Ephphatha

“And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him. And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened . ”

Except for saving the world by the shedding of His blood, what more precious miracle did Jesus, the Son of God, perform while on earth than opening a deaf man's ears? Could there be a greater curse than deafness? Can there be a more significant healing than to heal the ears of the deaf? Let me put it more plainly: if the Word of God is not heard, how can we ever be saved?

When I was in the special coatings business, they periodically tested our hearing with a set of headphones and a machine that made a high frequency sound in one ear or the other. The tester asked that you raise a finger each time a tone sounded, and indicate which ear you heard it in. He was testing for hearing loss in the high frequency range. This type of hearing loss is common among those who work with machinery, especially sandblasting. Loud high frequency sound can kill your hearing. Life in the big city, loud rock music, running a jackhammer, doing anything in a loud environment without hearing protection can cause hearing loss later on.

I once sat 20 minutes at a Steve Miller Blues Band concert right in front of the biggest speaker I'd ever seen. The band ended its set and we left. My ears rang all night long. There can be too much of a good thing.

But the hearing loss that can do you the most harm comes when you can't hear God anymore. Now, you may say, “I've never heard God. What do you mean—‘can't hear God anymore?'”

Adam and Eve, our first human parents, walked in a garden world and talked with God. He spoke to them and they understood Him, word for word. What do you not understand about, “the tree in the midst of the garden, don't eat of that tree or else you will die”? But Eve, and then Adam, stopped hearing God's voice for a tragic moment and you know the rest. They didn't become totally deaf after that, but heard what God asked of them and commanded from there. Their sons heard God, too: one obeyed, the other rebelled.

God spoke to lots of Bible characters, and He has not stopped speaking yet. King David spoke out God's reqest: “Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth.” Psalm 78:1

Isaiah was taken into God's throne room where God spoke the most amazing thing: “I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me. And he said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and convert, and be healed.” Isaiah 6: 8-10

What God meant by that fascinates me. Here is a willing prophet. God wants to speak to His people through Isaiah. I think God wanted to be heard and understood—it's illogical to think that God wants only to speak and be misunderstood. But here God is expressing His long held frustration. He is sending yet another prophet to His people. They need the word of God or they will perish. He would be less than God to fail to send His word to them. And yet He knows what they will do with what He tells them. He knows how well they will attend His commands, His warnings, His prophecies, His observations about their sins and abominations. They won't hear. They won't see. They'll refuse to understand. They'll end up doing whatever they want and ignoring the words that can save them, heal them, find them and return them to their Source of life. He knows before He sends the prophet that the prophet will be lucky to get out alive.

It was no different with Ezekiel, or with Jeremiah, or Micah, Amos, Joshua, Samuel, Elijah, or Ezra. They tried to kill many of these. They succeeded with Abel and Zechariah, to name two. And when God sent His Son, He knew the outcome of that gift as well. But He sent them all the same. When He sent Isaiah, God's ironic statement expressed His frustration in reaching out to people who just didn't want to hear what He would tell them. “Hear, but don't understand; look, but don't see; make your heart sluggish, plug your ears, shut your eyes—so in the end, you won't see, won't hear, won't understand: don't be converted and healed.” Hear God's frustration in that? He sent Isaiah to express His disappointment.

The Proverbs put it this way: “Speak not in the ears of a fool: for he will despise the wisdom of thy words.” 23:9 This is wisdom. There are some people you just don't tell important things to. Jesus said that telling the truth to some folks was like casting pearls in front of swine. They will just walk on them and crush them into the mud.

Isaiah, however, was listening, and hearing, and his words even today, 2,700 years later, encourage us with the promises of God to us. He spoke of God's promise of restoration to His people: “The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose… Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not: behold, your God will come… and save you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and the tongue of the dumb sing: for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert… And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of holiness; …the redeemed shall walk there: And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads.” Isaiah 35:1-10

Jesus was just as frustrated with the deafness of the people as His Father. He spoke in parables to hide His meaning from those who would just despise God's truth. But His parables held glorious truth for those who wanted to hear and understand: “ Who hath ears to hear, let him hear… I speak in parables: …in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Esaias… But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear. For verily I say unto you, That many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them… Jesus said unto them [in Nazareth], A prophet is not without honour, save in his own country, and in his own house. And he did not many mighty works there because of their unbelief.” Mat 13:9-58

Even the church, which has heard all God's truth that can save mankind, holds many who want to play around with it, redefine things, soften the harshness of God's clear warnings, make hell a holiday and heaven a bore. St. Paul saw it all in the 1 st century, could tell that it was coming, and wrote his protégé, Timothy, to record this forecast: “I n later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons…” 1 Tim 4:1 “Men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful… lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power; Avoid… those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses, always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” 2 Tim 3:1-7 They will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.” 2 Tim 4:3-4

What is it that we don't want to hear? It's easy to plug my ears, to say I am listening, but that God just isn't speaking to me. A conscience is an ear canal. Sin is earwax. Unwillingness to listen to God is an index finger thrust thus into the ear. God is speaking still. Will we hear Him? Where do you go to hear God speak? Where do you go when you want to hear what you want to listen to? Are they the same place? Shouldn't they be the same place? One of the best prayers in the prayer book, today's collect offers up this request:

ALMIGHTY and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than we to pray, and art wont to give more than either we desire or deserve; Pour down upon us the abundance of thy mercy; forgiving us those things whereof our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things which we are not worthy to ask, but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, thy Son, our Lord. Amen.

Jesus saw the deaf man and to show all of Israel what they needed, He “ put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue; and looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened. And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.” St. Mark vii Lord, open our ears.

PFH+