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By Pastor Glenn Pease
Variety is not only the spice of life it is the very essence of life.
Consider the bacteria that is all about us and within us.
There are about 1500 different basic forms or species of these tiny one celled creatures.
If you took 400 trillion of these creatures they would weigh only about 1 pound.
Most of these bacteria have gotten bad press, and we think of them in negative terms.
We are not even aware that many of them are essential to our lives.
Only a small percentage cause disease.
According to Issac Asimov they are far fewer than the percentage of human beings who commit crimes.
Bacteria carry out chemical reactions that are essential to digestion, and bacteria in our intestines form some of the vitamins that we cannot make for ourselves.
Molecular biologists are working hard to figure out how to use these tiny creatures as more efficient servants in fighting disease.
So they are primarily friends of man and not foes.
Man has already designed a bacteria that manufactures human insulin so diabetics can live normal lives.
The hope is that bacteria will help man produce vaccines for his most potent disease agent-the viruses.
When you get into the world of scientific healing the one characteristic that stands out is the infinite variety.
There is no end to the means and methods by which man fights off his foes to maintain his health, or to regain it when it has been taken captive.
What is fascinating in studying the healing miracles of Christ is that Jesus also used a variety of means and methods to bring about healing.
You would think that if all Jesus had to do was to say, "Be healed," that He would have a standardized method, and one healing would be just like another.
It would be monotonous and boring, but it would be so simple and easy.
But Jesus deals with people as individuals.
He recognizes that each person is unique, and is in need of treatment that is unique to their problem and personality.
No where do we see this more clearly than in Healing of the deaf-mute in our text.
This is a healing that strays from the norm.
Jesus is giving this man a specialized treatment.
First of all, He takes him aside to deal with him privately.
Usually Jesus just heals people in the midst of the crowd.
But here He departs from the crowd to a place of privacy.
Jesus did often touch the patient, but here He puts His fingers into the man's ears.
Jesus does something that seems rather gross.
He spit on His finger and touched the man's tongue with the spittle.
There are a lot of strange things that happen in the world of healing, but fortunately this one never caught on.
You will have a fruitless search trying to find any healer who follows Jesus on this one, and practices spit healing.
What Jesus is teaching us here is not a particular technique, but rather, the importance of variety in the methods and means of healing.
Not all miracles are alike anymore than all medicine is alike.
Miracles do not come in a can, and massed produced so that one is identical to the other.
Each miracle is adapted to fit the individual who needs it.
Miracles come in custom made packages with a lot of variety.
Understanding this is a key factor in trying to figure out the puzzling mysteries of miracles and healing.
Healing is not mass produced like bottles of aspirin.
Each one is custom made to fit the nature of the person, the disease, and the circumstances.
Jesus may heal in the crowd, or in private.
Sometimes He heals by the spoken word alone.
At other times He adds touch, and as here, He adds special personal touches of His finger and spittle.
On another occasion He used clay.
He may heal at a distance, or right where He is present.
Usually He heals instantly, but He also healed by process and stages.
Some patients were required to do nothing, and others were asked to cooperate in their healing.
One was asked to go and wash in the pool of Siloam, for example.
Richard Trench in his classic The Miracles Of Our Lord wrote, "There must lie a deep meaning in all the variations which mark the different healing of different sick and afflicted.
A wisdom of God ordering all the circumstances of each particular case."
When he wrote that book in the 1800's, he did not have a clue as to what that deep meaning might be.
But today with the rapid advance of medical knowledge, we do know why His variety of treatment was of great value.
Modern medicine has discovered what the Great Physician always knew, and now it has become a principle of health and healing.
The principle is this:
I. THE MIND OF THE PATIENT IS THE DOOR BY WHICH HEALING POWER ENTERS THE BODY.
You might think this should have nothing to do with miracles.
What difference does it make if the mind is open or not?
We are talking about God's power, and He certainly does not get stopped at the door just because the mind of man is closed, does He?
It all depends on whether you are going by the popular idea of miracles, or the Biblical record.
The popular idea is that God can do anything, and generally does.
It is all a matter of His choices, and man has little or nothing to do with it.
His puny mind is as irrelevant as bacteria is to the movement of a tank.
But what does the Bible say?
If you go back to Mark 6:5-6, you will read the shocking words that make the popular idea as false as a four dollar bill.
It says, "He could not do any miracles there, except lay His hands on a few sick people and heal them, and He was amazed at their lack of faith."
Miracles may not be man produced, but they can be man prevented.
Yes, man can stop a miracle by a closed mind of unbelief.
If the mind of a man is not open to the possibility of a miracle, then a miracle will not happen.
Miracles are like electric power; they do not flow in where there is no outflow.
There has to be a complete circuit, and if the mind of a man is shut, the switch is off, and the energy will not flow.
Man can resist the Holy Spirit, and quench the power of healing by a closed mind.
So what are the implications for healing?
It simply means that almost all healing is psycho-somatic, and that to get to the body you have to go through the mind.
To do this you have to appeal to each person in a way that opens their mind to be healed.
The mind is the door to the body, and if you can't get through the mind, you will not be able to heal the body.
Doctors need the patients cooperation to be successful.
This particular man that Jesus is dealing with in our text is obviously a reluctant patient.
Some people have brought him to Jesus to be healed.
He was not like the paralytic who was brought by his friends, for this man could walk.
Yet, he had to be brought, and that means he did not choose to come, but is there under some social pressure.
He is likely somewhat skeptical and not convinced Jesus can heal him.
Jesus recognized this reluctance, and so He gives the man special treatment that will have the psycho-somatic effect of opening his mind.
Jesus is practicing psycho-somatic medicine.
He is using what is very popular today because it works like a charm-the placebo effect.
The spit of Jesus had no power to cure a deaf-mute, but it had the power to open his mind to receive the healing power of Christ.
It kindled in him a sense that he was loved as an individual, and this gave him faith and hope.
Once that blockage was away from the door of his mind, the door could be opened, and the flow of healing power could enter his body.
The healing power was not in Christ's finger or His spittle.
This was the means by which to get the man's mind open so it could receive the healing power of Christ.
Whatever opens the mind to receive healing energy is a powerful medicine for that particular person.
That is why there are so many different methods and means of healing.
What appeals to one mind leaves another unimpressed.
The minds of men are so varied that there is no end to the means by which they can be impressed and opened.
Pills can be the open sesame to many minds, and that is why placebos can be effective.
The minds of many are ready to accept that any pill will work.
So when they are given a mere sugar pill they have a powerful effect on the body because the mind has been opened to receive healing power.
The spit of Jesus did this for this man.
It had the placebo effect that modern man has learned has power to heal.
C. S. Lovett in his book Jesus Wants You Well gives some amazing illustrations of the power of the placebo effect, or suggestive therapy.
A young woman had a paralyzed tongue and could not speak.
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