“God cannot count. Everybody is number one. God became man not for a crowd but for each one of us.” Not for a crowd, but for each one of us...these words of Cardinal Basil Hume aptly capture the message of today’s Gospel. Our Lord does not seek the adulation of the crowd but focuses on the man who is brought before him. His concern is not the crowd but the individual in need. In the midst of a crowd of admirers and spectators, that man was number one.
Certainly, Our Lord could have healed this man without the gestures. We know from other accounts that he could do so with even being present. But our Lord chooses an intimate, personal, “one on one” setting. Jesus puts his fingers into the man’s ears and spitting, touches the man’s tongue and groans, “Ephphatha!” (Be opened!) Our Lord knew that this man needed the physical contact that would reassure him that God knew exactly the source of his problem, the ailment that kept him trapped in silence, in isolation from others.
It is the way God relates with us. He created us and knows us better than we know ourselves. We too need to be reassured that in his compassion, God is involved in MY life. He knows the circumstances that impact my life.
The Lord does not see the crowd, he sees the individual. He knows my joys and struggles, my fears and anxieties, my doubts, and weaknesses. This is the truth that this Gospel episode conveys.
But it also conveys a task, a duty for the Lord’s disciples. The Lord’s cry, “Be opened” is a summons for us to open our ears, our hearts to the Lord’s word. In the midst of an increasingly unbelieving and secular culture, many of us have become far too comfortable, and deaf to what the Lord asks of us.
With regards to the witness of our faith, we often suffer from a speech impediment. We resign ourselves to silence out of fear of being perceived as out of date or even odd. Our aim is to blend in, to go along with the crowd.
We have to be alert so that our faith does not become lukewarm or even cold. Let us ask the Lord to give us the courage to be different so that our witness will be wholehearted and genuine.
In today’s Holy Communion and throughout this week, let’s allow the Lord to take us aside, away from the crowd, away from the hectic activities of our day to listen, to absorb, his Word. Let us allow him to restore our hearing and to remove our speech impediment. In our thanksgiving after Communion and in our daily prayer, let us remember that the Lord does not see a crowd but me. The Lord cannot count, and I will be number one!
