People brought to Jesus a deaf man who had a speech impediment and begged him to lay his hand on him. He took him off by himself away from the crowd. He put his finger into the man’s ears, and spitting, touched his tongue; then he looked up to heaven and groaned, and said to him “Ephphatha!” (that is, “Be opened!”) And immediately the man’s ears were opened, his speech impediment was removed, and he spoke plainly.  

The lady in the relationship in the song "Who Knew" should just move on in life, but it is so difficult because the man had lied to her, and now she is in pain. He had said "forever," and did not mean it at all. This is one of the great lessons of early life—there are many people who say "forever," and really have no idea what they are saying.

Spiritual writers have always looked at Jesus’ miracles involving listening and speaking to be statements concerning how well people listen and speak the truth. Jesus heals their impediments, saying in effect that they must listen to and speak what is true. Part of listening and speaking the truth involves consistency: we cannot speak the truth at one time, and then change our minds about it at another.
          
It is a common problem that we have in life. There are things that we say in the heat of a moment when things seem to be going just right, and so it makes sense to say what we say, but then, when we are a bit calmer and are in a different setting, then we do not mean them anymore. The word “forever” fits right into that thought. How many married couples there are in our world who said with full knowledge of what they were saying—“I will love you and honor you all the days of my life”—and then a couple years later, they conveniently forget what they said. They are not being deliberately evil when this happens. It is simply a matter of  weak human natures.  We must understand our human natures: at any given moment, we are going to want what we want, and unless we have trained ourselves otherwise, we will get what we want even at the expense of giving up what we said before.

Therefore, we must be aware of the meaning behind the words that we say. We must hear ourselves speak the promises of a future, know what we are saying, and then--the important thing--be willing to do whatever to carry it out.                

THOUGHT
 
PRAYER

Good and gracious God, one of the problems that we have as human beings is our inability to carry through with what we say. Your Son healed diseases of speech; may he heal us in such a way that we will always understand the importance of our words. Be with us, we pray.  

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©2007 Capuchin Province of Mid-America
Fr. Mike Scully is a member of the Capuchin Province of Mid-America