Taking Time For Those In Need
Mark 7:31-37
Taking Time For Those In Need
Mark 7:31-37
Picture for a moment this scene from Winnie the Pooh. Pooh Bear is walking along the river bank in the Hundred Acre Wood. Eeyore, his donkey friend, suddenly appears floating downstream, on his back of all things, obviously distressed and in danger of drowning.
Pooh calmly asks if Eeyore has fallen in. Trying to appear in complete control, the anguished donkey answers, “Silly of me, wasn’t it?” Pooh overlooks his friend’s pleading eyes and remarks that Eeyore really should have been more careful.
Now in greater need than ever, Eeyore politely thanks him for the advice, even though he needs action far more than he needs advice. With his characteristic, belly-full-of-honey, ready-for-a-nap yawn, Pooh Bear notices, “I think you are sinking.” With that as his only hint of hope, drowning Eeyore asks Pooh if he would mind rescuing him. So finally, Pooh pulls him from the river. Eeyore apologizes for being such a bother and Pooh, still unconcerned, yet ever so courteous, responds, “Don’t be silly. You should have said something sooner.”
Even though the characters in Winnie the Pooh are imaginary, we are invited to see a little bit of ourselves in them. When we encounter someone with a very real need, do we offer advice and encouragement from safe and secure positions, or do we wade into the mess, offering real hope and compassion and help? In the New Testament book of James, St. James asks a penetrating question. “If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warmed and filled,’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?” (Js. 2:16). That’s a rhetorical question, by the way. The answer is obvious. It doesn’t do any good at all, even to speak a blessing over someone who is drowning in some way in life without offering real help. Turn with me to Mark 7:31-37.
Jesus has been in the region of Tyre, north of Israel on the Mediterranean coast. Tyre was one of Israel’s bitterest enemies. From there, he travels back down to the Sea of Galilee, but he does not yet re-enter his own territory of Galilee in the northern parts of Israel. He goes instead to the eastern side of the big lake, to the region of the Decapolis, a region of ten cities that were primarily inhabited by Gentiles. He’d been there before. It was the region he’d been in when he cast enough demons out of a man to fill and destroy an entire village’s herd of pigs.
But he took a really weird route to get there. Mark says that he went from Tyre through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee. The problem is that Sidon was farther north than Tyre. It was in the opposite direction of the Sea of Galilee. The Sea of Galilee was south. So Jesus goes south by going north? And Sidon was viewed through pretty much the same lens as Tyre. Tyre and Sidon were, together, among Israel’s worst, most hated enemies. Jesus is lingering and ministering in gentile lands, among Israel’s most hated enemies. People they viewed as unclean. Jesus is forcing his disciples to face their biases and prejudices and preconceived notions about who God does and doesn’t accept.
He is challenging their worldviews, their basic assumptions, because the Kingdom of God is available to all who will come through Christ. God’s grace is available to all in Christ. If the Jesus you’re following never challenges your most basic assumptions, you are not following the Jesus revealed in the pages of Scripture. You’re following a Jesus you’re making up in your own mind.
Matthew hammers that point home as he records Jesus’ lament over Israel in Matthew 11:21-23. “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! (Those are Israelite cities.) For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon (remember, those are among Israel’s bitterest of enemies), they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum (that was Jesus’ home base for the entire first part of his public ministry), will you be exalted to heaven? You will be brought down to Hades. For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom (Sodom was the city destroyed by fire in the Old Testament because no one faithful to God could be found in it), it would have remained until this day.” Sometimes, the hardest hearts are found in those who think they know God the best. Sometimes, the biggest resistance to what God is doing comes from within the body of Christ, and when that happens, the results can be tragic and destructive, and it breaks the heart of God.
So when Jesus gets to the region east and south of the Sea of Galilee, the people bring to him a man who has two problems – he is deaf, and he has a speech impediment. And they ask Jesus to lay his hands on him. Now, there are two things I want us to notice here. First, it would appear that this man was born able at least to hear, because when Jesus heals him, he begins to speak. He has a mental concept of language. He knows that speech is a thing, that people can talk.
In that day, it is unlikely that someone born deaf would have any concept of language at all. He would of course see that people moved their mouths, but he would have no mental concept of those movements making noise. So it’s likely that he lost his hearing through an illness or in an accident. In fact, he can still speak, even though he is deaf, although it is with difficulty. He likely had some kind of condition that caused his tongue and facial muscles to spasm, making speech difficult. But even though he was deaf, he tried to speak. That isn’t something someone born deaf would try to do in those days.
The second thing we need to notice is how absolutely amazed his friends are when he can hear and speak clearly. Yes, it is always amazing when a miracle happens right before our eyes, but the level of their amazement – Mark says that they were “astonished beyond measure” – indicates that they probably didn’t expect this healing. And that certainly wouldn’t be because they thought Jesus couldn’t heal him. Jesus’ reputation preceded him wherever he went. He’d already healed the most hopeless case imaginable – the man with an entire legion of demons in him, and word had gotten around about that.
But it was also common for people to simply ask for a blessing from a great rabbi, at which point the rabbi would lay his hands on the person for whom the blessing was sought and speak a blessing over him or her. And typically, in Mark, when people are seeking healing, Mark says that. Here he says that they “begged him to lay his hand on him.” That language and the fact that they were extremely astonished by the healing indicate that they were probably asking Jesus to place his hands on the man to bless him. But Jesus has something else in mind.
Look at V. 33-35. They seek a blessing for the man, but Jesus provides healing. God’s grace goes far beyond what we dare to ask for, or think we deserve. In Ephesians 3:20, St. Paul tells us that God is “able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think.” He isn’t saying that if you ask God to make you a millionaire, he’ll do that. God isn’t a genie in a bottle waiting to fulfill your every wish. But when your request aligns with God’s purpose and plan, God acts. And God always goes above and beyond what we think God will do. Sometimes that happens in this life, but this is also a promise pointing to our future hope – that what God has in store for us in eternity with him goes far beyond anything we dare to even imagine, and it is the highest of goods. In this case, even though what they seek is a verbal blessing, Jesus gives what they didn’t ask for – healing.
Now, remember – Jesus has so often simply spoken, and healing has happened, even from great distance. He doesn’t need to be close to the situation, or touch the person, in order to bring healing. Truth is, he doesn’t even need to speak. He cast the demon out of the gentile woman’s daughter without being near, and without speaking to the demon. He simply told the woman that he daughter was now well, and it was so. But Jesus touches most of the heals. Why? Because touch is a basic need of all of us as humans, and many of them had, because of their illness or handicap or oppression, been deprived of touch.
Dr. Dacher Keltner, a professor of psychology and the scientific adviser for Pixar’s film Inside Out, claims that human touch is one of the “foundations of human relationships.” He explains, “Skin to skin, parent to child, touch is the social language of our social life … The foundation of all human relationship is touch. There are four years of touch exchanged between mother and baby … In the social realm, our social awareness is profoundly tactile.”
He was one of the co-authors for a study that looked at “celebratory touches” of pro basketball players, including “fist bumps, high-fives, chest bumps, leaping shoulder bumps, chest punches, head slaps, head grabs, low fives, high tens, full hugs, half hugs, and team huddles.” The researchers discovered that teams who players touched one another a lot did better than those teams whose players didn’t. He has concluded that touch lowers stress, builds morale, and produces triumphs – a chest bump instructs us in cooperation, a half-hug in compassion. [i] And people who have been deprived of touch, of normal human relationship, need touch. Not inappropriate touch. Safe touch.
In this man’s case, Jesus’ touch is even more significant than that. Remember, he cannot hear. He cannot hear the words that Jesus is speaking to him. So Jesus meets him in his disability and actually pantomimes what he is going to do for the man. He puts his fingers in his ears and then removes them, indicating to the man that he is going to heal his hearing. And then he spits and touches the man’s tongue, indicating that he is going to heal his speech. Jesus gently communicates with this man exactly what he is about to do in a way that the man understands. And Jesus pulls him away from the crowd. He wanted to make sure the man understood what was happening, that he could communicate clearly with him, and also he protected the man from becoming a spectacle. Often, people with disabilities don’t really want their disability to become the center of attention, and Jesus protects this man’s heart and dignity while he heals him. Jesus’ touch is always a safe touch. He deals gently with us.
And then when he prays, he lets out a long sigh. Almost a groan. He isn’t exasperated with the man in front of him, or the needs of the masses of people in general. But he hates what his creation has done to itself, what sin has done to this world, to every living creature that lives in it, and especially to us as human beings. He hates the impact of sin and the impact of brokenness. He is indignant at the suffering and brokenness he so often encounters. He is angered by Satan’s work in the world. And so his pray becomes a sigh, or a groan.
And the man is healed. The words Jesus spoke, “Be opened,” actually mean “Be opened completely.” There is an extra emphasis on the “opened” that indicates a fullness. Jesus heals completely. And the man’s ears are opened and his speech is corrected. The word Mark uses for spoke is “orthos.” It’s the root of our words “orthodox,” which means “correct belief,” and also “orthodontics,” which means straight teeth. It has the sense of being completely correct. Jesus didn’t shy away from his need. He touched and fully healed this man. He met his need. He asked for blessing. He was blessed with complete and total healing. In the end, the only thing people can say of Jesus is “He has done all things well.”
He tells the people not to talk about what he has done. The crowds are getting too big, and in Israel they’re threatening to make him king by force, something that doesn’t align with his mission and purpose in the world. In our celebrity culture, we want bigger and bigger crowds. Jesus knows that sometimes we’re more effective one on one. Our televangelist faith healers want to do everything in front of everyone so that they are amazed. Jesus draws this man away from the crowd and deals with him privately and gently. He refuses to allow himself or this man to become a spectacle. But the more he tries to quiet them, the more zealously they proclaim what he has done. Kind of ironic, isn’t it, that Jesus tells the man whose speech he has healed not to speak. At least, about this, for now.
You see, the “go and tell” command happens after the resurrection. Sight and hearing are symbolic of the kingdom of God in the miracles of Jesus, and that doesn’t become a full reality on earth until after the resurrection. But the kingdom of God cannot be spoken of with full understanding at this point. It is only after his resurrection that Jesus, returning to his Father’s side, sends the Holy Spirit and gives the command to “go and tell.”
Jesus deals gently and generously with us in our need. And he invites us to do the same with those he sends our way. Having dealt graciously with each one of us, he now invites us into his work, asking us to share that grace with others. And that isn’t easy. People in need can be, well, needy. Intense. They certainly were for Jesus.
Henri Nouwen was a priest and a brilliant teacher at places like Harvard and Yale. Feeling led by God, he spent the last decade of his life living in a community of people with severe emotional, mental, and physical disabilities. It was an enormously healing time for him. In one of his many books, Henri tells a story about Trevor, a man with severe mental and emotional challenges who was sent by Henri’s community to a psychiatric facility for evaluation. Henri wanted to see him, so he called the hospital to arrange a visit. When those in authority found out that Henri Nouwen was coming, they asked if they could have a lunch with him in the Golden Room—a special meeting room at the facility. They would also invite doctors and clergy people to the special luncheon. Henri agreed.
When Henri arrived, they took him to the Golden Room, but Trevor was nowhere to be seen. Troubled, Henri asked about Trevor’s whereabouts. “Trevor cannot come to lunch,” he was told. “Patients and staff are not allowed to have lunch together. Plus, no patient has ever had lunch in the Golden Room.”
By nature, Henri was not a confrontational person. He was a meek man. But being guided by the Spirit, here is the thought that came to Henri’s mind: Include Trevor. Knowing that community is about inclusion, Henri thought, Trevor ought to be here. So Henri turned to the person in authority and said, “But the whole purpose of my coming was to have lunch with Trevor. If Trevor is not allowed to attend the lunch, I will not attend either.”
The thought of missing an opportunity for lunch with Henri Nouwen was too much. They soon found a way for Trevor to attend. When they all gathered together, something interesting happened. At one point during the lunch, Henri was talking to the person on his right and didn’t notice that Trevor had stood up and lifted his glass of Coca-Cola.
“A toast. I will now offer a toast,” Trevor said to the group.
Everybody in the room got nervous. What was he going to do?
Then Trevor, this deeply challenged man in a room full of PhDs, started to sing, “If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass. If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass…”
Nobody was sure what to do. It was awkward. Here was this man with a level of challenge and brokenness they could not begin to understand, yet he was beaming. He was thrilled to be there. So they started to sing. Softly at first, and then louder and louder until doctors and clergymen and Henri Nouwen were all practically shouting, “If you’re happy and you know it, raise your glass.”
Henri went on to give a talk at the luncheon, but the moment everybody remembered – the moment God spoke most clearly – was through the person they all would have said was the least likely person to speak for God.[ii]
Every time we see his goal of peace and quiet (for a few moments or days, never forever) interrupted by real human needs, he always shows up with generous grace. May we, as his people, do the same. Let us pray.
[i] Adapted from Adam Gopnik, “Feel Me: What the new science of touch says about ourselves,” The New Yorker (5-16-16)
[ii] John Ortberg, in the sermon “Guide,” PreachingToday.com