Be Opened!

From today’s reading…

In 1 Kings 11 today Solomon is having his kingdom torn apart but it’s Mark 7 that is eye-opening today.

Yesterday Jesus healed the Gentile woman’s daughter when He was in Tyre and now He just left that area heading towards the Sea of Galilee when He is once again approached by people seeking physical cures.

Rather than put on a show like a vaudeville performer, Jesus takes the deaf-mute man “off by himself away from the crowd” and touches his ears and tongue as He heals him.

But notice what’s happening here. There’s always a deeper meaning—deeper meanings—to everything we read in the Bible, especially the Gospels.

Jesus doesn’t look at the man and tell him Ephphatha! He looks up to heaven. He’s asking/ordering heaven to open up and…hear Him…receive Him…receive us? While also telling the man to be healed…to literally open his ears and mouth but to also open his mind and his heart to understand what he has been given and by whom he has received it.

Additionally, Mark uses the Aramaic word, Ephphatha here amongst his Greek translation.

Why?

For one reason, it’s most likely the native tongue of Jesus and the people He was ministering to.

We see Jesus using Aramaic at key times in the Gospels including:

• “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” on the cross.

• “Abba” for Father in the agony in the garden.

• “Talitha koum” when he raised the girl from the dead.

• And when Simon was renamed “Cephas” or “Kepha.” (This translation is crucial in the Catholic/Protestant debate on the role of Peter and the Pope, but we’ll get to that in another post.)

Finally, notice how Jesus “groaned” when He made this statement/plea/order. He really wants this—all of this—to happen. He’s frustrated it hasn’t happened. He’s optimistic it will all happen. He’s saddened at the thought that it won’t happen for some. He’s excited for those for whom it will happen.

All of this is going on in one half of one verse.

God is easy to know and to understand because He is love.

God can also lead 10,000 people to write 100,000 books and discuss for 1,000,000 hours what He meant by one half of one sentence, which is why we must stick together to help one another…

Stay the course. Keep the faith. Endure.

Now go sell something.