Healing Hands

Be Opened

“They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hands on him. Jesus took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, 'Ephphatha,' that is, 'be opened.' And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue released, and he spoke plainly.”
Mark 7: 31-35

“Be opened.” Jesus was still trying to hide his gift of healing, but he couldn’t refrain from using it. He had such compassion for the people who came to him, some of whom walked for miles carrying their sick and disabled loved ones. He wasn’t ready just yet to step into the role of Messiah—perhaps it scared even him that so much was happening so quickly. He knew the fate of the Messiah. Yet, he couldn’t withhold his touch from those in need.

Jesus’ way of healing can only be described as “gritty.” He was a man of the earth. He spat in the dirt and made a paste for blind eyes, he spat and touched the deaf man’s tongue, he sighed, breathed on people. He told them, “your faith has made you whole,” “your sins are forgiven,” “be opened.” He never claimed the healing as his own work, and in fact, later in this same text, he asked the disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” as though he questioned his own power.

“Be opened” is a profound and powerful injunction. Be opened in order that you may hear, and see and speak plainly. Jesus often said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear,” “He who has eyes to see, let him see.” His admonition, “be opened,” was speaking about openness of heart and mind as well as ears and eyes—openness to this difficult idea that God was establishing a new relationship with God’s people and that everyone, and not only the children of Israel, was included! Jesus had moments of uncertainty about his ministry, as when the Syrophoenician woman asked him to heal her daughter. (Mark 7:24-30) His first response was to hesitate, but when the woman persisted, his own heart opened and her daughter was healed.

“Be opened” was the guiding principle of Jesus’ ministry. He blessed faith where he found it, and accepted hospitality where it was offered. He touched, and breathed on, and healed people who were called unclean, even demonic, by the religious establishment of his time. There was no situation in which Jesus admonished his followers to “be closed.” This is still the case today—be opened, not closed. Whenever we experience the “openness” of acceptance, the understanding that all are welcome at the table and healing is free, Jesus will be in the midst of us, blessing us and healing our wounds.

In the Spirit,
Jane