Mark 1 - An Impossible Silence

October 19, 2001 12:35 - 2:00

Before I met him my life was marked by silence.  When no one wants to talk to you, you quickly learn to 

talk to no one. When you’re family abandons you, when you never know what it is to have a friend, its 

easy to keep your thoughts inside.  In one day,though, that all changed.  I went from being a man marked 

by silence, to one who finally has something worth talking about. 

I became a leper at a young age, and was subsequently abandoned by my family.  It wasn’t that they didn’t love me, but simply that they didn’t know how to deal with the problem.  So rather than find a way to cope, they left me. You can imagine how interesting it must be to tell others your family moved, and when they ask where, admit you don’t know.  

By the time I was nineteen I had already lost my left hand at the wrist, and several fingers on my right.  But it wasn’t the disease that really hurt me.  It was my sight.  It was seeing families that loved each other.  Seeing people enjoying friendships like those I had almost forgotten.   I became bitter; thankfully it was not at my family or friends, but rather at this disease which had driven them from me.  I came to a point where I was being eaten alive, not just from the leprosy without, but by the bitterness within.

It was at that point I heard about Jesus.  No immediate joy or happiness thrilled my soul when I heard his name, or of what He had done.  I was just curious.  What if?  What if it was true?  What if He could heal?  It was worth a chance.

  

When I saw him, I knew.  There was nothing strange or supernatural about it, I just knew.  I knew He could heal me.  I knew everything would be Ok.  And He did heal me. What was a stump of a left hand one moment was something that had been missing for a year and a half the next.       

But Jesus didn’t just heal the outside.  He healed the inside.  He took all the bitterness, all the filth out of my life and made me a new person.  He changed me.  But then He asked me to do something.  And I suppose I should have obeyed, but even now, looking back I don’t see how I could have.  Jesus asked that I tell no one about what He had done for me.

  

I’m sure He expected that I would at least tell my family.  How could I keep from them the wonderful news of Jesus’ healing of my life?  But if I told my family, why wouldn’t I tell all who could hear.  So many could benefit from the healing power of Jesus in their lives, and yet I was to keep silent.  If I could only tell one message, the message of a man who can take a broken life and make it whole again is certainly the one which must be chosen.  How many people had I seen suffering from sickness and disease?  How many people lived out each day with no hope of ever being cured?   And yet I had found the cure for all sickness, outside and in.  That is a message worth spreading.  That is a message worth living.  That’s something worth talking about.