Without Ears - They Listened.

Jesus spoke to the deaf demon and he listened.¹

Blow you away a little bit? Jesus speaks words that you don’t always need ears to hear. And not only hearing, obeying. There are deeper implications than the demon listened (as in heard) but he also listened (as it heard and responded to the command given).

Jesus also talks to a fig tree² and a storm³, which both don’t have ears, but they both listened. He also spoke to dead people, ⁴ who had ears but had stopped working, and they also listened.

Jesus knows stuff. He operates on a different level. He didn’t even speak normally. He had the Spirit of God (which we do too⁵) and would talk that way. He had a fuller revelation of the power of speech. We have an idea that for someone to hear they have to have ears, for someone to see they have to have eyes, for someone to talk they have to have a mouth. (I don’t know the full weight of this statement, but I do know that God doesn’t need ears for someone or something to hear. I could go off on the idea of how things could talk to us without mouths or see things without eyes, but the focus is on speaking and hearing.) Jesus spoke with the idea that all things could hear Him weather dead or alive, ears or no ears and He knew they would respond.  Why? Because He’s had experience. “In the beginning…God said… and there was…”⁶ I think this has something to say about testimony and knowing God’s character and what He has done before and what He can do again.

Proverbs tells us “the power of life and death are in the tongue.” ⁷

A fact, I know I don’t fully grasp yet. Otherwise, my words would not come out so quickly. Jesus cursed a plant and it died. I don’t want to speak death over my car, house, family, the annoying people in restaurants/ball games, a slow waitress, or someone who flips me off in the car. I think we need to speak life, blessings, and joy over them. Over those we know and those we don’t. Jesus said “Bless those who curse you.”⁸ Even our enemies we should be blessing. Why would we speak death over ourselves all the time in the form of criticism or “humility” or “honesty.” I could go off on this topic, but for now I want to keep it on speaking life and truth to all things – those that we naturally expect and don’t expect to listen. Then, I want us to ask God to raise our faith so that we expect all things to listen as we speak His words through us to them.

Before we jump down the easy trail of just saying nice polite things to everyone, I want to add in another point that prevents us from watering these statements down. This has been challenging me and so I propose it to you with the power of words. Remember, Jesus spoke to a tree and it died, He spoke to the storm and it stopped, He spoke to a deaf demon and it listened and obeyed, He spoke to at least three dead people and they listened and came back to life. So what do we do with this statement?

He tells us to speak to mountains⁹ and mulberry trees¹⁰ and tell them to be thrown into the sea.

Yes, He’s explaining if we have faith (even a small amount) we can do these things. But before we rule it out as an illustration, we must remember it comes after the fact that He JUST KILLED A FIG TREE WITH HIS WORDS. I don’t think it was a nice polite picture of what if… I think there was a statement here. Have you ever prayed for a mountain to move? I mean, I’ve prayed for rocks to move before, but I’ll be honest, I was going to be super surprised and pumped if they did- which, I know, is not much faith.  But what can we do with this? I want you to think about and wrestle with this statement. Jesus tell us if we speak to mountains or mulberry trees and tell them to be thrown into the sea with even a hint of faith they will happen. If that’s the case (where there is no real purpose to move a mountain or tree), then how much more would He want to show His love to those who don’t know it (believers and nonbelievers), the full weight of His love.  Nothing is impossible for God and nothing will separate us from His love towards us. Speak words. Speak Love. Speak Truth. Expect them to have the weight Jesus promised they would.

¹ Mark 9:25; ² Mark 11:14; ³ Mark 4:39; ⁴ Matthew 5:41, Luke 11:14, John 11:43; ⁵ 1 Corinthians 2:12; ⁶ Genesis 1; ⁷ Proverbs 18:21; ⁸ Luke 6:28  ⁹ Mark 11:23; ¹⁰ Luke 17:6

P.S. He also made a donkey talk.