From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet.
Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, "Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs."
But she answered him, "Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs." Then he said to her, "For saying that, you may go--the demon has left your daughter." So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.
Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, "Ephphatha," that is, "Be opened." And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly.
Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. They were astounded beyond measure, saying, "He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.""
Doing All Things Well
Churches often send questionnaires to potential staff members. Along with logical questions about personal testimony and doctrine, some of the questions can seem a little strange at times. One pair of questions I saw once asked in succession: How would you describe yourself? How would your peers describe you?
Now, the first question in that pair was very logical but I am not too sure about the second! The pastor who received that questionnaire answered it: “I hope my peers would agree with my description of myself, but I think you will have to ask them!”
It would be fascinating, though quite possibly embarrassing, for us to know what our peers actually think of us. We do know, however, what the people who walked with Jesus thought of Him: "He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak."
Wow, would to God that everyone who looked into our lives would say, “He has done everything well!”
The thing I have come to understand, however, is that the definition of “doing all things well,” can differ, depending upon who you may be talking to. As one pastor who moved from a large city to a rural area once told me, “When I was in [the big city], if a church held a community outreach event it had to be absolutely excellent. If it wasn’t done to a very high standard, people had many other churches to choose from, and they would just go down the road to the next offering. Here, people are not as concerned about how well you do an event as much as they see that you care enough to do the event.” This is similar to the catch-phrase, “People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.”
So, what about Jesus? Why did He seem to be “hiding His light under a basket?”
Simply this, Jesus did not come to heal people. He came to seek and save the lost souls of this world. He “came to the Jews first, and then to the Greeks” as Paul says in Romans 1.
He had a mission to accomplish, but that did not prevent Him from being kind and loving those who did not understand that mission. In truth, no one alive at that time understood His mission, and so Jesus had to be patient with all kinds of people, Jews and Gentiles, His disciples and His critics, those seeking salvation and those seeking miracles.
We should live our lives so that people will say that we do all things well as we serve God. It is a difficult balancing act to pursue a mission, while at the same time relating to people who don’t understand your mission, but Jesus did it, and since He sent us to the Holy Spirit to empower our ministry we can, too.
As the advertising slogan goes, “If it were easy, anyone could do it.” Seek the help of the Holy Spirit, and while it will probably never be easy, it can be done!
Every blessing,
Dr. Otis Corbitt
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