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Mark | Chapter 7

Mark 7:1-7

“Tradition verses relation”

  1. Introduction
  2. Vs. 1-2 Finding fault
  3. Vs. 3-5 The fence of the Pharisees
  4. Vs. 6-7 The problem with traditions

Introduction

    The only link between the first 23 verse of chapter 7 and what we just read about the feeding of the 5000 in chapter 6 is one that is not apparent on the English but is in the Greek. We are told that in verse 2 of chapter 7 that the delegation that had come from Jerusalem to find some thing to accuse Jesus of did so by observing His disciples. It appears that his had happened while watching the disciples eat some of the left over bread that had come from the 12 baskets of leftovers at the feeding of the 5000. It never ceases to amaze me how there are those Parasitical types that can look at a blessing and only see a rules violation. At issue is two opposing views of what constitutes true worship. The religious leader’s views centered around observance of traditions that enabled them to be God’s special people. Jesus views was that of simple loving obedience to the Father who so loved them. There are four stages to this drama that unfolded in the first 23 verses:

    1. Vs. 1-5 Accusation: The religious delegation was following Jesus around in hopes of finding something they could publically accuse Him of that would discredit Him and cause His popularity to diminish.
    2. Vs. 6-13 Condemnation: Jesus defended His disciples while exposing the hypocrisy of the religious leaders. In defending their tradition, the Pharisees eroded their own characters and also the character of the Word of God.
    3. Vs. 14-16 Declaration: Jesus announces to the multitude that living right with God is a matter of the heart and not about merely keeping outward rules.  
    4. Vs. 17-23 Explanation: Finally, Jesus explains what He had just said to the multitudes.
    5. Vs. 1-2 Finding fault

    Vs. 1-2 The first thing we notice is that the religious establishment decided to send a delegation to intimidate and antagonize Jesus and His disciples. The washing of hands had nothing to do with personal hygiene, nor were they command by God through the scriptures. Instead they were a part of the traditions added by religious leaders as their way of worshipping. No doubt the primary motivation for this was jealousy at the increasing popularity of the movement. To understand this continual conflict between Jesus and the Pharisees we need to look at their origins. The Pharisaic movement was born during a time of Jewish history in the 4th and 5th centuries before Jesus which we have no biblical record of. It was a time when the religious leaders felt they needed to further protect the people from the encroachment of the world upon their way of life. They were the Puritans of their age against the Babylonian and Greek influences were threating their way of life that had separated them from other cultures. So these men banded together to establish oral laws that would maintain by all means the Jewish distinction and people from the surrounding nations. These new precepts over time increased and slowly became the authority and interpretation of God’s Word. The traditions and interpretations over time need further clarification and more traditions and interpretations were added until they became a barrier between what God said in His word and the people He communicated to. The Pharisees saw themselves of maintaining the religion to the people and in their own writings referred to themselves as those that put a “fence around the law”. It wasn’t until three hundred years after Jesus that these oral laws were written down in a collection called the Mishnah. There are over 65 pages devoted in the Mishnah to the proper way to ceremonially wash your hands. God had given His people principals of hygiene that averted the spreading of germs and infections. The conflict was not only between God’s truth and man’s tradition, but also between two divergent views of sin and holiness. Jesus had already made it apparent on the Sermon on the Mount that true holiness is a matter of inward affection and attitude and not just outward actions and associations.


    Vs. 3-5 The fence of the Pharisees

      Vs. 3-5 What bothered the pharisaical delegation was not that the disciples didn’t wash their hands before eating but rather that they didn’t do so according to the prescribed religious tradition. Their religious practice looked more like a surgeon preparing for and operation than a person preparing to sit down for some supper. The hands had to be held palm up and slightly cupped and water poured over them. Then one hand was used to scrub the other hand, then the fist of the clean hand would be used to wash the other hand. The hands then would have placed out palms down and fresh water poured over them to cleanse the dirty water, then the hands would be lifted up so that the water could drain down the forearms exiting off the elbows. If anything touched the cleansed hands after the process the whole ceremony would have to be repeated. The problem was that the religious establishment took these requirements and began to make them a way to appear religiously superior to everyone around them. It was no longer enough to do the “right thing” the people now had to do the “right thing” the “right way”. This kind of self righteousness is not isolated to the Judaism as Paul had to address the same things in the early church in 2 Corinthians 3:17 when he wrote “where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty.” Mankind has a propensity towards making rules and religious regulations our sole standard and declaration of being religious and better than others. One of the marvelous aspects of the book of Acts is the indifference the Lord had to these barriers as believers indwelt with the Holy Spirit moved freely in expression and experience as He dictated. There was spontaneity and variety in the way the church was formed that allowed people to experience more of the presence of the Lord. But soon these very expressions become regulated, orchestrated and calculated into a liturgy of acceptable forms of worship that claimed authority to be sole basis of how a person was to experience God that stiffened the very work of the Holy Spirit. Looking out over church History is to discover that every renewal where the Holy Spirit has broken free of the stagnant religious tradition has over time become a stagnant tradition that will need to be broken free from!   


      Vs. 6-7 The problem with traditions

      Vs. 6-7 Here we see Jesus’ initial response which He will go onto further illustrate in verse 8-23. And we see that He wastes no time in addressing the reason why, “His disciples didn’t walk according to the tradition of the elders…” The problem, Jesus said, was not in the observance of the traditions of the elders but rather in what their observance produced in those who adhered to them, “hypocritical arrogance”! According to Matthews account in chapter 15:12 such blunt speech by Jesus caused the disciples to come to Him afterward to inform Jesus that the religious delegation had been offended by His comments. But Jesus was fully aware of offending them and in fact did so deliberately. In quoting Isaiah 29:13 Jesus points out two things about “walking in the traditions of elders” that produces “hypocritical arrogance” does in destroying true worship:

      1. Vs. 6 “This people honors Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me”: The first thing Jesus says that it does in destroying true worship is that places right words with wrong attitudes. All of the emphasis in this is upon the outward action but it doesn’t consider the inward heart or attitude. Such action Jesus says is hypocrisy as it only looks worshipful and devotional while inside the attitude is completely different. This is often the observation of folks who look at the church as they say, “You use all the right words but you don’t really mean them. You talk about love, but you don’t love. You talk about forgiveness but you don’t forgive.” When everything becomes “externalized” and outward and as long as we are fulfilling our acceptable tradition we are right with God. Someone has well said that: The most dangerous situation facing the church today is thinking that because we use the right words and believe right doctrines we are pleasing to God.  It can be difficult to determine if have become a church or an individual that places “right words with wrong attitudes” but one of the ways you can determine this is to ask yourself this question: “If you became tangled up in some sin, overcome by some horrible failure in your life, embarrassed by some gross behavior; where would you feel you would receive the greatest amount of love and help to overcome your situation in the church among people like you or in a bar?” The truth is everyone of us at some time are going to need to run some where to receive help for what we have done to ourselves, my prayer is that we will run to God and His people our brothers and sisters and not the local bar! It is at the church amongst God’s people that I will find folks who have done dumb things just like me and will help me recover by pointing me to Jesus just as someone had done for them!
      2. Vs. 7 “And in vain they worship Me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men”: The second thing that the traditions of elders do is clothe the worlds wrong words in right sounding attitudes and traditions. Here according to Isaiah this was another hypocrisy as the religious leaders as they took the concepts of the old nature and made people self righteous and self centered attitudes. Jesus had addressed this very issue a year earlier John chapter 4 verse 24 with the woman at the well. There Jesus told here that “God is spirit and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and in truth.” There to that woman by the well Jesus outlined three essential elements of what true worship of God entails:
      3.  First worship must be genuine: It can not be superficial or shallow, it can not be something that you go through the motions on or repeat actions without the emotion behind it. There is no such thing as auto pilot when it comes to true worship. Worship in its purest form is spontaneous, an expression full of wonder and amazement that bursts forth in enthusiastic praise. Far too much of what passes of genuine worship is nothing more than a repeated liturgy or a contrived response to a structure of practice. What Isaiah was referring to was that people had added traditions and worldly attitudes to be expressions of devotion and in essence killed any possibility of there being any true worship.
      4. Second worship is individualistic: That is not to say that we can’t have or experience true worship of God corporately but that or corporate worship is made up of individual expressions. Again Isaiah was writing against the establishment of rules that sought to regulate all into the same list of worship and expression. There may very well be similarity in our expression but there will always be individuals doing so. The posture or activity in which we are participating in must never supplant the individual’s expression of their devotion and love of God.
      5. Third worship is growing: To worship God in spirit in truth requires and demands continual growth other wise it will become stagnate and hinder that what at one time it enhanced. No church creates worship by our traditions and structure all we can do is offer the opportunity for people to enter into their expression of devotion publically.  

      That was the problem with the teaching as doctrine the commandments of men as it removed true worshipful expression from the people. This is a difficult subject to talk about, “the power religious tradition has over us”. How we perceive what is acceptable before God and what we deem as outside the realm of acceptance. All sorts of things that we now conclude as being ok at one time in a previous generation was considered taboo. Everything from the day we worship, to the way we worship has been debated and new groups forming that took it outside the realm of what previously accepted.                                             


      Mark 7:8-23

      “The Heart of the Matter”

      1. Introduction
      2. Vs. 8-9 A poor substitute
      3. Vs. 10-13 Side stepping
      4. Vs. 14-16 Defied or defiled
      5. Vs. 17-23 A difference in what is clean

      Introduction

        As we noted this section deals with the religious delegation sent from Jerusalem seeking a charge that they might accuse Jesus of. They found it in the observation of His disciples not ceremonially washing their hands while they ate from the 12 basket of fragments at the feeding of the 5000. The indictment, from my point of view, is far greater towards these religious “do gooders” as they were more concerned with religious observances than miracles. Mark presents this section in four-parts as we have noted:

        1. Vs. 1-5 The Accusation
        2. Vs. 6-13 The Condemnation
        3. Vs. 14-16 The Declaration
        4. Vs. 17-23 The Explanation  

        We have already commented on the accusation from the religious delegation and the first part of the condemnation from Jesus where He quoted Isaiah 29 in verses 6-7 answering the religious delegations question of “Why His disciples didn’t walk according to the tradition of the elders” with regards to ceremonial washing of hands. The simple answer is that such practices leveled upon the disciples may have according to their traditions been religiously acceptable but it also contributed to their being inwardly arrogant and self righteous. At the heart of the disagreement is the traditions of elders verses the word of God. Some of the religious leaders claimed that the traditions of elders had come from Moses, others said that they came from the elders around Moses but the truth of the matter is neither of these positions was true.  


        Vs. 8-9 A poor substitute

          Vs. 8-9 The word “laying aside” in the Greek means to abandon and done so in order to go on to something else. And the word “hold” means to powerfully, carefully and faithfully hang on to something. The religious leaders were zealots when it came to observing their own rules but had done so at the cost of abandoning the Word of God. And the word “reject” means to set aside the affect of something in order to nullify its effect. In this case what they had set aside was the word of God in order to keep their own made up words.

          Even the word used here in the Greek for “tradition” can mean “substitution” as what God want most is us not what we give Him or do for Him. Jesus points out that another danger of traditions is that they tended to replace the Word of God with regards to what is to direct the actions and hearts of people. They become substitutions for the word of God and what God really wants. But when we substitute things for the heart we can fall into wrong impression that what we are giving God or doing for God is what is most important and our relationship becomes nothing more than works to obtain what we want. At the heart of God’s law was never performance it was relationship! Tradition begins with offering God a substitute, holding the traditions of men, something declared as “good” but the problem is that what we have declared as “good” is not what God wants us to offer, offer. “Good” can never be the substitute for the “Best”! Jesus points out that the elevation of the traditions of men to that of the Word of God erodes the character of God as well as the character of man. The outward establishment of signs and standards as determining the heart of a person towards God is not based upon man’s ideas but rather upon God’s word. The fact that religious people attempt to regulate the truth is the surest sign that they are worshipping themselves not God.  And in so doing they were destroying the right influence of the word of God upon human hearts and substituting man’s opinion. 

          History reveals that the Jewish religious leaders came to honor their traditions far above the Word of God. One ancient Rabbi named Eleazer said, “He who expounds the Scriptures in opposition to the tradition has no share in the world to come.” The Mishna, (the written collection of Jewish traditions) records, “It is a greater offense to teach anything contrary to the voice of the Rabbis than to contradict Scripture itself.”


          Vs. 10-13 Side stepping

            Vs. 10-13 The word “honor” in the Greek carries the idea of valuing where by a price is fixed upon the evaluation. Thus when you honor your father and mother there is a price fixed upon this that goes beyond merely respecting a person to deeming them worthy of your financial support. The word “curses” here means more than to just speak ill of but to abuse and revile. Jesus is indicting those that have placed traditions above the word with regards to the 5th commandment with elder abuse. “Corban” is a Hebrew word which Mark transliterates and explains it as meaning a gift or offering to God. The rabbinical tradition allowed the adult children to to keep whatever money should have been given by the son for the support of the parents if he declared it a gift to God, just by saying so. This enabled then to justify not to honor his parents by providing their necessities. Such action invalidated the 5th commandment of God.

            In using this illustration Jesus demonstrates another problem when traditions are offered as a substitute to God’s word. Not only do the traditions of man become a substitute they enable a person to side step obedience to the word of God and by so doing they hurt people. Jesus offers up the illustration of the 5th commandment in Exodus 21:17, “Honor your father and mother, and He who curses father or mother, let him be put to death.” These men claimed to love God, but demonstrated it by showing that they had no love for their parents! The commandment meant far more than just being polite and respectful to your parents it meant that there was an obligation to take care of them as they grew older, just as parents had an obligation to take care of their children when they were young. But the traditions of elders had work out a neat way of side stepping this commandment from God as the adult children could take the finances that were to be spent on care for parents and say that it was dedicated to God and by doing so they were now free to spend it as they wished. This commandment had to do with responsibility of distributing benevolence to older parents who without retirement and unable to work need to be cared for by their offspring and not a burden upon society. The tradition of elders in this case enabled the children to create a religious “tax shelter” and set aside the responsibility that God had clearly given them to care for their elder parents.


            Vs. 14-16 Defied or defiled

              Vs. 14-16 Jesus now address the crowd to reveal the hypocrisy of the traditions of elders. The Greek word for “defile” is the same as verse 2 and means that which is profane and secular compared to that which is sacred. Having spoken to the religious delegation, Jesus turns His words upon the multitude as He explains the problem with holding the traditions of elders as equal or above the word of God; they don’t address the real problem with man. They portray a false view that what is wrong with humanity can be regulated as it is from the outside. But the truth is that what defiles us is not from the outside it is a problem of the heart and thus inside. We are separated from God based upon a heart ailment that not amount of proper diet can correct and instead we need a heart transplant! All the traditions of elders do for humanity is keep us in a state by which we won’t turn to the great physician and receive the one thing that will cure us.


              Vs. 17-23 A difference in what is clean

              Vs. 17-23 Jesus seems to be disappointed that His own disciples were as caught up in the religious tradionalism as were the multitudes. This understanding wouldn’t take its full understanding in Peter until his vision on the roof top in the town of Joppa, where he heard “What God has cleansed, you must not call common”. Jesus had no illusions about human nature, as do some humanistic teachers do today. He realized that man is a sinner, unable to control or change his own nature.


              Mark 7:24-30

              “Mercy to ministry”

              1. Introduction
              2. Vs. 24-30 He could not be hidden

              Introduction

                By placing the first 23 verses of chapter 7 next to verses 24-37 Mark wants to show the benefits of Jesus’ administration when compared to the traditions of the religious establishment. Paul the apostle who had once in his own words described himself as a Pharisee of Pharisees commented to the Corinthian church in 2 Corinth 3:17 “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” The needs of the people both gentile and Jew would have remained un-transformed if Jesus operated within the traditions of the elders. But because He acted in line with the word of God and rejected the traditions of the elders He was free to move in the needs and hurts of those that were open to His touch. Mark offers up two examples of this: First in verses 24-30 as he shows that Jesus and His disciples moved to Tyre and Sidon and next week we will look at in verses 31-37 as Jesus heal the deaf in the gentile area of Decapolis.


                Vs. 24-30 He could not be hidden

                  Vs. 24-25 Matthew informs us that the woman who addressed Jesus was a gentile both of which would have disqualified her from ministry had Jesus up held the traditions of the elders. Jesus left the region of Galilee and crossed the border some 60 miles to Tyre and Sidon, gentile country. They inhabited the area of the Canaanite’s but were Phoenician by nationality and Greek by religion and speech. They had started out as trades people builders and artisans. And from this they acquired great wealth and that had further led them into idolatry. They were the hated enemies of the Jews and the feeling was mutual. They worship Asherah the god of nature and other Greek gods. The contrast couldn’t be more obvious as Mark points out from Jesus teaching against the traditions of elders he left the Jewish area and went directly to a gentile area and into a home there. There seems to be a theme in terms of the use of analogies as Jesus had just spoken in terms of food not being a defilement agent and here we see that Jesus illustrated this by going into an unclean person’s region and home to minister to the need. The analogy is clear, we all have folks, that we just can’t “stomach”. Oh we may say we do have any prejudices but we can like the Pharisees declare someone off limits, untouchable.  They are “unclean” something we just don’t have a taste for but not so with Jesus He came to seek and save that which was lost. What He couldn’t stomach was the hearts of those who refused to reach out to people. Marks gospel tells us that upon arriving into this region “He entered a house and wanted no one to know it, but He could not be hidden.” He could not be hidden for this woman’s need drew Him forth.

                  I wonder if Jesus seeking solitude from the continual interrogation from the religious delegation sought places like Tyre and Sidon knowing that their traditions would keep them from coming? It also would provide a teaching moment in His disciples as they would be witnesses that such action on His part in correlation with His teaching was not just religious platitudes and theory as clearly He put it into practice. This woman came to Jesus in her desperation because she had “heard about Him”. Jesus knew that there was a gentile woman, with false ideas about God. She had grown up raised on a host of false deities, perhaps she was faithful to those ideals and now a crisis has come into her life her daughter has been severally possessed by a demon. Her concepts of god, her religious works avail nothing. Yet, she has heard of this Jesus and even though it goes against her religion and all of her prejudice she comes to Him. Folks, He traveled 60 miles to meet this woman and in so doing He broke religious barrier with the gospel. Do you realize that this is the first recorded gentile convert? She is not coming for herself she is coming for her daughter. Jesus came not to destroy her faith, but to develop it.

                              Note: The contrast between the Pharisees and scribes and this woman: They had come to him traveling 60 miles to argue tradition above relationship. Jesus had traveled 60 miles because there was a woman wanting relationship above her traditions. I believe that all people are religious and they all have to over come those religious traditions of their lives to come to Christ.

                  Vs. 26 Yet with that said these comments by Jesus towards this woman seem to be derogatory, why did Jesus treat her so harshly. Matthew tells us that she first came to Jesus asking Him to do something about her severely demon-possessed daughter. According to Matthew’s account this woman keeps on crying out to the Lord so much so that the disciple’s say; “Hey, Lord do something that she may go away!” To be honest I’m not so sure that I would not have said the same thing. This is the second time they have asked the Lord to send needy people away.

                  A.) “Have mercy.” Nothing wrong with this it ought to be the cry of every soul in distress.  It speaks from the human side of being unworthy and from Gods side as being greater then any other thing.     

                  B.) “Son of David.” Of the 16 times you find this phrase in the gospels this is the only time in which it is uttered by a gentile. This term was used to exclusively by Jews as a messianic term and when applied towards Jesus is was an acknowledgement that He is the long awaited for Messiah. This phrase is something that no gentile would have used or known anything about. It is obvious that she had heard this term used by Jews of Him and wanted to address him religiously in hopes that the correct terminology would grant her what she requested. But as Mark in forms us with such a religious traditional response, Jesus has not a word to say.

                  At first glance this seems to be a bit harsh, a desperate woman trying to save her child, trying to say the right things to get Him to respond in mercy to her need. “And He has nothing to say?” Do you ever feel like this? Do you ever have a pressing need and you do all the right things to get God to respond and nothing? May I suggest to you that Jesus will never respond to traditional religious formulas no matter how correct and truthful they are. Jesus is not a theological conviction, He is not a creed you recite, He is a person!

                              Think of it in human terms: You go to the person you want to marry and you propose, pulling out a piece of paper you recite a standard traditional phrase…. “Roses are red, violates are blue, will you marry me and I’ll love you too.” No, that’s not how you communicate to the person you love instead you poor out your heart to them, you become vulnerable. 

                  Vs.27 Jesus response to her is based upon her initial approach as He in essence tells her that; “If you are approaching me based upon religion and tradition then I will answer you only upon religion and tradition.” There were according to religious tradition three things against this mother:

                              1.) She was a woman

                              2.) She was a Canaanite

                              3.) She had not made a good impression upon the disciple’s

                  But she had two things that set her apart: She was determined and she had come to the right person, albeit the wrong way! Matthew then tells us that upon Jesus rejection of her initial approach that she did three things that came natural for her and it is this that moved her past the religious barriers:

                  A.) She worshipped Him: The word worship means to turn and kiss, like your dog does on your hand. It is a spontaneous sign of great affection. Where religious formulas failed spontaneous affection worked.

                  B.) She changed her words:  She didn’t call Him by what those Jewish people would have she called to Him based upon her heart felt need; “Lord”.

                  C.) She shortened her need: There was no shopping list, no do this my way. No, just “help me.” This is one of the three shortest prayer recorded in the Bible. Peter had just cried out “Lord save me.” Now we see this woman cry out, “Lord, help me.”. Then finally you will here the thief on the cross cry out, “Lord, remember me.”

                  1.) “Lord save me.”

                  2.) “Lord, help me.”

                  3.) “Lord, remember me.”

                  All of these got an immediate response. We don’t need to impress the Lord, He want’s us to cut to the heart of our need.

                  At first glance Jesus calling her a little dog seems quite harsh especially when we note that the Jews had a word for dogs as they called them “goy”. They were kind of like wolfs or coyotes; vicious animals that traveled around in packs attacking farm animals and little children. In the Hebrew language there are no swear words. Instead they would use words that spoke of things that they didn’t like and apply them other things they didn’t care for. And this is the case with the word “goy” as they called gentiles “goyim”. It was a racial slur a dirty word calling them vicious dogs. But that is not what Jesus calls her, as our English translation renders it “little dogs”. I have no doubt that this mother was familiar with the term and had been called it many a time and Jesus changes the word to another word for dog as it described a little puppy that was part of the family.

                  Vs. 28-30 She understood Jesus choice of words and what they were trying to convey and doesn’t argue her unworthiness to receive mercy, she only asks for the crumbs that would fall from the table. In those days there were no eating utensils neither were there any napkins, eating was a messy proposition. They would save a piece of bread or two for after the meal and would use it to clean their face and hands, then they would just throw that piece of bread to the little four legged family member under the table. That is what her view of herself and the gentiles as she asks the Lord to deal with her on her low estate, right where she is at.

                  I can just picture a smile breaking out on His face as Matthew tells us He spays to her: “Woman” which is a Hebrew word “goo-nay” and it is used as a term of endearment, the same word Jesus used to address His mother. It is also the word used when a person would speak to their wife, today we would say, “Dear”. Jesus marveled at her trust in Him as her faith had over come religion and prejudice, silence and disappointment. She had come through all of that and received what she had longed for.


                  Mark 7:31-37

                  “Can you hear me now?”

                  1. Introduction
                  2. Vs. 31-32 The most difficult person to reach
                  3. Vs. 33-34 A strange cure
                  4. Vs. 35-37 The actions of God verse’s the God who acts

                  Introduction

                    It’s been a few weeks since we were in Mark and so I’ll review briefly by saying that the Holy Spirit guided Mark into placing these two miracles as an illustration of what Jesus was conveying to His disciples at the time that the two miracles took place as well as there importance in what Mark wanted to demonstrate to his Roman readers. At issue to the Roman readers was the superior benefits of Jesus’ administration when compared to the traditions of the religious establishment as well as the Roman Emperor. Such demonstrations continually emphasize the radical difference of Jesus compared to all others in power and authority where He is always about others especially those that would for any other human inspire our personal prejudices. In verses 24-30 we saw this demonstrated when Jesus and His disciples moved to Tyre and Sidon and now we will look at in verses 31-37 as Jesus heals the deaf and mute man in the gentile area of Decapolis. Though this miracle is only recorded by Mark it’s appeal is far more reaching than just this one gospel as not only for the fact that it was again across racial barriers but also because of the difficulty of reaching this man as seen by Jesus’ application of a strange methodology to implement his cure. The far reaching success of this healing is fully appreciated unless we turn to Matthew 15 where we are told that Jesus actions in this gentile region garnered praise to the God of Israel. The area of Decapolis or “ten cities” was so influenced by Roman culture that it was known as “Rome away from Rome”. This man not only had the barriers of racial ramifications he also presented a case that had limits do to the extreme difficulty of natural communication. He was deaf, and as such could not hear Jesus words. The evidence of the severity of his affliction is seen in the extreme methods Jesus employed through sight and touch. Even Jesus prayer is changed to communicate as we see in verse 34 that the word in the Greek for “sigh” is the same word connected to prayer in Roman’s 8:23 and 26. Yet though this man could not hear Jesus speak all of creation could, and at His command obeyed giving this man what he had never had the gift of communication.


                    Vs. 31-32 The most difficult person to reach

                      Vs. 31 The 2nd story begins by describing a journey that apart from knowing the area and continued racial prejudices would not garner any interest. Jesus was in the north in an area of modern day Lebanon and according to the text he was going to go south to the region of Decapolis which at that time was right on the Sea of Galilee and extended into what is now modern day Jordan. But the story tells us that Jesus did so by first going north before He went south. As such we see Jesus deliberately continuing His ministry to the Gentiles as He avoided Jewish territory and instead traveled only through the gentile areas until reaching the Gentile region in the south called Decapolis or ten Greek cities on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee, this would be in modern day Syria and not the normal route taken from Tyre and Sidon. Many scholars believe that this was not a few day journey but rather that Jesus took up to 8 months in this region. In the next chapter we will find that after these many months ministering exclusively to the gentiles that Peter will conclude in verse 29 that Jesus was the the messiah. I believe that it was Jesus

                      example during these months that spoke a greater truth to Peter than the miracles accomplished in Israel among the Jews. When you examine the amount to recorded time Jesus spent among the gentiles during His 3 ½ years of ministry you realize that 1/3 of it was among them. Yes, Jesus went to the Jews first but He did not neglect the gentiles as He fulfilled the fact that God had uniquely placed Israel to be a light among them. The longevity in this region was a further lesson for His disciples that God is not a respecter of persons.

                      Vs. 32 I suppose that no handicap is a pleasant circumstance but at this time this condition had far more stigma placed upon it than blindness. Those afflicted with blindness didn’t bare the same social pain as dead the deaf and mute. First they were unaware of the impatient and condescending stairs. Then there was the awareness that people who were deaf and mute were considered stupid because of their disability. The condition of this man was desperate he was deaf but apparently not from birth as he could speak but that speech was further hindered by the fact that he had speech impediment, so in truth he had two disabilities that adversely affected His life. Here was a man shut out from life, he couldn’t hear or communicate. He couldn’t hear the truth or ask questions, living in a silent world of isolation all the while being around people. This by all practical physical situation would be the most difficult person to reach: A gentile, unable to hear or speak!


                      Vs. 33-34 A strange cure

                        Vs. 33-34 Mark records for us five things that Jesus did to minister to this man that were quite unusual for those of us not afflicted with this man’s handicaps.

                        1. “He took him aside”: Though this seems to be a minor thing, I suggest that to this man it may have been the biggest thing he had experienced since becoming deaf. The compassion Jesus exhibited to take this gentile man aside privately, away from the gawking crowds, demonstrates to this man that Jesus well understood his handicaps. Just like today compassion and caring were not in vogue but they were always present in our Lord. We see it often before the healing that Jesus was “moved with compassion”. One author put it well when he wrote concerning Jesus that, “There is no place where earth’s sorrows are more felt than in heaven!” The only conclusion we can make is that with Jesus, His compassion was a key ingredient to His healing for the hurting and suffering. This man couldn’t hear Jesus but this first method spoke more to him than anything he had encountered in years. And the crowds around this man would have known the sensitivity Jesus was using to treat his condition. They didn’t hear Jesus yell at him as some might have tried, instead he took him aside privately. The next three things Jesus did was to awaken this man’s faith as He needed to communicate to him what He was going to do for him.
                        2. “Put His fingers in his ears”: Jesus never recoiled from laying His hands of hurting humanity. True compassion is not just what we FEEL, it requires us to reach out and touch!  But why this method, what was the purpose? I believe that by so doing Jesus was indicating that He knew that he was deaf and that He intended to enable him to hear again. It was this touch that demonstrated this to a deaf man.
                        3. “He spat and touched his tongue”: Spit in that day was thought to hold medicinal value and Jesus wetting his fingers and touched the man’s tongue would have indicated that He was going to lose his tongue so that he could speak and communicate again.   
                        4. “He looked up up into heaven, He sighed”: Jesus looked into heave and sighed to indicate where this healing was going to come from and breathed out to indicate that it was from the invisible agency of the power of God.  
                        5.  “And said to him “Ephphatha” that is “be opened”: And when Jesus looked into his eyes He knew that the man understood spoke the Hebrew word “be opened” to indicate that the invisible power was none other than the Hebrew God!

                        Vs. 35-37 The actions of God verse’s the God who acts

                          Vs. 35-37 And immediately he began to hear and speak perfectly. Jesus then told them not to speak of it but the more He commanded them the more widely they spoke about it. There is a change in pronouns as Jesus had been dealing with the deaf man until here but now he speaks to the multitudes but the more He told them the more they published it. Jesus didn’t want the moniker of miracle worker as He was and is far more than this. People are far to blind as they can only see the actions of God instead of the God who acts! Yes, He does all things well, but it is because of who He is.

                                Yet I think that some of this methodology may also serve a greater purpose than the healing of a deaf and mute man 3 thousand years ago. Alfred Edersheim wrote many wonderful books and one of my favorites is the “Life and times of Jesus the Messiah”. His perspective is that this healing serves as a great blue print on how to reach out to a pagan lost world through 4 methods Jesus employed to heal this deaf and mute gentile.

                          1. Looking up to heaven: First and fore most if we are to reach a lost world we will need to overcome our sense of “prayerlessness”. We will need a more and greater dependence upon the Father as Jesus always demonstrated. Remember that Jesus look to heaven was in the midst of a very busy hands on ministry. We are far to intent on doing good and being busy that we neglect the most important part to accomplish His purposes for His glory, prayer. If we are to be effective to return sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf we will need to be “looking up to heaven” to do so.
                          2. He took him aside: As already mentioned this a visible demonstration of compassion. Such compassion is a part of any work of reaching people, we won’t be moved until we are moved with compassion. We need what Jeremiah wrote of with regards to his own heart in 9:1, “Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.”
                          3. His touch: we are told of this strange remedy but the common denominator is that Jesus touched him. With out a word spoken Jesus in full view of His church, the disciples, reached out and touched a man that they would never have thought to have doe so. It didn’t matter what the person’s ailment they all received a touch from Jesus. That touch said so much as it said, “I’m with you, I feel your pain, I care about your predicament and I’m going to do something more than just express my sympathies.” His touch is akin to Isaiah’s words, “Here I am send me” as they demonstrate a willingness to be a part of the solution and not just a mere mention of the problem!
                          4. His word: I love the fact that the first thing this man heard was the words “Be opened”. I also see the proper order of this response to reach a lost world. We often become frustrated in our attempt’s to reach people because we have been speaking to them the word and they are not “OPEN”. But it could be that they are not open because we have skipped lessons 1-3 and it is our lack of openness that has cause theirs!

                          I pray these lessons have spoken to your heart in reaching a lost world!   


                            

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