Miracles And The Mind Series

Variety is not only the spice of life it is the very essence of life. Consider the bacteria that is all

about us and within us. There are about 1500 different basic forms or species of these tiny one

celled creatures. If you took 400 trillion of these creatures they would weigh only about 1 pound.

Most of these bacteria have gotten bad press, and we think of them in negative terms. We are not

even aware that many of them are essential to our lives. Only a small percentage cause disease.

According to Issac Asimov they are far fewer than the percentage of human beings who commit

crimes.

Bacteria carry out chemical reactions that are essential to digestion, and bacteria in our intestines

form some of the vitamins that we cannot make for ourselves. Molecular biologists are working

hard to figure out how to use these tiny creatures as more efficient servants in fighting disease. So

they are primarily friends of man and not foes. Man has already designed a bacteria that

manufactures human insulin so diabetics can live normal lives. The hope is that bacteria will help

man produce vaccines for his most potent disease agent-the viruses. When you get into the world of

scientific healing the one characteristic that stands out is the infinite variety.

There is no end to the means and methods by which man fights off his foes to maintain his health,

or to regain it when it has been taken captive. What is fascinating in studying the healing miracles

of Christ is that Jesus also used a variety of means and methods to bring about healing. You would

think that if all Jesus had to do was to say, "Be healed," that He would have a standardized method,

and one healing would be just like another. It would be monotonous and boring, but it would be so

simple and easy. But Jesus deals with people as individuals. He recognizes that each person is

unique, and is in need of treatment that is unique to their problem and personality. No where do we

see this more clearly than in Healing of the deaf-mute in our text. This is a healing that strays from the norm. Jesus is giving this man a specialized treatment.

First of all, He takes him aside to deal with him privately. Usually Jesus just heals people in the

midst of the crowd. But here He departs from the crowd to a place of privacy. Jesus did often touch

the patient, but here He puts His fingers into the man's ears. Jesus does something that seems rather

gross. He spit on His finger and touched the man's tongue with the spittle. There are a lot of strange

things that happen in the world of healing, but fortunately this one never caught on. You will have a

fruitless search trying to find any healer who follows Jesus on this one, and practices spit healing.

What Jesus is teaching us here is not a particular technique, but rather, the importance of variety

in the methods and means of healing. Not all miracles are alike anymore than all medicine is alike.

Miracles do not come in a can, and massed produced so that one is identical to the other. Each

miracle is adapted to fit the individual who needs it. Miracles come in custom made packages with

a lot of variety. Understanding this is a key factor in trying to figure out the puzzling mysteries of

miracles and healing. Healings are not mass produced like bottles of aspirin. Each one is custom

made to fit the nature of the person, the disease, and the circumstances.

Jesus may heal in the crowd, or in private. Sometimes He heals by the spoken word alone. At

other times He adds touch, and as here, He adds special personal touches of His finger and spittle.

On another occasion He used clay. He may heal at a distance, or right where He is present. Usually

He heals instantly, but He also healed by process and stages. Some patients were required to do

nothing, and others were asked to cooperate in their healing. One was asked to go and wash in the

pool of Siloam, for example.

Richard Trench in his classic The Miracles Of Our Lord wrote, "There must lie a deep meaning

in all the variations which mark the different healings of different sick and afflicted. A wisdom of

God ordering all the circumstances of each particular case." When he wrote that book in the 1800's,

he did not have a clue as to what that deep meaning might be. But today with the rapid advance of

medical knowledge, we do know why His variety of treatment was of great value. Modern medicine

has discovered what the Great Physician always knew, and now it has become a principle of health