9 July 2019
Tuesday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Jesus’ opening moves in the war against Satan continue as He casts out demon that was causing a man to be mute. What a terrible thing to suffer: being unable to speak! Jesus said “A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good, but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil; for from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks,” (Luke 6:45). Imagine having so much to say but being completely unable to say it, and having no understanding as to why. The crowds remark that “Nothing like this has ever been seen in Israel.” What did they see? We do not know; why weren’t they amazed rather by what they heard? The Word of God (John 1:1-3) spoke, and the demon fled; the mute man, by the Word of God, again had a voice. “Lord open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise,” (Psalm 51:17).
Ah but the Pharisees are never mute, accusing Jesus of using the power of Satan to drive out demons. We do not hear of Jesus’ reaction to this, but perhaps His silence says it all: the Pharisees refuse to listen to the Word of God, and their words reveal the hardness of their hearts. What Word could Jesus speak that would land on “good soil” (Matthew 13:19)? And so Our Lord departs; He cannot win a victory over those who have allied themselves with the Enemy.
Town after town, village after village He goes, the way already prepared by His seventy-two disciples. He teaches and calls others to His Cause. He curse disease and illness, fortifying not only bodies and hearts, but souls; imagine the faith of those who experience or merely witness such feats of divine power! Yet whose heart was moved?
The Heart of Jesus: “At the sight of the crowds, his heart was moved with pity for them because they were troubled and abandoned, like sheep without a shepherd.” As He patches up His wounded, He is in turn wounded. He begins to see the sheer scale of the war that lies before Him, and He commands His disciples to call upon the Lord of Hosts for reinforcements. Recall that a third of all the angels once serving God in Heaven rebelled and joined Satan, being cast from Heaven to Earth for doing so (Revelation 12:4): the Enemy’s numbers are great! Yet we have God on our side, and twice as many angels as Satan has, in addition to every saint. But Jesus calls us, too, to fight, to do our part in the war that rages between Heaven and Hell.
At the Resurrection Jesus says to His apostles as He says to all of us by our Baptism “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you,” (John 20:21). We are sent as Jesus was sent, to fight as He fought. And did He not say, “…whoever believes in me will do the works that I do, and will do greater ones than these,” (John 14:12)? If we believe in Him, brothers and sisters, we have nothing to fear, and we are certainly capable of giving the Enemy a good fight. The Pharisees could not believe in Him; they had already surrendered. Who shall we follow? Who shall we serve? “Lord, teach me…to fight, and not to heed the wounds…”