by Bishop Thomas Gumbleton
Pax Christi USA Teacher of Peace
There is something strange about that command at the end of the Gospel today where Jesus tells the person who is cured, “Don’t tell anybody.”
How is that ever going to happen? People know this man has been deaf and mute, now he isn’t any longer, and they are rejoicing. They’re happy. They want to spread this good news, but Jesus had a reason why. He insisted on this in other parts of the Gospel and in fact, Scripture commentators talk about this as the Messianic Secret.
Somehow Jesus was trying to keep secret that He is the Messiah. The reason was that it was so likely and it happened so easily, that the people misunderstood about the Messiah. In fact, there are times when they want to make Him king. They think of Messiah as the one who is going to restore the power and might of Israel from the past and restore the kingdom like it was in David’s time. So they really don’t understand why Jesus came.
They want Him to be a Messiah according to their way of thinking.