Mark
7, 31-37
6th
Trinity August
As
he was again leaving the region around Tyre, he went through the
country around Sidon to the Sea of Galilee in the middle of the
region of the ten cities of the Decapolis. They brought to him one who was deaf
and who spoke with difficulty, and asked him to lay his hands on him. And he
led him apart from the crowds by himself, laid his finger in his ears, and
moistening his finger with saliva, touched his tongue, and looking up to the
heavens, sighed deeply and said to him, “Ephphata, be opened.” His hearing was
opened and the impediment of his tongue was removed and he could speak
properly. And he commanded them not to say anything to anyone. But the more he
forbade it, the more they widely they proclaimed it. And the people were deeply
moved by this event, and said, “He has changed all to the good: the deaf he
makes to hear and the speechless to speak.
6th
August/September Trinity
Sept 1, 2013
Mark 7, 31 – 37
As we get older our hearing often declines. It is as though
our ears close a bit. We fail to accurately pick up what was spoken to us. And
so we get a false message. And to others our response is inappropriate.
In a sense we are all deaf. Even if our hearing is perfect, it can be that our hearts are closed, so that we don’t pick up what is really being said. Our hearts are closed, often in self-defense, against the overwhelming voices of pain and suffering around us. We may rarely hear the inspirations our angels are whispering to us.
It is difficult for us to speak in truth. Our words wield an enormous creative power, for good or for ill. The poet makes us aware of their power; he says,
When I pronounce the word
Future,
the first syllable already
belongs to the past.
When I pronounce the word
Silence,
I destroy it.
When I pronounce the word
Nothing,
I make something no nonbeing can
hold.[1]
Christ came to open our hearing, to open our hearts, so that
our words have the power to create. ‘Be opened’, he says. ‘Hear my voice in your heart’. When you break your silence with love, you create a future which no non-being can
destroy.
www.thechristiancommunity.org
www.thechristiancommunity.org
