The Twelfth Sunday after Trinity (Sunday, August 22, 2021)

May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be alway acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, our strength and our Redeemer. Amen.

This morning’s Gospel reading from St. Mark occured as Jesus was returning to Galilee from the region of Tyre. On his way, a deaf man with a speech impediment was brought to Jesus. The crowds wanted Jesus to lay his hands on this man, so Jesus took him aside privately, put his fingers in the man’s ears, spat and touched his tongue, pronouncing, “Be opened.” And immediately, they were opened; the man could hear and speak. Jesus urged the witnesses not to tell, but the more he requested their silence, the more they zealously proclaimed his work. The reading concludes with the crowd’s pronouncement: “He has done all things well; he even makes the deaf hear and the dumb speak.” This pronouncement has two Old Testament echoes. First, it is reminiscent of Genesis 1:31 where God saw his creation and observed that “It was exceedingly good.” Second, the crowd quotes Isaiah 35:5-6: “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert.” The significance of these two allusions put together in the mouth of the crowd is a recognition that Jesus is the same God who created all things and, simultaneously, the Messiah who was predicted by the prophets who would lead the people in a new exodus away from spiritual bondage and oppression.

As usual, the deaf and mute man in the reading isn’t just about the deaf and mute man; there is something deeper at work here. The deaf and mute man’s transformation is a way of pointing out the transformation of the twelve disciples that occurs over the course of the Gospels. In chapter 8 of St. Mark’s Gospel, we get the miraculous feeding story. In Mark’s account of it, the disciples admit they forgot to bring bread. Jesus rebukes them for their lack of faith: “Do you not yet perceive or understand? Are your hearts hardened? Having eyes do you not see, and having ears do you not hear?” The same disciples who lacked confidence in the feeding story are the same disciples who become some of the first martyrs and saints of the Church. How do they undergo such a dramatic evolution? The answer is in this morning’s Gospel reading. How is the blind man healed? When Jesus touches him. How did the disciples become the men of faith they became? They were transformed through their encounters with Christ. The Word, our Lord Jesus Christ, was present with them. When the Word speaks, he creates; just like in Genesis 1: When God says let there be light, there is light. Similarly, when God spoke, he created new life within them. In some ways, the disciples who were present early in Jesus’ ministry were not the same disciples who appear in Acts boldly proclaiming Christ crucified. The deaf and mute man, then, is the template for that change. He is a picture of the disciples and their increased understanding of Jesus, culminating in the rapid growth of the primitive Church. However, that same change that happened in them is the same change the Word continues to affect in each of us today.

Have you ever noticed how much of the Mass and the Daily Office is saturated in Scripture? The Introit comes from the Psalms, the readings include Old Testament, Epistle, and Gospel lections, the Creed, while not explicitly quoting the Bible is nonetheless a summary of biblical truths, the sermon (hopefully) expounds on the readings and other propers for the day, the offertory is a Scriptural quotation, as are the absolution and comfortable words, and the Words of Institution in the Canon of the Mass. Our liturgical life is saturated in Scripture, reflecting the conviction that Scripture is important because it’s given to the Church by God. It is a means by which we encounter our Lord. The Mass has this beautiful bifold structure to it: the first part of the service, from the Collect for Purity to the Prayer for the Whole State of Christ’s Church, is designed to house this encounter with the God in the Scriptures. Not only is Christ present in the readings and the preaching, but the Holy Spirit is there stirring our hearts Godward, convicting us of sin, and calling to our mind deeply formative spiritual truths. The second act of the Mass, its culmination, is the Eucharist itself where our Lord is present in the bread and wine, offering us his own body and blood. Scripture, then, prepares us for, and actually is, a part of a sustained encounter with our Lord in the context of the Mass. We come deaf and mute only for Christ to reach out and touch us. He unplugs our ears through the Scriptures and he loosens our tongue by giving us his very Body and very Blood for food and drink. If we really, truly pay attention during the Mass, we come to the same realization as the titular priest in Georges Bernanos’ novel Diary of a Country Priest in the closing lines of the book: “Grace is everywhere.”

One of the major takeaways from our Gospel reading, and I would argue from the Mass itself, is helplessness. Note how helpless the deaf and mute man was. Presumably born with the condition, he knew nothing he could do could fix it, not a better diet, not a better work out plan, not better physical therapy. Prior to his encounter with Jesus, I’m sure he had resigned himself to accept his fate. What does the man do beyond receive the great gifts of hearing and speech?

The poor man’s dependence is a spiritual picture for our helplessness, as demonstrated by the Epistle lesson in 2 Corinthians. St. Paul demonstrates this when he placed his confidence purely in Christ: “Not that we are competent of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our competence is from God, who has made us competent to be ministers of a new Covenant.” This same grace is at work in the Sacrament of Ordination when the Bishop lays hands on the Priest and calls the Holy Spirit to work through their ministry: “RECEIVE the Holy Ghost for the Office and Work of a Priest in the Church of God, now committed unto thee by the Imposition of our hands. Whose sins thou dost forgive, they are forgiven; and whose sins thou dost retain, they are retained. And be thou a faithful Dispenser of the Word of God, and of his holy Sacraments; In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.” The grace for St. Paul’s ministry and for all ministry, whether that be the sacramental ministry of a priest, or a vocational lay ministry, comes from God, highlighting this fact of our sheer dependence on him. It’s what we acknowledge today in our collect: “ALMIGHTY and everlasting God, who art always more ready to hear than we to pray, and art wont to give more than either we desire or deserve; Pour down upon us the abundance of thy mercy; forgiving us those things whereof our conscience is afraid, and giving us those good things which we are not worthy to ask, but through the merits and mediation of Jesus Christ, thy Son, our Lord. Amen.”

The deaf and mute man forces us to recognize our utter dependence on God. Our very existence is only possible because God holds all things together: “In him, we live and move and have our being.” Even if we get past our dependence in existence, we come to realize that our redemption is also entirely dependent on him because he redeemed us when we owed a debt we could not pay. The entire Christian life comes down to the continual recognition of this dependence. The Eastern Orthodox inculcate this dependence through something called the Jesus Prayer, a short prayer that they pray over and over and over again: “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me a sinner.” If you pray it enough, you might start to believe it. Whatever else sainthood is, it’s a perpetual recognition of this reality: Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me a sinner.

This is also why the Blessed Virgin Mary is such an important biblical figure. She embodies this in what we might call her active passivity. When she is confronted by the angel about her miraculous conception, she assents: “Be it down to me according to thy will.” This is the model for all Christian life: God gives and we receive. God gives us himself in his Son Jesus Christ and we receive him at the baptismal font, at the Altar, and in the confessional. As my friend, Fr. Creighton says:

The sacraments sanctify us, heal us, and prepare us to live as Christians in the world. The beauty of the sacramental system is that, from an objective standpoint, God is affirmed as the giver/initiator, and mankind is affirmed as the recipient. Yet, in the life of Our Lady we are shown the value of cooperation. Our Lady is given the opportunity to cooperate with the Incarnation, and she says an emphatic ‘yes.’ Therefore, the Christian life is, in one sense, the pursuit of this Marian receptivity. We are constantly presented with God’s gifts, both in our own being, and in God’s gift of sacramental grace; yet, we are also constantly warring against ‘the world, the flesh, and the devil.’ God presents us with an opportunity to cooperate with His grace. We are constantly being asked to say ‘yes.’ Moreover, through cooperation and our willingness to be ‘handmaids’ of the Lord, we become fruitful. Our Lady’s fecundity, in bringing forth Christ, re-makes Eve’s disobedience and spiritual sterility. Thus, when the Christian says ‘yes’ to God and cooperates in the spiritual life, he or she becomes capable of bearing much fruit.

We are the deaf and mute man. We are the receiver of what good God gives to us. In response to his offer, we can only say “Be it unto me according to thy Word.” And, as we see his grace play out in our lives, we can affirm with the crowds: “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.”

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.