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4Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. 5Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, 6who has made us competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.
And taking him aside from the crowd privately, 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.
*sigh*
*grunt*
*grunt sigh*
The Bible is full of these noises.
Jesus is sighing at the sufferings His creatures have in this present life.
The Spirit is taking our prayers and tears and cries and interceding for us with groans too deep for words.
We are groaning (2 Cor. 5:2-4) in this life –
we are dwelling in tents waiting to be in our eternal home,
we are desiring to be absent from the body and at home with the Lord,
our outer self is wasting away but our inner self is being renewed day by day,
we are not looking to transient things that seen but to the eternal things that are unseen.
So while we are still in this temporary tent, we groan under great burdens.
Thus says Paul in 2 Cor. 5.
For a bit, I’d like us to consider perhaps one particular sound that you make. I don’t know how it sounds, if it even has a sound. But it’s what would come out of your mouth when you have messed and are frustrated with no one but yourself.
It’s when you’re mad at you for saying, thinking, doing, being, feeling, being what you are.
You’re mad at you. Perhaps for your lack of faith. Or perhaps for your lack of love for your neighbor. Or both.
It’s an important sound – if it is a sound. I think I internally scream.
Because, for the Christian, it’s a recognition that there is a war that is happening, not just in the world, but also in us.
Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
Lord, I want to love, but I’m still so focused on myself.
Lord, I want to hope, but I’m still so tempted to give up and despair.
I really have one purpose for this sermon. God can use it for other purposes. But my purpose is to encourage you to keep fighting the good fight, to keep running the race – it’s not over, but it will be.
You know the end. You are forgiven and holy in Christ. You long to be home with Him.
You have had your ears opened to hear God’s kindness and acceptance of you in Christ.
You have had your tongue released to speak plainly. You have confessed your sins, rather than keeping silent with your bones wasting away and groaning all day in guilt and you have said Amen to the forgiveness you have heard from God and your pastor and fellow Christians.
You are baptized. You are a Christian.
But you are in the battle, a race, a fight – even a battle within yourself.
You do not live, Christ lives in you.
And in that life you seek the things above, where Christ is.
You think about what is true and honorable and just and lovely.
You love much because you have been forgiven much.
You know love, because Christ has laid down his life for you, and so you also lay down your life for others.
You are in the world, but not of the world.
You hate sin – not particularly sin in others – for you see the log in your own eye and you hate it and if God has given it to you, you help your brother take the speck of their eye.
You love your Master Jesus and hate when Master money and greed and worry about treasure on earth try and command you around.
You honor your father and mother.
You love your husband or wife.
You give of yourself to your children.
You delight in God’s Word. It is sweeter than honey and finer than gold. You know in God’s Word you are hearing the Words of eternal life, the one thing needful to treasure most, the things written that you may believe Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and by believing, having life in His name. The letter kills your sinful nature and raises you to new life and righteousness in the Spirit.
You watch. You stay awake. You pray.
The Spirit is willing and you know that and you thank God that He has not taken His Holy Spirit from you.
That is you. You are a new creation in Christ. You have put off the old self and put on the new self.
I am not saying to compliment you. You aren’t sufficient within yourself. Nothing comes from you except sin. That’s why these imperatives kill us, too. They still show us our sin. You aren’t sufficient within yourself.
But your sufficiency does come from God. Such is your confidence you have toward God who gives new birth and with it new light, new hope, new strength, new powers.
Good works are not your fruit. But fruits of the Spirit.
It is not you who live, but Christ who lives in you.
You are not producing good fruit, Christ the vine is pumping life through the braches. The blood of Jesus in holy communion flowing through you to the world.
The light of Christ shining through you to be the light of the world.
And yet, we still groan.
We still sin.
We are still mad at ourselves for not being fully who we know we should be.
And this is good. Let we be tempted toward pride, thinking we stand on our own strength.
If anyone stands on his own strength, take heed lest he fall – let we think we are sufficient within ourselves.
But in falling as Christians, in not placing our confidence in ourselves, we don’t despair but thank God our confidence is Jesus.
Our Jesus pulled this deaf and mute man aside privately from the crowds.
This sermon is a public word, for the crowd of Christians here present, but the Spirit who gives life knows exactly what your personally, privately need to hear for your conviction and for your comfort.
We still groan. We still struggle. We still need to be shown our sin and we still need proclaimed to us our Savior.
A Savior who groaned and sighed, and not only spit before He healed the deaf mute man, but was spit upon as He suffered our guilt and shame on the cross.
He who looked up to heaven before healing the deaf mute man, came down from heaven and was lifted up on a cross to open heaven for us.
If Jesus becomes frustrated with us when we sin, it is only because He knows the danger of us going our own way.
Instead, He desires to take us aside privately, all of us collective individuals, as His body, yet individual members of it, and privately open our ears and release our tongues.
God’s love is ephphath’d here, open for you to receive as you bring your frustration and disappointment even in yourself here.
Perhaps you’re mad at you. Well God is not mad you. He is here, at peace with you, giving healing and forgiveness and renewal –
So we press on through the groans and sighs and grunts and cries to make it our own, because Christ Jesus has made us His own.