Easter Sunday Sermon

"Speak, But Don't Tell"
[Mark 7:31-8:10]
April 16, 2006 Second Reformed Church

Happy Resurrection Sunday!

This morning, let us look at two events in the Gospel, and as we look at them, let us consider two questions: If Jesus is physically risen from the dead, how should we respond? And, does He minister to us today?

Jesus and His disciples left Tyre and Sidon after He healed the little girl who was possessed by a demon, and they sailed across the Sea of Galilee to the middle of the region of Decapolis. And as soon as they got out of the boat, a crowd formed around them, because they recognized Jesus and had heard the stories about His Ministry.

Now, there was a man who was deaf and had a terrible speech impediment, and his friends brought him to Jesus and begged Jesus to lay hands on him and make him whole in body. We should notice the compassion of the friends -- that they heard Jesus was coming and they made sure that their friend who was in physical distress got to see Him. Christians ought to care about the physical needs of others and help them in whatever way we are able. This church does well in that, as many here have been in physical distress and others have stepped up to provide counsel and rides and comfort. Let us continue to minister to the physical needs of each other in whatever way we are able.

Jesus also had compassion on the man and healed him: God is able to sympathize with our physical needs because He became incarnate and became a real human being. Jesus took the man aside, privately, but still in view of the crowd, so they could see and hear Him. And Jesus stuck His fingers in the man's ears, and then He spit on His fingers and touched them to the man's tongue, and then He looked up to heaven and sighed, and then He spoke the word, "Ephphatha," which means, "Be opened."

Why? Why did Jesus go through all those gestures? They weren't necessary to heal the man. In the verses preceding this morning's text, we see Jesus heal a demon-possessed girl that He never sees or touches. And Jesus is the Incarnate God, the same One Who by His Very Word, spoke everything into existence. Why did He make all these gestures? Why didn't He just say, "Be healed," as He did on so many other occasions?

Jesus put His fingers in the man's ears and spit and touched his tongue to symbolically show that He had the power to heal. He showed it was not a coincidence that the man was healed, but it was by His Power that the man was healed. And Jesus looked up to Heaven that they would know that His Power and Authority comes from Heaven -- He is neither a magician nor a con-artist, but the Savior Whose Power and Authority come from Heaven. He also looked to Heaven to make it clear that He is the Only Mediator between God and Man -- it is Jesus Who stands between God and man and makes us right with God. And He sighed, because He was truly sorry for the man and his afflictions. And then He spoke to manifest the healing. We read that as soon as Jesus spoke, "immediately," he was healed.

We can conclude from this that God also desires that His own be delivered from spiritual death and disease. For if Jesus was so concerned and compassionate towards the physical needs of those around Him, surely He would be all the more concerned about the greater issue of the health of a person's soul. And so should we.

So, Jesus healed the man. "And he ordered them to tell no one, and the more he ordered them, the more zealous they proclaimed. And they were exceedingly amazed, saying, 'He has done all things well and he makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.'"

Jesus said to the man, "Speak, but don't tell." Why did Jesus tell them -- command them -- not to tell anyone? Wouldn't it make more sense that he ask them to spread the news as far as they were able? Wouldn't it only help His ministry to have more people know what He had done?

No. For two reasons: Jesus told them not to tell anyone because He didn't want them to get addicted to miracles. There are some today that preach that God wants everyone healthy and wealthy -- that is what Jesus wanted to avoid, because the truth of the matter is, if God is God, then God gets what God wants. If God wanted every single person to be healthy and wealthy, they would be. But He does not, and He doesn't want us to become addicted to the spectacular, because God does heal today, but not everyone will be healed in this life.

The other reason Jesus commanded them not to tell is that God is a God of order, and He works out His Plan in time as it pleases Him. It was not time -- we've heard that over and over in our look at Mark -- it was not time for Jesus to be revealed in His Fulness among them. But the time would come:

On that first Easter morning, the women went to the tomb where Jesus had been buried, "And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, 'Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He is risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you'" (Mark 16:5-7).

If Jesus is physically risen from the dead, how should we respond? We should respond just like the friends did -- we've got to tell somebody If we know that God cares for us and calls us to belief in Jesus Alone for salvation, if we know the Truth and the Truth is the greatest news that anyone could ever know or believe, we must tell -- we must speak up! Jesus Himself said, "Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation" (Mark 16:15b).

About the same time that Jesus healed the man who was deaf and had a speech impediment, another great throng gartered around Him to listen to Him teach and preach, and they stayed with Him in a desolate place, listening, hearing, for three days. And Jesus had pity on them and showed compassion towards them, because they had gotten so caught up in hearing Jesus, that they had forgotten to eat, and Jesus was concerned that they would start to faint, especially if He sent them back to their homes.

So He called His disciples to Him and told them that He was going to performed another miracle, one similar to one He had performed before. Jesus asked them for their bread -- seven loaves -- and their few small fish. And Jesus told them to prepare -- to set out baskets, because He was going to bless the bread and the fish and feed all 4,000 people there with them.

When Jesus had fed the other crowd, He asked the disciples what food they had, and they responded in an unbelieving manner to Jesus; they did not believe He could feed about 15,000 people with five loaves of bread and two fish. They scoffed at Jesus. But now they knew better, and Jesus prepared them for what was going to happen so they would be able to partake of the miracle rightly and to their benefit

We ought also prepare ourselves before we come to worship, so we will not be caught off guard and fall into sin. We ought to get a good night sleep and arrive on time for worship. We ought to give ourselves enough time to quite down and be ready to hear from God. We ought to pray for ourselves and each other -- that we would hear and receive the Word of God -- and we ought to be in prayer for the minister -- that he would prepare well and handle the Word of God accurately. And we ought to take a special preparation on those days when we know the Lord's Supper will be celebrated. Since Jesus and the Apostle Paul have warned us against receiving the bread and the cup without discerning the body. Let us come, having confessed our sin and made ourselves right with each other. Let us come expecting that the bread and the cup will be for us the Body and Blood of Christ, such that He will be spiritually present with us as we receive the elements. We do well to prepare before we hear God's Word and receive the Sacrament.

So Jesus blessed the bread and the fish and fed all 4,000 people, until they were satisfied, and the disciples collected six baskets full of fish and bread that were left over. And then they got into the boat and sailed to the region of Dalmanutha.

Notice again that Jesus cared for the physical needs of others, and, we understand, much more for their spiritual needs. So, how does the Risen Jesus He minister to us today? The two primary ways He ministers to us is through the reading and preaching of God's Word and through the administration of the sacraments.

When the Word of God is read and preached, Jesus gives us His Grace, and when we receive the bread and the cup, Jesus gives us His Grace. As we join together in these primary actions, Jesus is spiritually here with us, strengthening our faith. The words printed on the pages of the Bible are not magic, neither is the bread or the cup magic, but Jesus uses these things to be the conduit through which He meets us and ministers to us with His Grace. And becoming addicted to Jesus is a good thing. To desire Him more and His Word more and the Sacrament more are good things. It shows that we are becoming more and more vessels of God that declare His Glory, and that is why we were created. We were created to glorify God, and when we glorify God, we receive joy from Him, and on that day when Jesus comes for us and we enter into His Kingdom forever, then we will be constantly obsessed with glorifying God, and we will be filled with the eternal joy of Jesus.

Let us pray:
Almighty God, we are amazed and humbled as we hear that You understand our weaknesses because You have lived among us as a human being. We rejoice that Your Work was accomplished and Jesus is risen from the dead. We ask that You would stir up the fire of the Holy Spirit within us and cause us to speak out that Truth all the more. Grant us that excitement for Your Glory. We thank You for the gift of Your Word and for the sacraments. We ask that You would continue to minister to us and give us Your Grace. We ask that You would help us to prepare before worship and increase our desire to be in Your Presence. For it is in the Name of our Risen Savior, Jesus, we pray, Amen.