken on a body in His Incarnation, assumed His humanity from His virgin mother, uses His Body in the restoration of His creation. He does not distain His good creation. We follow the same premise in our worship and piety. The body is created by God the Father, redeemed by God the Son, made a temple of the Holy Spirit through Holy Baptism. What we do with our bodies matters. Ceremony accompanies faithful confession.
But notice this too: it is not the ceremonies, not the “sign-language” as it were, that accomplish the miracle. It is the Word. To paraphrase the Small Catechism: “how can spittle do such great things? Certainly not just spittle, but the Word of God, does these things. For without the Word the spittle is plain spittle and not a miraculous restoration of hearing and speech. But with the Word of Christ, the fingers, the spittle, the touching, the sigh, are signs and ceremonies that accompany the creative, restorative, authoritative Word of Christ.”
It is the Word that does the work, that accomplishes what it says. Ephphatha! Be opened! And first his ears are opened, for the Word always works first on the ear. The Word of the Lord sent out from His mouth moves from the ear to the heart, from hearing to belief, from the heart to the lip, that is, from belief to confession, then from the lip to the life, from confession to practice. Is this not what St Paul declares to the Christian Church in Rome? Faith comes from hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ. Faith which is created and sustained through the preached Word, proclaimed by those who are sent to those who have ears to hear. It all depends on the Word. First the ear. Then the lip.
And it is no different for you. The morning prayer office, Matins, begins, O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. Make haste, O God, to deliver me. Make haste to help me O Lord. You sand that Psalm in the Introit this morning. Jesus sighs as He looks up to heaven, signifying to this deaf-mute that he is to lift up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh his help in the Name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. All things. Good.
Truly it is by Jesus’ Word that the man’s ears are opened and his tongue released and he spoke ορθϖσ, that is rightly, orthodox-ly. He confessed according to that which his ears had heard. For with the heart one believes and is justified and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
Again, it is no different for you. In Holy Baptism He took you aside and stuck the fingers of His Word in your ears as He washed you with water by which heaven is opened unto you. It is no coincidence, beloved, that the early baptismal liturgies of Rome and Milan, as recorded by St Ambrose, included spitting and the utterance of Ephphatha. It is not because these ceremonies of themselves accomplish anything, but because such ceremonies, accompanied by the powerful Word of Christ, confess with the body what one believes in the heart! Again, the signs point to Jesus! The ceremonies teach. For the sake of the deaf-mute and for the sake of we who were spiritually deaf to the preaching of the Word and silent in our right confession of the same.
Jesus charged them not to tell anyone, but they went ahead and proclaimed it anyway. Such is the prerogative of confessing faith. But Jesus would not send out His preachers to preach until He had finished His work. He is not a Magic Man, but the GodMan. He came not simply to sigh and open ears and restore speech, but to sigh and take up the Cross by which He opens the very gates of heaven for you. Jesus, who takes on our flesh and blood, in His very Body and Blood, provides perfect healing for our bodies and souls. He opens His veins to saturate the thistled ground of creation with His life-giving blood. He sighs and speaks a Word: τετελεσται, It is finished.
He rests in the earth on the Sabbath and rising from the dead, never to die again, delivers His Word of victory and life to His Apostles, sending them with His authority to baptize into His saving death and to teach all things whatsoever His Word proclaims.
He deals with you according to His Word. Only according to His Word which alone is true and good and beautiful. Has He not taught you, O Christian, that His Word joined to His earthly element is what He says? Does His Word not say to you, concerning the Bread, This is My Body? And concerning the Wine, This is My Blood. And does He not preach in His Word that these are given and shed for your for the forgiveness of your sins? Come, then, beloved, in obedience of the Gospel, with faithful hearts, to open your lips and mouth and receive the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, in His divinity and humanity, by which He grants you true healing in both body and soul unto life everlasting.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
The signs signify who Jesus is. The miracles reveal His divinity. He has done all things, not only well, but καλϖσ. Good. Beautiful. Pleasing. Done well in accordance with the good and gracious will of the Father. For example, Jesus isn’t just the Good Shepherd. He is the καλϖσ Shepherd. The noble, beautiful, restorative Shepherd who glorifies the Father’s name by laying down His life for the sheep. He has done all things καλϖσ.
And the Greek speaking Gentiles of the Decapolis would have recognized that word, καλϖσ, because it is the oft repeated conclusion to the day’s work in the creation account of Genesis. And God saw that it was good. Καλϖσ. Then God saw everything that He had made and indeed it was very good. Who is it that does all things καλϖσ? The God whose creation was good became man. He assumed human flesh and blood, taking upon Himself a created body, begotten of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. And in that body, He does all things well. Beautifully. In accordance with the good and gracious will of the Father. And the signs signify His essential divinity; only God can make the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.
And they are of a pair. Hearing and speech. For you learn to speak first by listening, not to yourself, but to others. You learn how to speak the language of faith, to confess, by listening to your Father in heaven as He speaks to you in and by and through His Word.
So it is that Jesus, the eternal Word of the Father, by whom all things were created good in the beginning, comes now, in time, to restore fallen creation which was decidedly not good. For sin has marred the beauty of God’s good creation, sin has disfigured and deformed it. Sin has wrecked havoc on the nobility of God’s very good creation of man and woman. Sin has made us sub-human, less than what God in His goodness made us to be.
You think that to err is human, to sin is human, because you cannot conceive of a perfect humanity completely free from sin and death and the power of the devil. To sin is not human. To sin makes us less than human. For consider Jesus who is truly and completely human, yet without sin. His humanity is not altogether different than yours. His humanity was and is in complete and perfect agreement with the pure and holy Law of God; whereas in this life, your humanity is still marred and stained by sin. It clings to your very bones until the day that you die.
Thus is a child of Adam, one in whom the gruesome effects of sin are keenly seen, brought to the perfect Man, the Second Adam, Jesus. They brought to Him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment.
Now it is important to note here, regarding the effects of sin, that we don’t believe in some sort of karma. Like the foolishness of the disciples’ question in John chapter 9, Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? it would not only be foolish, but patently false to suggest that this man is deaf and mute on account of his sin. We do experience temporal consequences for our sins, but we must remember Jesus’ response, It was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. And He added, in concert perhaps with this miracle, As long as I am in the world I am the light of the world (Jn 9:2-3, 5).
But Jesus, upon encountering this dear child in whom the effects of sin were so acutely felt, took him aside, privately from the crowd, and healed him. Note the ceremonies that accompany the restoration of the deaf-mute. Jesus puts His fingers in His ears, He spits, He touches His tongue, He looks up to heaven, He sighs. God the Son who has taken on a body in His Incarnation, assumed His humanity from His virgin mother, uses His Body in the restoration of His creation. He does not distain His good creation. We follow the same premise in our worship and piety. The body is created by God the Father, redeemed by God the Son, made a temple of the Holy Spirit through Holy Baptism. What we do with our bodies matters. Ceremony accompanies faithful confession.
But notice this too: it is not the ceremonies, not the “sign-language” as it were, that accomplish the miracle. It is the Word. To paraphrase the Small Catechism: “how can spittle do such great things? Certainly not just spittle, but the Word of God, does these things. For without the Word the spittle is plain spittle and not a miraculous restoration of hearing and speech. But with the Word of Christ, the fingers, the spittle, the touching, the sigh, are signs and ceremonies that accompany the creative, restorative, authoritative Word of Christ.”
It is the Word that does the work, that accomplishes what it says. Ephphatha! Be opened! And first his ears are opened, for the Word always works first on the ear. The Word of the Lord sent out from His mouth moves from the ear to the heart, from hearing to belief, from the heart to the lip, that is, from belief to confession, then from the lip to the life, from confession to practice. Is this not what St Paul declares to the Christian Church in Rome? Faith comes from hearing and hearing through the Word of Christ. Faith which is created and sustained through the preached Word, proclaimed by those who are sent to those who have ears to hear. It all depends on the Word. First the ear. Then the lip.
And it is no different for you. The morning prayer office, Matins, begins, O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise. Make haste, O God, to deliver me. Make haste to help me O Lord. You sand that Psalm in the Introit this morning. Jesus sighs as He looks up to heaven, signifying to this deaf-mute that he is to lift up his eyes to the hills from whence cometh his help in the Name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. All things. Good.
Truly it is by Jesus’ Word that the man’s ears are opened and his tongue released and he spoke ορθϖσ, that is rightly, orthodox-ly. He confessed according to that which his ears had heard. For with the heart one believes and is justified and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
Again, it is no different for you. In Holy Baptism He took you aside and stuck the fingers of His Word in your ears as He washed you with water by which heaven is opened unto you. It is no coincidence, beloved, that the early baptismal liturgies of Rome and Milan, as recorded by St Ambrose, included spitting and the utterance of Ephphatha. It is not because these ceremonies of themselves accomplish anything, but because such ceremonies, accompanied by the powerful Word of Christ, confess with the body what one believes in the heart! Again, the signs point to Jesus! The ceremonies teach. For the sake of the deaf-mute and for the sake of we who were spiritually deaf to the preaching of the Word and silent in our right confession of the same.
Jesus charged them not to tell anyone, but they went ahead and proclaimed it anyway. Such is the prerogative of confessing faith. But Jesus would not send out His preachers to preach until He had finished His work. He is not a Magic Man, but the GodMan. He came not simply to sigh and open ears and restore speech, but to sigh and take up the Cross by which He opens the very gates of heaven for you. Jesus, who takes on our flesh and blood, in His very Body and Blood, provides perfect healing for our bodies and souls. He opens His veins to saturate the thistled ground of creation with His life-giving blood. He sighs and speaks a Word: τετελεσται, It is finished.
He rests in the earth on the Sabbath and rising from the dead, never to die again, delivers His Word of victory and life to His Apostles, sending them with His authority to baptize into His saving death and to teach all things whatsoever His Word proclaims.
He deals with you according to His Word. Only according to His Word which alone is true and good and beautiful. Has He not taught you, O Christian, that His Word joined to His earthly element is what He says? Does His Word not say to you, concerning the Bread, This is My Body? And concerning the Wine, This is My Blood. And does He not preach in His Word that these are given and shed for your for the forgiveness of your sins? Come, then, beloved, in obedience of the Gospel, with faithful hearts, to open your lips and mouth and receive the very Body and Blood of Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, in His divinity and humanity, by which He grants you true healing in both body and soul unto life everlasting.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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