Friday, our weekly email touched on how we were born in God’s heart even before we existed. We spoke about our origin story. The way our Trinitarian God, in all his beauty and love, set us apart in his creation as the ones to walk in His Spirit and reign with him.

It’s a pretty incredible thing, especially when you think about how perfect nature is. How everything is connected and work together to ensure that life continues.

Then, we look at us and our ability to care for things…he origin of how God has created us for this task // and it doesn’t take much for you to realize how bad we’ve messed things up. Just listen to 5 minutes of news and you will be bombarded with all kinds of wars and conflict amongst ourselves.

The ones who should be carrying on the work of Christ, the ones who should be bringing “Shalom” wherever we go. Divine order – a greater sense of peace and flourishing of all things.

When we read our Gospel passage today, the healing of a dear and mute man, we tend to have 2 responses:

Either

• You are in awe of God. // You wish you could have been there to witness the miracles. Some of us want to experience miracles in our own lives today and wish the same for our loved ones.

Or

• You have to fight a deeper sense of skepticism. It’s as if the Scriptures were talking about something so far removed from our reality that you can’t really picture it. You kind of glance over these passages. Don’t want to spend much time thinking about what they mean.

As your pastor, I really hope you’re part of the first group, but if you have found yourself struggling between the 2 groups, I want to assure you that there’s no condemnation. Instead I have a huge desire for you to see and experience the power and love of God that gives us life // life in abundance.

Our reading says:

Then he returned from the region of Tyre and went through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. And they brought to him a man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, and they begged him to lay his hand on him.

You see, the incarnation had Jesus take on human flesh so He could put Death to death. In his provision, God made a way for our humanity to be forever transformed.

Jesus, in every act of healing, this one and every single healing act he ever did, gave us a glimpse of what the renewal of all things will look like. When he heals today it speaks that same message.  And it starts with us. Just like we see in C.S.Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia – The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. When the whole creation is waiting for God’s children to know who they are. Lewis used all his creativity to explain this truth of Scripture in a beautiful way for us to understand. 

These ordinary children had within them the destiny to become kings and queens of Nárnia. Aslan just needed to show it to them. And so do we have this destiny, as we follow the one who is not safe, but is good.

Rom 8:19 says:

“For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.”

Then, it continues in verse 22-23:

“For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.”

When we see Jesus strong emphasis in healing people’s bodies, and performing miracles, we need to remind ourselves of these passages.  These miracles were just to show he is God, he could have done all kinds of things to show that. Instead it was a purposeful restoration of what he intended from the beginning. Renewal of all things.

This passage in Romans, or the one in Revelation we included in the letter on Friday, are just some of the ones that announce what God has in store for us from the beginning of time. I encourage you to go home and read Psalm 8 also.

We need to remember that God’s heart towards us is not to just fix some broken parts, but to redeem us completely.

Our reading continues:

And taking him aside from the crowd privately, he(Jesus) put his fingers into his ears, and after spitting touched his tongue. And looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.” And his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. 

It’s funny how the people, who brought the man to Jesus, asked Him to lay hands on the man. It sounds a lot like a proper religious act, something way more solemn, and perhaps proper, than what ended up happening. 

It is such a great reminder for us that:  God is God. The only One. He is the Creator.  We are His creation. It is okay for us to ask, even beg Him to do something, but we better leave enough room for Him to be God. What you’re asking may come in a very different package.

Christiane loves this part. As a physician, she laughs about the many years and crazy amount of studying needed for someone to begin to understand the human body. So, they can go on trying to fix some ‘broken parts’. And, here is the Creator in action, putting his fingers in the man’s ears and spitting and touching his tongue // AND just so we don’t forget… saving his soul in the process.

I mean, we all know the value of a good doctor, but I have to agree that nothing compares to the Great Physician – the Healer // the Creator // the Redeemer.

I want you to leave here today with a greater expectation for God than you had when you came in this morning. I pray God will meet you in a special way this week. Perhaps in a very unexpected way/

From eternity to eternity, God has desired for us to walk in the Spirit, to abide in Him, and have fullness of life. 

So the the passage ends reminding us of a final truth:

The thing about having this abundant life God has for us,  the thing about being touched and transformed by Him, is that we cannot keep it to ourselves. 

Our passage ends:

And Jesus charged them to tell no one. But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, “He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”

They couldn’t keep it to themselves. Something miraculous, life-transforming happened to them. Jesus may have healed one man from deafness and speech impediment, but He surely touched all of them. 

So, I pray that you may go on having life-transforming encounters with our Triune God. And, that not only you, but those around you may also experience his healing – whether physical, emotional or spiritual; his power to transform us;  and his unconditional love.

May we all look forward to God’s renewal of all things… starting with us!

Amen