Matthew 7:24-37

He sighed

There is a lot to ponder on in our Gospel reading today and I could be drawn down any number of rabbit holes – but two words stopped me in my tracks when I was reflecting on our passage in verse 34.

He sighed

Last week I had a phone conversation with a clergy colleague in the diocese. We have a close though slightly formal relationship. After we exchanged the usual and expected greetings and pleasantries I said to him, “So how are you, really?” 

He sighed deeply and said, “It’s déjà vu. It’s just like it was last year. I’m planning for the Autumn term but everything is so uncertain.” I heard his exhaustion and frustration. His sigh spoke louder and said more than his words. I know what that sigh is like and I’ll bet you do too.

I find myself sighing sometimes, especially as I recover from Covid! I sigh more often and I sigh more deeply. And I wonder if that’s true for you too. I wonder what your sigh is today.

I’m not talking about a sigh of relief or satisfaction, an “Ahh, this is good” kind of sigh. I’m talking about the kind of sigh we hear from Jesus in today’s Gospel. It’s not only a sigh, it’s a moan and a groan. It’s a murmuring. It’s an expression of something deep within.  

Jesus has returned to the region around the Sea of Galilee. The people “brought him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hands on him.” Jesus took the man “aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha,’ that is, ‘Be opened.’”

“He sighed.” What do you make of that? What do you think Jesus’ sigh is about? Maybe he’s just tired. Haven’t you had days that wore you out and as soon as you got home you dropped into your chair and sighed?  Have you ever sighed when the phone or door bell rang and you wondered, “Now what?”

Maybe that’s what happened to Jesus when the people brought this deaf man with a speech impediment. Maybe he just wanted to be left alone for a while. Or maybe he’s heartbroken at this man’s life, the difficulty and struggle. Don’t you sometimes read the news and sigh?

Gaza, Israel, Afghanistan, racism, migrants and refugees seeking a new home, political divisions and public bickering. It’s one sigh after another.     

Guy sometimes says to me, “That was a big sigh, what’s going on?” Let me tell you what some of my sighs today are about. 

• I sigh when I’m tired, when I feel overwhelmed, and when I wonder if I have what it takes. I sigh when I feel powerless, when I don’t know what to do, and when I feel lost. 
• I sigh when I see people who I care about who are struggling – with ill health, worrying about surgery, finances, anxiety.
• I sigh about the things I desire and long for but don’t have. I sigh when I am frustrated, disappointed, discouraged, or exasperated.
• I sigh when I read or hear our local and national conversations about social justice, civil rights, and public health. I sigh when profits are given priority over people. I sigh because it doesn’t make sense and I don’t get it.
• I sigh when I catch myself living old patterns and behaviours that are not good for me. I sigh when I realize nothing has changed or is changing. I sigh when I begin to have the same old conversations and arguments in my head.  

What about you? What causes you to sigh today? Maybe you sigh at some of the same things I do. Maybe you’ve got other things that make you sigh. Maybe I make you sigh. If you were to list the top three things that cause you to sigh today, what would they be? 

We sigh for a thousand different reasons but here’s what I wonder:

• What if our sighs are the revelation and recognition that we have bumped up against a closed place within ourselves, in a relationship, or in our life and world? Isn’t that what happened in today’s gospel? The people of that region brought Jesus a man who is closed. His ears are stopped up and his tongue is tied. And Jesus sighed.
• What if every sigh carries the words, “Ephphatha, Be opened?”
• What if the exhalation, the breathing out, that accompanies every sigh is the breath of life? 
• What if Jesus is sighing new life into the man in today’s gospel, into you and me? Isn’t that the story of creation? God “breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being” (Genesis 2:7). And for the man in today’s gospel, Jesus “sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha,’ that is, ‘Be opened.’ And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly.” He was a new man, a new creation.

I think most of us experience our sighs as a resignation to the circumstances. We sigh believing that’s how it is, that’s how it will be. We close ourselves off from the future, each other, and the possibility of something new happening. We resign from life. But Jesus doesn’t do that. 

His sigh is not a resignation. It’s a deep breath, a pause. Maybe he’s breathing in the life giving breath of the Holy Spirit – to re-energise him, to re-focus him, to equip him to heal. It’s his refusal to accept limitations or restrictions on the fullness of life.

When I look at the sighs in my life I can see the closed places in me, my attitudes and opinions, my ways of thinking, my version of the truth, my actions, my dreams and hopes, my vision for how life might be. My sighs show me that I still have work to do. They point me to places of growth and healing. 

Perhaps when we sigh, we can re-frame it. Not as a sign of resignation, of accepting the status quo, but as an invitation from God to breath in the Holy Spirit – the life-giving force that keeps us alive.

An invitation to live life to the full by opening ourselves up to the Holy Spirit, by allowing him to work in and through us for the benefit of others.

Look at the top three sighs in your life today. What are they about? What closed places are they showing you? What would it take for you to sigh at those closed places and then say, “Ephphatha, Be opened?” And to allow the Holy Spirit to work?

I wonder what it would be like for you and me to sigh together, not out of resignation, but to register our openness to receiving from the Holy Spirit. To accept our own limitations in the world and to allow God to open our hearts and minds.

A sigh sounds very much like the first spoken name of God – Yahweh. The Jewish people thought speaking the name of God almost a blasphemy, so they said it like a sigh – Yahweh. Maybe we can sigh the name of God and by doing so re-focus our thoughts and wills to him – let him in, let him help.

I think that sigh would be a divine sigh, a prayer, a cry for help, an expression of longing and desire, a hope against hope. It just might be the opening of something new in our lives and in the world. It was for the deaf and mute man in today’s gospel.

Amen.