Sunday afternoons can be loud in their own way. Lunch with family, a full table, conversations crossing over each other, plans for the week already creeping in. You can be in the middle of all of it and still feel like nobody quite hears you.
There’s a man in Mark’s Gospel who knew that feeling better than most of us.
They bring unto Him one that was deaf
“And they bring unto him one that was deaf, and had an impediment in his speech; and they beseech him to put his hand upon him.” (Mark 7:32, KJV)
He couldn’t hear, and he couldn’t speak clearly. Other people did the talking for him. They brought him, they explained his problem, they asked on his behalf. He may not have even known exactly what they were saying about him. He was in the middle of a crowd and completely alone inside it.
Notice that his friends asked for something simple: put Your hand on him. Jesus did far more than that.
He took him aside
“And he took him aside from the multitude, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spit, and touched his tongue.” (Mark 7:33, KJV)
The first thing Jesus did was get him away from the noise. No audience, no show. Just the two of them.
Then He did something we might find strange, but think about it from the man’s side. He couldn’t hear a sermon or an explanation. So Jesus spoke to him with His hands. Fingers in the ears: this is the part I’m going to heal. A touch on the tongue: and this too. Jesus met him in the only language he had.
That’s still how He works. He doesn’t wait for you to understand everything before He comes close. He knows how you hear, what you can take in today, and He speaks in a way you can receive.
He sighed
“And looking up to heaven, he sighed, and saith unto him, Ephphatha, that is, Be opened.” (Mark 7:34, KJV)
Before the word of power, there’s a sigh. Mark doesn’t explain it, and maybe he doesn’t need to. Jesus looked at this man’s silence, at all the years of being talked about and not talked to, and it moved Him. He looked up to His Father and sighed the way you sigh when you love someone and see what they’ve carried.
Scripture says we have a high priest who can be “touched with the feeling of our infirmities” (Hebrews 4:15, KJV). That sigh is what it looks like. Your struggle isn’t a case file to Him. He feels it.
Then He spoke one word: Be opened.
“And straightway his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spake plain.” (Mark 7:35, KJV)
The first voice that man ever heard clearly was the voice of Jesus.
For your Sunday midday
Maybe something in you feels closed today. Maybe you can’t hear God the way you used to, or you can’t find words to pray, or you’ve let other people do your talking for so long that you’ve gone quiet inside.
Let Him take you aside for a few minutes. Step out of the noise, even if it’s just a walk around the block or five minutes in another room. You don’t need the right words. He already knows what needs opening, and He’s not frustrated with you. He’s moved by you.
Read Mark 7:31–37 slowly. Then pray something simple, out loud if you can: Jesus, take me aside. Open what’s closed in me. Let Your voice be the one I hear first.
The crowd’s verdict at the end of the story is a good one to carry into the afternoon: “He hath done all things well” (Mark 7:37, KJV).