Mark 7:31-37 - He has done all things well

7:31,32

Jesus then left Tyre and Sidon. These were both Phoenician cities, but with Jewish communities. The Decapolis was a region of ten Hellenistic cities, ie with significant Greek influence. We are not told who “they” were, but whoever they were, they brought a man to Jesus who  was deaf and had a speech impediment. The speech impediment may well have been associated with his deafness. It is also likely that this was not the only person who was brought to Jesus for healing, but Mark records this one for a reason.

7:33,34

Jesus took the man aside. This was going to be a private healing, at least as far as possible. Jesus put His fingers in the man’s ears. This was probably to indicate to him that He was going to heal his deafness. Then Jesus span and touched his tongue. Spitting was usually considered “unclean”, but could be associated with healing. Jesus was telling the man He was also going to restore his speech. If the spitting is viewed as unclean, then Jesus would be saying to the man (remember he is deaf, hence the “sign language”) that his imperfect or unclean speech would be restored.

Jesus looked up to heaven and then said to the man “Ephphatha”, which is Aramaic for “be opened”. Jesus knew that the healing came from heaven. It also says that Jesus sighed, from things that Jesus says elsewhere this could be a weariness that man does not realise that we can call upon God for ourselves and bring healing.

7:35-37

The man’s ears were indeed opened and his tongue released, so he could now hear and speak properly. Jesus had carried out the exercise in some degree of privacy (v33) and told the man and those who did witness it not to tell anyone. However, this command was singularly unsuccessful, and the more Jesus told them to keep quiet, the more zealously they proclaimed what had happened.

The people were amazed at Jesus, they were amazed at His teaching and at His healing abilities. “He did all things well”. So what does all this say to the church today? It seems that in the gospels Jesus could not stop people telling others about Him, even when He did not want them to. Today we find it very difficult to tell people about Jesus, for a whole host of reasons. What was it people marvelled at? It was Jesus Himself. Now Jesus is not here on earth, but we are His body. So we should continue to do the things that Jesus did. However, the aim must not be to draw attention to ourselves, but to point people to Jesus.