I would like to direct your attention
this morning to the words which we find at the end of the chapter
that we read together from the Gospel according to Mark, chapter
7, and particularly just a few words
from verse 37. The Gospel according to Mark,
chapter 7. We should just read the 36th
and 37th verses. And he, that is Jesus, charged
them that they should tell no man. But the more he charged
them, so much the more a great deal they published it, and were
beyond measure astonished, saying, he hath done all things well. he maketh both the deaf to hear
and the dumb to speak." Particularly just those few words, he has
done all things well. We read in that chapter of various
things that Jesus did. We find him at the beginning
of the chapter contradicting the Pharisees and the scribes
who were coming to him. They were, we could say, very
legalistic, they were very formal about their religion, they had
no heart to it, but they merely went about following a set pattern
of rules and instructions and commands that they had to keep,
and they never thought to seek the Lord. They did not recognize
Jesus to be the Messiah, the one who was promised to save
his people from their sins, and so we find very often, do we
not, in the gospel accounts, how that Jesus Christ comes to
them and they come to him with all their oppositions and their
arguments and their questions and they try to tempt him and
to test him on points of the law. And yet he time and time
again proves them to be hypocrites as following a set of instructions
but never seeking after the Lord. And he shows how that they have
exchanged their traditions and the patterns that they followed.
They have taken those and they now hold to those so much that
they have cast off everything else, they no longer seek after
the Lord, they no longer seek the law of God. But that has
been set aside. But then we find him passing
on to teach to them further on this, now calling, as it were,
all the general assembly, more of the people to him, to speak
to them. We find him teaching them how
that it is not something from the outside which defiles a man.
They of course were Of course, speaking of washing their hands
very often, making sure that they were outwardly clean, outwardly
they were just right and were not defiled. And yet, he speaks
of how the true defilement, that is to say spiritual defilement
or defilement before God, it comes from within. It is a consequence
of the heart of man, which is wicked, desperately wicked. Who, says the prophet Jeremiah,
can know it? It is so evil. But we find then
he passes on teaching this to go into Tyre and Sidon. And he finds here this remarkable
case of the Syrophoenician women. She comes, not a Jew, but somebody
from outside of the Jewish people, someone who was a stranger, as
it were, someone from whom She could expect nothing from Jesus
because she was not a Jew. This was their Messiah who had
been promised to them. He had come to his people, not
to these. And yet what a mercy this is,
and we may take encouragement from this also. We who are not
Jews, here was the Savior himself. though it were promised and shown
all through the Old Testament that it was open to all. The
stranger was to be received and welcomed into the camp of Israel.
And so we find so many times in the Old Testament there were
those brought in from outside. And now we find Jesus himself
setting forth the pattern. And this, of course, would be
later confirmed to the apostles as the apostles were sent forth
to the Gentile nations. And they were all called to faith
in Jesus Christ as the Jews. And she comes with great faith
to Jesus, having been given it by God, coming with such God-given
boldness before him and pleads with him that he would cast out
the devil from her daughter. But then from the 31st verse
here, we find an account which we find in no other of the Gospels. Coming from Tyre and Sidon, coming
to the Sea of Galilee and through the midst of the coast of Decapolis,
one is now brought unto Jesus. Such an one, as he is both deaf,
he cannot hear anything, and he also has some kind of speech
impediment. We cannot conclude that he was
entirely dumb, he could not say anything, he could speak perhaps,
but it was very limited what he could speak, and his speech
was very far from being clear. There was something which was
stopping his speech, something getting in the way. So perhaps
he was hard to understand. And they bring him to Jesus,
desiring that he would heal him, that he would touch him, that
he would do him good. And we see how that Jesus shows
great humility. He takes him aside, though there
is a multitude about him, yet he takes him aside. And there
he deals with him. We may observe that Christ here
uses some means. He puts his fingers into his
ears and spit and touched his tongue. He did not need means. And yet, in order to demonstrate
that he was able to do all things, so he did. And on this occasion,
he used these means. He looks up to heaven from whence
is his authority and his power. And looking up to heaven, he
sighs, longing as it were in himself that this man might be
healed, desiring earnestly of God and perhaps silently praying
that the Lord would come in for him, would work and give to him
that healing. And then he gives that authoritative
command. Having looked to his father,
Ephathah, That is to say, be opened. And with that word of
authority, that word of command from Jesus Christ, what do we
find? Straightway his ears were opened,
and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain. Such a miracle being worked,
such power being demonstrated, having taken him aside that the
multitude might not see it, He charges them, this is Jesus,
that they should tell no man. Yet as we find in other cases,
this was too wonderful a thing. This was too marvelous a thing
that had happened. It was so great, it was so wonderful,
it could not be hid. We read earlier in verse 24 of
the chapter that he arose and went into the borders of Tyre
and Sidon and entered into a house and he would be private there,
he would hide away secretly as it were. And yet what do we read?
He could not behead. And so now, coming and doing
such a wonderful thing for this man, he could not behead here
either. There was no hiding, but all
these who had seen it now, now went forth. And they went and
published it abroad. They told all those around. And
so the word spread throughout, no doubt, that great multitude
of what the Lord had done. And what is the reaction? It
is glorious, is it not? They were beyond measure astonished. They were taken aback, as it
were. They were filled with surprise and wonder and amazement at what
had happened. And then they say this, he hath
done all things well. He maketh both the deaf to hear
and the dumb to speak. May we not know something of
that wonder this morning, that we may come as we are assembled
to worship God. May we not testify in our own
souls this morning, he hath done all things well. May we not say
that it is true? If we look at it very generally
for a moment, we may see it in three particulars. He did all
things well at the very beginning. This same Jesus was present,
being the Son of God, with his Father at the very beginning.
There, at the very creation of the world, Jesus Christ was there
present. He was there with the Father.
And he was there, very much involved in the creation of the world.
And what was the verdict at the last? Was it not that all things
were very good? Was not this a great and a wonderful,
and perhaps to us sometimes, or maybe all the time, an incomprehensible
work that was done? That the almighty God of heaven
spake the word, and all things came into being. this world and
everything around us which perhaps we just take for granted so much
of the time. It all was spoken into being
by God. We may look at the glory of it
now. We may behold the beauty of it. And perhaps going to certain
places we may wonder at a glorious scene. And yet it was far better than
this at the first. What we see now is somewhat broken. This whole creation groans and
travails under the burden of man's sin. All this was so much
better. Was not this a great and a glorious
work? Was not this something which
was done well? Again, in the second matter,
we may see her in providence and declare, hath he not done
all things well in this? Can we not look at all that has
happened and look with great wonder and amazement at what
has passed? We may look back in various respects.
We might look back in time and we may read through all the scripture
accounts. We may see so many times how
the Lord's people were miraculously delivered, how they were wonderfully
spared, what glorious and great things were done for them. We
may look even upon a passage such as this, perhaps very small
if it were to be compared with the passing of the Red Sea and
so many great wonders that were performed, we may look at these
with wonder. We should do, we ought to very
well. The God of the Bible, the God
who did these things which we read of in the scriptures is
no different now from he was then. He who did all these wonders
and miracles that we read of is still able to do great things
in our day. He has not changed, but he is
the unchanging God. Again, we may take encouragement
from looking back over church history and see how the Lord
has worked in the church in times past. Again, we may look back,
I trust, even over our own lives who know Christ. And we may look
back and see all that has happened for us. We may see how that even
perhaps when we have done things which were foolish, things which
were stupid, things which we ought not to have done, yet in
wisdom, the Lord overruled. The Lord spared us through them.
He brought us through them. By his hand, he guided us, even
perhaps before we were saved, and prepared us to serve him.
But in the third place, and this particularly, I think what we
have depicted for us here, see how that Jesus has done all things
well in redemption. This, the third great work which
is done, here we have a picture of redemption. A picture, as
it were, in part, of salvation for this man. Many of the miracles
of Christ are given to us as, we could say, physical pictures
of a spiritual reality. They were outward signs of something
which would be done, as it were, by the gospel through the power
of God in individuals. We find, of course, so many of
these. And so many give us very instructive
pictures of salvation, of conversion, of the human state by nature
and what he is brought into by grace. And this we find, do we
not, in this place also. We find a man here who was deaf
and effectively dumb. He was not entirely dumb. but
he could speak somewhat, as I've said before, but he had difficulty
speaking, and he was straight deaf. What do we see in this? Is not this a picture of man
without God? Naturally, man cannot hear the
word of God. Naturally, he has no interest
in it. If he ever comes to a place of
worship, perhaps, those who are brought by their parents. You
come to a place of worship. You hear the word of God preached.
I was like this myself. And yet, when the word is preached,
it passes in one ear and out of the other, as we say. You
hear it with the hearing of the ear, and yet it never enters
into the heart. It never goes further than this.
Perhaps you think about it a little. Perhaps you think intellectually
about it. You think, perhaps, about what you have heard in
so much as to intellectually think upon the things that you've
heard, and yet it never goes beyond that. It never becomes
anything more than that. It never becomes something in
your life. It never affects you. It never
changes you. It never does anything to you.
And in a respect, in a sense, and I say this carefully, you're
as good as not hearing it, because it has done nothing for you.
Yet, my friends, this, and this is the marvel of it, and perhaps
it seems to us sometimes a little strange, the preaching of the
gospel, yet falling upon deaf ears, is the means that God employs
for the salvation of souls. We have this shown to us very
plainly, do we not? In Romans chapter 10, there is
a system that is set out there. The apostle there writing, whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved, he says,
that's the great principle. But then he asks this question,
how then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?
And particularly this, and how shall they believe in him of
whom they have not heard? The gospel must be preached,
and yet so often it falls upon deaf ears. So often it falls
upon those who have not the ability to hear it, savingly. Oh, my
friends, what is needed? It is the power of God that is
needed. This is the only way that a man's ears can be opened
to hear the words of life and to receive them into his soul.
How can he open them? He cannot do it himself. A man
who is deaf might go to all the very finest of the doctors and
physicians, and he might try to obtain some kind of remedy,
some kind of help. He might say to the doctor, is
there anything that you can do that I might just be able to
hear a little bit? I might just be able to regain
just a little of my hearing, that I might be able to hear
just a little more than I have. And all the physicians of the
world would never be able to help him. There was that woman
who had the issue of blood. She had sought out the physicians
for so long. She had sought that they might
heal her, but they could do nothing for her. And surely it was the
same for this man, though we know not that he himself had
sought help. Had he have done so, there would
have been nothing for him. He had no help in man. And so
we as deaf people, yet knowing that we are deaf Perhaps beginning
to come to a sense of a realization that we are deaf, we are not
right with God, and we do not hear his words, and they do not
mean anything to us. What must we do? Well, the natural
temptation is to look around in this world, to try to find
something, to try to hear something. And yet there shall never be
any hearing which will profit us, except the Lord open our
ears to hear the word of God. Oh, that he would do so for us.
Sometimes I fear it may be true that even believers may fall
in this, and we may become deaf to the voice of God. Perhaps
we become, as it were, if I might use the image, our ears become
so filled with the noises of the world, or the sound of its
music, that we fail to hear the voice of God. We become so distracted
and taken away with other things. We become so caught up with other
matters. And we are so busy listening
to all the voices of worldly wisdom, so busy listening to
all the voices of the world's ideas, the world's plans, the
world's suggestions, the world's expectations, that we do not
hear the voice of God. And is not this the way that
even the devil himself will employ our minds, and most certainly
the minds of unbelievers, that they should not hear the truth?
And so he piles us, heaps upon heaps of all sorts of influences
from the world to distract us, to deaden us, to deafen us even
more, as it were, if it could be possible that we should hear
nothing of the voice of God. Oh, my friends, how much need
we have as believers to be in prayer that we might be kept
from this, that we might be those, even as Samuel of old, in that
very touching picture that we have of the young Samuel. There,
in the courts of the house of God with Eli, when the Lord came
and spoke to him, called him by name, and then he runs, of
course, to Eli. Neil, I did not call him and
send him back, and yet he goes again. Thou didst call me, yet
he did not. And he sends him back. Speak,
Lord, for thy servant heareth. Oh, that we may each know and
hear the voice of God, that we may be deaf to him no more. And
yet, those that are deaf, there is but one place to go. There
is but one voice that can open the ears. There is one who can
command that the deaf ears be opened. And just as we have this
encouragement here, just as we see the result of that word of
command being given here, as Jesus commands that his ears
should be opened, what do we find straightway? His ears were
opened. He is able to do this. Though we may have been deafened
for so long in this world. Though we may have been so rebellious.
Though we may have set ourselves adamantly that we would not hear.
We would not have this man to reign over us. We would not listen
to this man. We would not listen to his advice,
his counsel, his pleadings. Sometimes is it not so that a
rebellious one will be entirely ignorant? of the tears, perhaps,
of his parents over what he has done. He will completely ignore
them and set them to one side, being so bent upon a rebellious
way. He will never give ear to them,
though they are so upset, though they are so grieved and so troubled
in spirit over it. Yet he will go on in his way.
Is it not so? Jesus Christ stood there, did
he not? He wept over Jerusalem, that
very same Jerusalem which contained all those men who would go and
who would crucify him. Yet still he wept over them.
What tenderness there is in Christ. What great mercy and love there
is in him that he should stand there and do that. What is his
instruction later? Do we not find him? Where was
the gospel first to go forth? Was it to go forth now in all
the heathen nations? Were they now to go to the four
corners of the earth as far away as they could possibly get from
Jerusalem and start preaching the gospel there? No. Beginning
at Jerusalem. The place where the very worst
of sinners were to be found. The place where those who had
physically put the nails through his hands and his feet, those
who had stood before him, who had scoffed at him, who had mocked
him. Yes, those. What love and mercy
there is in Christ to take pity and great compassion upon such
poor lost souls. Oh, my friends, if you know you
feel yourself to be deaf towards God this morning, your hearing
is impeded, perhaps. Seek this one. He is full of
grace, full of mercy. He will not turn away those who
are troubled. But we see here in the second
part of the picture how that the string of his tongue was
to be loose. This man with an impediment of speech, what can
we say to this? Is it not true that without Christ
a man's speech will never be holy in any sense? A man's speech
will never be of anything good. Maybe some common grace which
will make a man to be kind in his speech and so forth. And
yet he will not speak of God. Quite the contrary. He may have
thoughts of God. Indeed, he may be terrified at
night with dreams and thoughts of God and of judgment to come.
And yet he would not speak of these things. He would remain
silent. He would remain calm on these
matters so far as anyone else was concerned. He would perhaps
even fear to speak. What would happen to him? If
he went out and started speaking like this, what would happen
if he mentioned it? Some, perhaps, are very much
tempted this way, going to work. You fear, perhaps, to speak of
going to church on the Lord's Day. You fear to speak of the
fact that you are religious, or perhaps have been brought
up in that way, because you fear what people will think of you.
You're afraid that they will think that you're very strange.
Perhaps they'll think that they'll begin to mock you and to laugh
at you and to scorn you. Perhaps they'll shun you and
avoid you and not want to be with you or near you or correspond
with you or communicate with you. And you will be given, as
we say, the cold shoulder. But see what a change comes here. His tongue is loosed. Is it not
so? When a man is saved, When Christ
comes to the soul, when his ears are opened and the gospel is
received unto him, he might never have spoken of God before. He
might only have ever used the name of God in blasphemy, in
swearing and so forth. Yet now, his speech is very different. Once, he spoke in a way that
was wholly unnatural for man. Man was made at the very first,
with one great chief end, which was to glorify God. Man who does
not consider God, man in whose heart there are no thoughts of
God, he does not glorify God in his speech, he does not glorify
God in his way of life, he does not glorify God at all. In that
sense, He does not do what he was made to do because of the
great corruption of sin which has infected his nature and caused
his whole body to be full of a great sickness. What do we find then? Do we not
see how that after a man is saved, after he comes to a knowledge
of the truth, how that he is changed? Now, What ought to be
his theme? What is his joy? I trust it is
so for every one of us who knows Christ. Does he not delight to
speak of these things? Is it not his joy now to speak
of this? And is not his word all the day
long? He has done all things well. Do we not often find this coming
forth from his mouth? Because he sees now, he does
not see it perhaps in its fullness, but he sees it in a great way,
what he was. He sees how deaf he was. He sees
how that there was no hope of him hearing. Perhaps he has tried
many ways to hear and failed. He has never known perhaps what
it was to hear. And yet now, he hears the voice
of God. and hearing it, now his tongue
is also loosed, and he speaks of it, and he goes forth, and
he declares the glory of his savior, he declares the wonder
of it, and surely is not this a word of testimony? He has done
all things well, and none could speak of that so well as this
gentleman, this dear man, who was cleared of his deafness and
of his speech, Though he could not answer many of the questions
about the Saviour perhaps. Perhaps he scarcely knew who
Jesus was. He was but poorly acquainted
with him. Yet now he had heard of him. He had heard him and
he had believed. And now he could speak properly
of this. My friends, do you know anything
of this in your own souls? Have you experienced Jesus coming
to your soul? Do you know His glorious and
great salvation, even this morning? If you have, can you not testify
and say from your own experience, from your own life, from all
that you know, He has done all things well? Perhaps there are some things
that we, if we had had our own way, might have changed. I trust
we would all have desired that we might have changed our rebellion,
our great sin, and our ignorance of God before salvation. Yet it was His ordering. And
now we may stand and gaze in wonder that ever we were brought
out of such a lost condition, that ever we were saved from
such a desperate case, that ever he had mercy upon us. Let us look back, seeing that
all things have been done so well. Can we not stand and have this
same response as these people, they were beyond measure astonished. Can we not stand in amazement
and wonder and marvel at this glorious fact that Christ Jesus
came into the world to save sinners? Not only this, But for we who
believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, he has applied it to our hearts.
Of all the millions and billions of people in the world, he has
come and he has visited us. He has touched our souls, he
has touched our hearts. Now my friends, there is no cause
of despair. But now, let us go forth and
declare to publish it openly a news, a word, a change, something
that has been done that cannot be hid. Jesus Christ could not
be hid. How can it be that he can be
hid if he be in us? If Christ is all our hope and
all our glory, if Christ is all our boast, how can he be hid? If he dwells with us, if his
spirit is within us, if Christ is walking with us, how can it
be hid? Oh, my friends, we must go forth. Let it often be a joy to us to
speak of Christ. Whether we be in unbelieving
or believing company, whether we be surrounded by those who
know and love the Savior like us or not, let us go forth, publish
the good tidings of what the Lord has done for us, and speak to others also. of
the great hope that there may be. No man need despair, for
though he be spiritually deaf and dumb, though he be dead in
trespasses and sins, if he do but feel himself to be so, Christ
came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. And so as it is yet the day of
salvation, Yet it is today whilst we still are given life and breath
from this good God. Oh, let us seek his face, apply
ourselves to him, and rejoice together as a body of his people
in this one glorious and grand truth, and declare with united
voice that surely He, my Jesus, hath done all things well. May the Lord so bless these words
to our souls this morning and grant to us we may be strengthened
by them for Christ's sake.