I just got back from Michigan where my twin brother got married. It was a beautiful wedding and fun weekend, but somehow I managed to catch a pretty bad head cold. No one enjoys having a cold. With all the sneezing, coughing, fever, the runny nose, and sore throat, it can make life pretty miserable. Throw in a couple long flights back to Florida that moved the congestion and sinus pressure into my ears and it quickly becomes the perfect storm of colds. Needless to say I am home sick today.
I don’t know if you have ever experienced a cold like the one I am currently experiencing. I know it could be a lot worse. It is only a cold, and in a couple days I will be back to my old self, but it is really annoying not being able to breathe, smell or hear. With the congestion and pressure in my ears it has really been difficult to communicate. It is not only difficult to hear others, but it’s hard to hear myself which makes talking a struggle. It almost feels like I am wearing ear plugs. It makes me feel self-conscience as I can’t tell how loud I am speaking. We have all experienced that person who yells to their friend sitting next to them because they have their music cranked up on their iPod, or the kid on the airplane who is trying to talk to his parents but is shouting because his ears haven’t popped from the flight. Well, that is me right now. Since coming down with this cold, I’ve relied on my wife to tell me when to speak up or to lower my voice, so I don’t look like a fool yelling or whispering to people. She is so good to me.
But today, lying in my bed, coughing and sneezing, congested and plugged up, I started to think about how this cold reflects my spiritual life at times. There are times in my life where I am so weighed down by my sin it is almost like having this cold. The Catholic Church says that “sin sets itself against God’s love for us and turns our hearts away from it” (CCC 1850). And if our sins turns us from God’s love, how are we to communicate with God, know God and love God? Our sin becomes like a bad cold that spiritually plugs us up. We can’t breathe. We can’t hear. It is even difficult to speak.
Lucky for us, Christ did not come for the perfect and healthy but for the lowly and the sick. Jesus himself said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice.’ For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners” (Mt 9:12-13). God is a healer. He comes to us in our sickness and sin and reaches out to us with mercy and compassion. No matter how sick or sinful we are, we need to remember that God’s medicine is greater than our disease.
So if you are reading this, take a minute and ask yourself, “In what ways do I turn a deaf ear or a blind eye towards Christ?” If you don’t know the answer to that question, keep thinking about it. When you find the answer, let Christ into that place. And if you already know the answer but don’t know what to do with it, all you have to do is bring it to Jesus. It may not be a quick and easy fix but He does bring restoration.
Jesus took [the deaf and dumb man] aside from the crowd, by himself, and put His fingers into his ears, and after spitting, He touched his tongue with the saliva; and looking up to heaven with a deep sigh, He said to him, “Ephphatha!” that is, “Be opened!” And his ears were opened, and the impediment of his tongue was removed, and he began speaking plainly…They were utterly astonished, saying, “He has done all things well; He makes even the deaf to hear and the mute to speak” (Mk 7: 31-37).
