We live in some amazing times. When I was a kid, if someone had a phone in his car, it meant he was really, really rich. Now I’ll bet most of you have a phone that you keep in a pocket or purse. When I was a kid, computers took up whole floors of large buildings. The first I computer I remember was at the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis where my father worked. It took up a huge room that had to be kept very cool. Now we carry computers around in briefcases that are faster and do more stuff without the big magnetic tape discs and punch-card inputs.

When I was a kid, I remember watching Neil Armstrong taking those first steps on the moon. Now we don’t even go to the moon anymore, although I understand they are planning to go back. I remember when microwave ovens were a big deal, when everybody I knew had a color TV except for us, 8-Track tapes and VCR’s. I remember buying my kids an Atari 2600 video game, which was the fanciest thing you could get at the time. Now they are becoming a little valuable as collector’s items. I remember when Pac-man and space invaders were cutting edge video games.

I could go on and on about all the amazing things that are happening in our world. But what is most amazing, is that none of the new stuff, none of the new technology seems to amaze us anymore. We’ve become so used to new discoveries that they no longer amaze us.

No one even pays much attention to a space shuttle launch anymore, unless something goes wrong. The only thing that gets our attention is when our personal computers don’t work like we think they should, or they don’t work fast enough.

So let me ask you, does anything amaze you anymore? Have we also lost our sense of amazement when it comes to God?

Our text this morning tells the story of a deaf man brought to Jesus by some friends. Not only was this man deaf, but he also had a speech impediment. Obviously, at some time, this man had had his hearing, since he had learned to talk. But he could not speak plainly.

Jesus heals the man, putting his fingers in his ears and touching his tongue, with a simple word of command. The man’s ears are opened, and he begins to speak plainly.

The crowds that witnessed this miracle are said to be so amazed that they wouldn’t stop talking about what they had seen Jesus do. In fact, the more Jesus told them to keep this miracle quiet, the more they proclaimed it.

In contrast, we often find it easy to keep our mouths shut about our God. Is it because we are no longer amazed by him? We find it easier to talk sports, or news, or the latest popular TV show than we do about God.

Everybody talks about Michael Jackson, or their favorite ball team, their favorite NASCAR driver, or the latest movie they saw. Why can’t we talk about the ways God has blessed us, or about the salvation that is ours through faith in Christ?

The word translated as "deaf" in today’s text can also be translated "dull" or "blunt." A dull knife, for example has a blade that is no longer sharp. A blade gets dull when it’s used a lot, but never sharpened.

That’s what happens when we live in this world, but not in God’s Word. When faith is not constantly being sharpened by the Word, it gets worn down by the sin in our lives, so our faith becomes dull or blunt. When the blade is dull, it can hardly cut through anything. But when you have a sharp knife, it cuts through things with ease.

In the same way, when our faith is blunted and dull, it loses its power to amaze us. Has your faith become dull? Does your conscience no longer bother you when you do wrong? Has going to church, attending Bible study, reading the Word, or taking a few moments for personal devotions become a chore? We feel imposed upon when asked to serve in some capacity. When our hearts are deaf to our amazing God, then it’s no wonder that our witness is mute as well.

When that happens, there is only one place to go. This deaf man’s friends brought him to Jesus. They plead for Jesus to lay hands on the man. Through his word of power, Jesus opens the man’s ears and loosens his tongue.

Our Lord still works in people’s lives through his Word. That’s why it’s a good thing to come to worship, to be in the Word in your daily devotion. Through his Word, Jesus speaks his powerful, life-changing "Be opened" to your hearts. With the Law, he exposes our spiritual deafness.

But with the Gospel, he tells the amazing story of his love for us – love that took him to a manger, to a painful, terrible death on the cross, to a tomb, and then, when the payment had been made for the sins of the world, an empty tomb.

With that message, he is able to open your heart. He makes your sin-dulled ears hear clearly the Good News of his love and forgiveness. Through his resurrection we can look forward to God’s promise of our resurrection.

Through his Word, our Lord is able to amaze us, when nothing much else can. Hearing what God has done in the Scriptures lets the Holy Spirit work and open our eyes and ears and hearts to the amazing things Jesus did for us through his death and resurrection.

Through the Scriptures, we can see what God, through Christ, is still doing for us today. It says in Romans 8 that Christ Jesus who died – more than that, who was raised to life – is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.

Most amazing of all still remains the future that we can’t see, but we can read and hear about. Scripture describes heaven in terms we can understand to give us a glimpse of the eternal joy, beauty, peace, and love that will be ours in heaven. I have no doubt that heaven will completely amaze us, because all that we read and hear only scratches the surface, because no one has the ability or vocabulary to describe how amazing heaven will be.

In our text, the people were so amazed, that like the deaf man, their tongues were loosed and they couldn’t stop talking about what they had seen Jesus do. In the same way, God can amaze us, so that we can’t stop talking about what Jesus has done.

God is doing amazing things in our lives. "Ephphatha!" he says to you and me. Open you eyes and ears and be amazed. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, may your tongue be loosed and may you be so amazed by what God has done for you through Christ, that you can’t quit telling the world about it. Amen.