The Purpose of Miracles

September 4, 2022 – Trinity 12

Text: Mark 7:31-37

INI

Where are God’s miracles now?

Why don’t they happen for me?

Or for my loved ones?

They happened for people back in Jesus’ day,

but where are they today?

 

Such wonder has plagued many Christians.

We can’t help but ponder the miraculous.

Because miracles are fascinating.

But they’re also quite mysterious and sort of elusive.

 

We all want one.

At some point or another,

We’ve all asked God to take away some illness,

Or to take away a chronic pain,

Or to miraculously help us in some area of our lives,

Or maybe, to miraculously heal someone else.

By His grace, maybe we see one now and again.

But they aren’t programmatic and reliable.

Rather, they’re random.

 

So, perhaps there’s a bit of tension we feel when we read today’s Gospel lesson.

It seemed so easy back then.

People were brought to Jesus and He healed them.

We don’t have that luxury now.

It leaves us to ask: what’s the purpose of His healings?

Why does He do it?

And what does He do for us today?

 

The Gospel lesson clues us into the answer.

In the beginning of the Gospel,

Jesus is traveling from the Gentile country of Tyre and Sidon.

There, Jesus healed the Syrophoenician woman’s daughter.

So now, Jesus’ fame is spreading far and wide.

He can’t go anywhere without an entourage following Him.

He’s known as the miracle worker,

And He’s piqued the interest of many.

 

This happens quite a lot in Mark’s Gospel.

As Jesus travels, the crowds flock to Him.

And if you read Mark’s Gospel straight through,

there seems to be a tension between what Jesus wants to do, which is to preach,

and what the people want Jesus to do, which is to perform miracles.

Now, there’s not an opposition between the two, but a tension perhaps.

In between teaching stints, Jesus is flocked with people who need help.

 

This deaf and mute man in today’s lesson is one of them.

He’s brought to Jesus to receive healing.

Of course, Jesus sees the effects of a sinful world on this blind man,

And is quick to be compassionate, and quick to help.

Jesus’ compassion for His people always leads Him to help those who come to Him.

 

What’s interesting about this miracle is that Jesus doesn’t just snap his fingers and heal this man.

Rather, Jesus seems to preach to this man in sign language!

Jesus put His fingers into this man’s ears,

He spat on the ground and touched his tongue,

Indicating to the man what He was about to heal.

Then, He looked up into the heavens,

Indicating the source of the healing and what was about to happen.

Then, Jesus said to him, ‘Ephphatha’ which means, be opened.

 

Suddenly, the man could hear and speak!

By Jesus’ Word, the curse of sin on this man had been reversed.

Even though Jesus told the deaf man to tell no one of this miracle,

Which we’ll address here in a bit,

This man zealously told everyone around what God had done to him.

Because God had taken a deaf man afflicted by the effects of sin,

And made him new.

 

The same is true for us too.

We become afflicted with diseases and illnesses,

because all humanity shares the curse of original sin.

But the diseases and illnesses aren’t the issue:

It’s just a symptom of our biggest issue.

Our biggest issue is death because of the guilt of our sin.

For “the wages of sin is death.”

 

If you remember in Genesis 1, God made all creation with His Word.

At the end of day 6, He saw all that He created, and it was very good.

Unfortunately, Adam and Eve introduced original sin,

and God’s creation became corrupted.

 

When the crowd saw the healing of this deaf man,

They said, “He has done all things well”,

Or a better translation, “he’s made all things good.”

They confessed the reason why Jesus does all these miracles.

 

Jesus never does miracles without a purpose.

Rather, His miracles teach, much like a sermon!

And it teaches this:

God is going to restore His creation.

He’s going to renew creation to the point where it can be called good again.

So, we learn from this miracle that Jesus comes to renew creation,

To take away the effects of original sin.

 

But the tension still lingers: why isn’t he doing this for us?

Why aren’t people lining up in droves to be healed by Jesus,

As the Gospels seem to picture?

 

The simple answer is: Jesus didn’t come to take away our illnesses.

He didn’t heal back then to do those very same things now.

His healings have a much bigger purpose than that.

 

The purpose of His miracles is to prove who He is –

to show what He is bringing all humanity towards!

The Old Testament prophesies that the Lord will return to His people,

And when he does,

the ears of the deaf will be unstopped.

The blind shall see.

The lame man shall leap like a dear.

To put it all together for you,

Jesus’ miracles point to something beyond just the wow factor of His miracles.

His miracles confirm that in Jesus,

God returns to redeem and make new His people!

 

Likewise, our Old Testament lesson today prophesies how the deaf will hear.

But they won’t just hear anything.

Rather, they’ll hear something specific.

They’ll hear the words of a book.

That is, they’ll hear the Word of God made flesh, who is Jesus Christ our Lord!

 

What’s the content of His preaching?

What is it that Jesus came to teach the people back then,

And also us now?

 

In the next two chapters of Mark,

Jesus makes three predictions of His suffering and dying.

That’s what Jesus wants His people to know more than anything.

He’s come to take away our sin.

He’s come to conquer death.

He’s come to save us from everlasting condemnation.

His preaching is about the cross.

That’s what Christ has come to bring!

That in the fullness of time, He’s come to suffer, die, and win victory over sin and death,

So that the curse of sin and death may be reversed in us!

 

That is far more valuable to us than having our diseases or illnesses cured.

Because this cure isn’t temporary.

The deaf man from the Gospel lesson today still died.

Jesus has something more valuable than that miracle to give.

The reversal of sin that Jesus gives,

Is that cure that lasts for all eternity.

 

Many people wonder why Jesus told this deaf man to tell no one about this miracle.

The reason goes back to this tension between His teaching and His miracles.

Many people see Jesus’ miracles, and just want him for that.
For example, in John 6, Jesus feeds the 5,000 people with 5 loaves and 2 fish.

But most of them sought to make Jesus a “bread king” the text says.

They wanted Jesus just for the miraculous.

But Jesus came for much more – and that’s why Jesus told him to tell no one.

Jesus didn’t want the spreading of the word about His miracles to lead to improperly formed assessments of the nature of Jesus’ person and his mission.

He’s not come to just be a miracle worker.

He’s come to atone for the sins of the world,

And reverse the eternal effects of sin.

 

He seeks to cure not temporarily, but eternally.

This is why no matter what happens in life,

No matter what illness and disease befall us,

Or what trial or hardship frustrate us or cause us despair,

We keep our eyes and faith focused on Christ’s cross and grave.

Because this is where Jesus provides the greatest miracle of all.

 

Just as Jesus’ had compassion on His people back then,

So He does now to you.

He gives the fruits of what He won on the cross to you now,

And that’s a far superior to a miraculous healing.

Because it seals in us the promise of the truly miraculous.

 

Since Christ has risen from the dead and conquered death,

So too will Christ come again at the resurrection of our flesh,

To raise our bodies from the graves,

And make us new again.

On that day, when God looks at us,

He will see us and say once again “it is very good.”

 

When Jesus healed the deaf man,

It was a temporary miracle meant to point to an eternal one,

Where He eternally frees us from the stain of death and the curse of sin.

So, certainly we still ponder the miraculous.

But we never wonder why we don’t get in on any of the miracles.

Because the point wasn’t that Jesus came to be a miracle worker among us.

Rather He came to be a Savior to us.

 

INI