6th Trinity III, 2022, Be Opened

 6th Trinity III

Mark 7:31-37 

Julia Stankova

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 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 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."

 6^th August Trinity

August 28, 2022

Mark 7:31-37 

Before the sun rises, the world is hushed. It is as if creation awaits in silence the making of a new day. The one in the gospel who was deaf and mute was enclosed, enwrapped in silence. And silently, Christ worked to prepare him. 

First, he drew him aside, apart from the crowds. He helped him come to himself. Then silently, Christ touched those senses in need of healing — the closed ears, the fettered tongue. Christ’s silent gesture spoke volumes. ‘Here,’ he says, ‘through your closed ears, you are self-enclosed. You can only hear your own thoughts. And thus your speech is captive.’ 

Then he looked heavenward. The deaf one, too, perhaps, raises his eyes to the heavens, to the profoundly silent world of the Father. And like a breath of fire — Ephphata! — Be Opened! — sweeps through him. The Word blazes within him. The man opens, he hears; he begins to speak, clearly, joyously. And this word of flame ignites the crowd and begins to spread. A new life begins. 

Christ burns away our dross. It is he who removes our impediments and barriers. It is he who shows us the way into our future. 

Ephphata, artist unknown

In our own moments of self-created silence, we pray to him to release our future. In the words of Rilke: 

I believe in all that has never yet been spoken

I want to free what waits within me

so that what no one has dared to wish for

may for once spring clear….

May what I do flow from me like a river

no forcing, and no holding back…

Then…I will sing you as no one ever has,….*

 

* Rilke’s Book of Hours, Macy and Barrows, page 58

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6th Trinity III 2021, Ears of My Ears Awake

6th Trinity III

Mark 7:31-37 

Julia Stankova

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 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 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."

6^th August Trinity

August 29, 2021

Mark 7:31–37

Gem hunters look for a certain kind of rock formation, for certain round ball-shaped stones. These spheres are called thunder eggs. Cracked open, they have colored layers inside and often a hollow space filled with beautiful crystals. 

In today's reading, a deaf man is brought to Christ by his friends. Being hard of hearing makes it difficult to both hear and to speak. One of the unfortunate results of being deaf is that one becomes closed off from interacting with others. Christ softens the rock-hardness of the man's hearing, his tongue, with His own life-giving moisture. And like a gem hunter opening the thunderegg, Christ's words strike emphatically – Ephphata! – Be opened!

Christ also speaks to us today—be opened! For we have become hard of hearing, hard of heart. Yet we can be opened; we can become actively receptive. We can receive and bear the One who is himself the Word of God, the Logos. And we can actively bring Him forth, sending Him from within us, out to others on the stream of our own words. In the words of e.e. cummings, we can jubilate:

i thank You God for most this amazing

day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything

which is natural which is infinite which is yes

 

….how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any-lifted from the no

of all nothing-human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?

 

(now the ears of my ears awake and

now the eyes of my eyes are opened)*

*e.e. cummings in Complete Poems 1904-1962

 

 

6th Trinity III 2020, No Non-Being

6th Trinity 

Mark 7:31-37

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.

Julia Stankova

 

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.

6^th Trinity

August 30, 2020

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 may get a false message. And to others, our response may seem inappropriate, even humorously. Yet even if our hearing is perfect, it can be that our hearts are closed, so we don’t pick up what is really being said.

In a sense, we are all deaf. Our hearts are sometimes closed, often in self-defense, against the overwhelming voices of pain and suffering around us. We rarely hear the inspirations our angels are whispering to us.

We speak with difficulty. Yet our words wield enormous creative power, for good or for ill. The poet Wislawa Szymborska makes us aware of their power; she says,

Tissot

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.*

 

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.

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*Wislawa Szymborska, “Three Oddest Words”.