“BE OPENED”
Mark 7:31-37
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR: THE GARLIC REMEDY
1. Soon after Bernard reached his 110th birthday, a Houston Chronicle reporter visited him looking for a story. "So, Bernard," asked the reporter, "to what do you think you owe your longevity?"
2. "That’s easy," replied Bernard. "It’s garlic."
"Garlic?" said the reporter. "Can you explain further?"
"Well," replied Bernard, "I eat a clove of garlic every morning after breakfast. Then, after lunch, I eat another garlic clove. And finally, just before I go to bed, I eat my third clove of garlic."
3. "Good grief!" said the reporter. "And why do you think that works?" "Well," said Bernard, "whenever the Angel of Death comes to me and calls out, ‘Bernard, Bernard,’ I turn and face him, take a deep breath, and loudly say, "Whooooooooooo?"
B. TEXT
31 Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to the Sea of Galilee and into the region of the Decapolis. 32 There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged him to place his hand on the man.
33 After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man's ears. Then he spit and touched the man's tongue. 34 He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, "Ephphatha!" (which means, "Be opened!"). 35 At this, the man's ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.
36 Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone. But the more he did so, the more they kept talking about it. 37 People were overwhelmed with amazement. "He has done everything well," they said. "He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak."
C. THESIS
1. This was a substantial miracle of Jesus. That would be reason enough to study it. But there are some mysterious sidelights that give one even more pause for thought.
2. So we’re going see some unusual facts about this, the seven steps in the miracle, reason for the crowd’s amazement, and what this miracle means to us.
3. Title: “Be Opened!”
I. UNUSUAL SETTING FOR THIS MIRACLE
A. JESUS’ NORTHERNMOST TRIP
1. Jesus had just traveled all the way to Sidon. This is the furthest point to the north that Jesus ever went. Then He went to the Decapolis.
2. Mark is the only gospel-writer who records this particular incident from Jesus’ public ministry.
3. Not that healing people was unusual in the ministry of Jesus. Of the 3,779 verses of the Four Gospels, 727
(1/5) of them are devoted to Jesus’ healing ministry!
4. JESUS HEALED EVERYTHING AND ALL
a. “…healing every disease and sickness among the people” Mt. 4:23.
b. “…healing every disease and sickness” Matt. 9:35.
c. “He healed all who were sick” Matt. 12:15.
d. “He…healed [all] their sick” Matt. 14:14.
e. “People brought all their sick to him…and all who touched it [cloak] were healed” Matt. 14:34-36.
f. “…power was coming from Him and healing them all Luke 6:17-19.
5. Jesus said, "He that hath seen Me, has seen the Father." You see, God is a Healing God! Just as it’s the devil’s nature to destroy, it’s God’s nature to heal.
6. We know it’s God's will to heal the sick because God healed people throughout the O.T. and because Jesus spent the largest part of His ministry healing the sick!
B. AREA OF REJECTION REVISITED
1. The Decapolis, “Ten Cities,” was where Jesus had previously healed the Gadarene demoniac. The people there had rejected Jesus; they asked Him to “move on” to
somewhere else.
2. But the formerly possessed man had been testifying
about Christ and we see how eager the people were to receive Him now!
3. Aren’t you glad Jesus gives a second chance to those who rejected him? Probably all of us did at some point; thank God He’s a God of second chances!
C. A DEAF-MUTE BROUGHT TO JESUS
It’s hard to imagine being in that condition. At least he wasn’t blind. Many people have partial spiritual senses – they can see a little of what God’s doing, but they can’t hear from God and don’t feel the liberty to speak for God. May the Lord heal all such.
D. LOW EXPECTATIONS BY THE PEOPLE
1. "They begged Him to lay His hand on the man." They wanted Jesus to give him a ‘blessing.’ People brought their children to Jesus for Him to bless them, so He put His hands on them.
2. That's all that they were expecting Jesus to do. That they faith was small is confirmed by their overwhelming astonishment after Jesus healed the man.
3. We have the tendency to “low ball” our requests, to only ask for the minimum. We need to have more faith! Jesus said, “As is your faith, so be it unto you.”
4. Jesus never rebuked large faith. Think of the Syro-Phoenician woman or the Centurion who had a sick servant. Jesus commended them. But He did rebuke small faith. “Oh you of little faith….” So let’s expect big things!
II. THE SEVEN PARTS OF THIS MIRACLE
In Mark 7:33-34, our Lord Jesus did seven things in performing this miracle:
A. HE TOOK THE MAN ASIDE
1. The first thing Jesus does is to take the man off to the side, apart from the midst of the crowd. Jesus wants his full attention, no distractions.
2. Another reason could have been the unbelief of some in the crowd. At Nazareth, “And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith” Mt. 13:58. “He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village” Mk. 8:23.
3. Sometimes, to get our full attention, the Lord has to take us aside. Jesus wants us to have a face-to-face with Him. Job said, “I know whom I have believed!” Know Him!
B. PUT HIS FINGERS IN HIS EARS
1. Second, Jesus put His fingers in the man’s ears. The Greek is even stronger, “thrusting [Gr. word, ebalen, (ekballo)] His fingers into his ears.”
2. The Lord put them in and pulled them out, as if to make way for sound to enter. The Lord wants us to hear
His voice!
C. HE SPIT
1. Third, the next thing Jesus does is to . . . spit? What’s up with that? Was he a baseball player or something? They like to spit. Some think the spitting was a gesture of blessing. In the Big Fat Greek Wedding they knew of two magic remedies: Windex and spitting.
2. Alfred Edersheim, a converted Jewish scholar says that the Jewish Talmud mentions spitting on the tongue as a means of healing (Shabb. 108b; Pliny, H.N. 28:7; Seut.,Vesp. 7). Edersheim also said that saliva was universally accepted for cures by the Rabbis.
3. Aren’t you glad we don’t do that in this church? Aren’t you glad there’s not a hymn, "Power in the Spit", "Are You Washed in the Spit?", "Holy Spirit Spit on Me."
4. I know one time I always spit: when I get something nasty in my mouth. The Lord told the Church at Laodicea (R 3:16) that because they were lukewarm, “I am about to spit you out of My mouth!” Maybe this man had been lukewarm! Are we?
D. HE TOUCHED THE MAN’S TONGUE
1. Fourth, “after spitting,” it says, Jesus “touched his tongue.” Possibly Jesus was dealing with his inability to speak. Many of God’s people need freedom/ liberty to be able to speak up for God! An anointing to get up and get out for Jesus & get their light out from under a bushel!
2. James said, “The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell!” Jm. 3:6.
3. Isaiah had an impure mouth so God sent an Angel to touch his lips with a coal of fire (Isa. 6:6-7). His guilt was taken away and his sin atoned for. Maybe that happened here! Maybe we need our lips touched!
E. HE LOOKED UP TO HEAVEN
1. Fifth, He looked up to heaven. Jesus is directing man’s gaze heavenward. David said, “I will lift up my eyes to the hills— from whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord, Who made heaven and earth.” Ps. 121:1-2.
2. At the feeding of the 5,000, Jesus…LOOKED UP TO HEAVEN and blesses the fishes and loaves (Mat.14:19).
Jesus was interceding for this man with the Father asking Him to bless what He was about to do.
F. HE SIGHED DEEPLY
1. Sixth, He SIGHED DEEPLY. The dictionary defines 'sigh' like this. 'To take in and let out a long, deep, audible breath, especially in expressing sorrow, fatigue, longing, etc.' It must have been loud to be heard in the crowd.
2. I wonder how many times God had heard this man sigh in sorrow, fatigue, longing, etc? How many times has He heard YOU sigh?
3. How wonderful that Jesus stands with us and so completely shares our sorrow, hurts, & disappointments, etc., that He sighs with us!
G. HE SPOKE THE WORD “BE OPENED”
1. Lastly, Jesus spoke the Word, “Ephphatha!” After putting his fingers into the man’s ears, after spitting and touching his tongue, after looking up to heaven and sighing, now Jesus is ready to speak and to do his mighty work.
2. One word, in Aramaic, the word “Ephphatha,” which means, “Be opened.” “Ephphatha!” Mark was an eyewitness & recalled the exact word. This is the only Aramaic word in his otherwise Greek-written gospel. It really stands out. “Ephphatha!” “Be opened!”
3. Ephphatha comes from the Hebrew word Patah which means “door,” and Jesus commanded it to be opened! Immediately his ears were opened and his tongue was loosed.
4. This same sort of powerful, divine word was spoken at Creation. “And God said, ‘Let there be light.’ And there was light.” God called the things that be not as though they were. Jesus reveals Himself again as the Creator!
III. AMAZEMENT OF THE CROWD
A. ULTIMATE SOURCE OF THEIR AMAZEMENT
1. "And they were astonished beyond measure." The effect of this miracle “blew their doors off.”
2. Suddenly, they connected the dots from 700 years before where the prophet Isaiah had predicted about the Coming Messiah;
3. "Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then shall the lame man leap like a deer and the tongue of the mute sing for joy." (Is.35:5-6).
4. They began zealously proclaiming, "'He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.'"
B. UNSTOPPABLE TESTIMONY
1. Jesus "charged them to tell no one." This was a practical request. What if Prince William and Kate were trying to see Huntsville; could they do it if the press announced they were here? No! They would have to run and hide. It was similar for the Lord Jesus.
2. But with a miracle like that, how could anybody not tell their friends and family what they had seen?
3. We don’t have to hold it back today. Now the Lord wants us to tell everyone what Jesus’ done for us!
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION
1. Bill Dorman and his son, Billy - then 4 years old, were driving down I44. At Lebanon they saw the Ferris wheel of a carnival. Billy asked if they could go to the carnival and Bill said, "sure."
2. He rode the kiddy cars, the airplanes, and even the live pony. Then he saw the motorcycles. They were full size, but ran around on a circle platform that had arms attached to each one moving it around in a circle. They did not move very fast. A safe ride, if only the safety pin had been installed that held the cycle to the arm. Why did Billy pick the only one that did not have a safety pin?
3. The ride came apart and Bill saw the motorcycle do a complete flip and land with the handlebars on Billy's face. Bill jumped over the ropes and somehow lifted the motorcycle and threw it aside.
4. Billy lay there not moving or breathing. “I picked him up in my arms and with blood gushing all over my clothes I carried him I knew not where through the carnival crowds.”
5. “Finally, a policeman made me lay him down and I knew Billy was dead. I, being led of The Holy Spirit, fell
upon his dead body, covered him and prayed, "Father, I give unto You this child. If it is Your Will to take him home now, he is Yours. O Lord, if it is Your Will for him to live then I ask that You breathe in him The Spirit of Life. O Lord, Your Will be done."
6. “As I lifted my body off him, Billy opened his eyes and said, "Dad, tell me this did not happen." At the hospital the x-rays showed he had been hurt very badly but the doctors could not find anything really wrong
with him.”
7. Much blood had been lost, his nose was broken, one eye was crossed, his skull was cracked, his teeth were loose, but all his actions, and senses were normal. He spent one night in the hospital.
8. Bill Dorman says, “For those who don’t believe in miracles, God raised him from the dead, at the time of writing this, Billy is 16 years old! Glory to God!”
B. GOD’S WORD TO YOU TODAY
1. Are you needing a miracle today? To you Jesus speaks a mighty “Ephphatha!” “Be opened, be loosed from your burden! My blood, shed on the cross, releases you from bondage!”
2. Isaiah heard the wonderful declaration, “Behold, your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.” The sure hope of total healing is yours today because of Christ.
3. Jesus says to you spiritually, “Be opened!” Your spiritual ears are opened to hear the Voice of God calling to you; to understand the Good News that God has spoken.”
4. “Your tongue, that was tied, is loosed to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father! You can now praise his holy Name!” (For “No one can say, ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit.”)
