Daily Gospel Reflection
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February 15, 2019
Jesus left the district of Tyre
and went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee,
into the district of the Decapolis.
And people brought to him a deaf man who had a speech impediment
and begged him to lay his hand on him.
He took him off by himself away from the crowd.
He put his finger into the man’s ears
and, spitting, touched his tongue;
then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him,
“Ephphatha!” (that is, “Be opened!”)
And immediately the man’s ears were opened,
his speech impediment was removed,
and he spoke plainly.
He ordered them not to tell anyone.
But the more he ordered them not to,
the more they proclaimed it.
They were exceedingly astonished and they said,
“He has done all things well.
He makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”
“God’s ways are not always our ways.” How many times have I heard that saying and shrugged it off? At best I respond with frustration with God’s apparent slowness to respond to my prayer, at worst with outright resentment or outrage that the Lord’s mind does not match up with mine.
Today’s Gospel challenges me to take a long look at my perception of Jesus’ power to heal. I wonder what this man thought—unable to hear, unable to speak, unable to advocate for himself. He had surely seen others healed in these crowds. He might have dreamed of being healed himself, imagining the glory of the moment. He probably could not have imagined spit being involved—albeit divine spit, but still—spit.
At first glance, this method of healing seems commonplace, weird, and even inferior to other healings in Scripture. But don’t our lives—full of twists and turns, highs and lows, roses and thorns—seem commonplace, weird, and even inferior to another’s? How often do we look with longing at someone else’s beautiful healing or encounter with Christ, deaf to the Lord’s gentle voice reminding us that we too are heard, loved, and healed, even when our abilities for praise and thanksgiving seem stifled?
Jesus is calling each one of us to the unique healing and freedom only he can give. He is calling us to relinquish our expectations, timelines, and plans and let him heal us no matter how messy, how slow, how ordinary the process seems. May we pray with these lines from the Litany of Trust given to us from the Sisters of Life:
That you always hear me and in your goodness always respond to me.
Jesus, I trust in you.
That you are continually holding me, sustaining me, loving me
Jesus, I trust in you.
Prayer
Lord Jesus: The people begged you to heal the deaf man with a speech impediment. At your touch and your word, he heard and he spoke plainly. In your compassion, Lord Jesus, help me to hear your word and to speak it with conviction. Amen.
Saint of the Day
On the fifteenth of February, 2015, twenty-one Christians were beheaded in Libya on the shores of the Mediterranean by members of the extremist group known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
Twenty of the men beheaded were Coptic Christians. Coptic Christianity is an ancient branch of Christianity in Egypt. It has a particular connection with Mark the Evangelist, who was believed to have founded the Christian Church in Alexandria shortly after 33AD. Egypt and, in particular, the city of Alexandria, produced some of the great theologians of the early Church: Athanasius, Clement and Cyril of Alexandria, and Origen.
These 21 men had been working in Libya as construction workers when they were kidnapped by ISIL in two separate raids in December 2014 and January 2015. They were purportedly executed on the beach opposite a hotel.
The icon featured today was createdby by a Coptic Christian, Tony Rezk. In the image, the martyrs' crowns descend upon the Copts and one man whose darker skin represents his difference. One of the men captured with them from the construction site was not an Egyptian Copt, but a man from Ghana (or Chad, say some reports). Most accounts say that he was not a Christian, but the faith of these twenty men inspired him to say, when asked, "their God is my God." The men are dressed in robes of orange to depict the orange jumpsuits in which they were martyred.
The Coptic Church remembers them as martyrs, and these brave men serve as a reminder of all persecuted Christians throughout the world who continue to sacrifice their lives to stay faithful to Christ. May their brave faith strengthen our own, and may their imitation of Christ's peaceful surrender inspire peace in the hearts of men and women throughout our war-torn world.
On this feast of the twenty-one Coptic Martyrs, let us pray for peace throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East!
Image Credit: Icon by Tony Rezk, used with permission. Visit Tony's website to view and purchase this and other icons.