Works in Secret

“It is not good to eat much honey, nor is it glorious to seek one’s own glory.”

In Luke’s account, the former demoniac Legion begs the Lord to allow him to be his disciple and follow him wherever he goes. Jesus replies, “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.”

Coming from the Lord Jesus, the command to go out and spread the word about his miracles is actually more unusual than I had realized. Far more often, when he did something remarkable for someone, he followed it with strict instructions not to talk about it.

These instances are not easy to search with a concordance. They all amount to much the same thing, but in different language. Most frequently he “charged them to tell no one”, or “strictly charged them”. But we also find quotes like “Be silent” and “Say nothing to anyone” and in one case, “Do not even enter the village.” More often, the gospel writers say things like “He would not permit the demons to speak” or “He strictly charged them that no one should know this.”

Of all the gospels, Mark’s is the one that brings this out most. I’ve found nine instances so far, some duplicated by Matthew or Luke. In Mark it is almost thematic. There are three in his first chapter alone. Rarely does he stop to explain why Jesus swore his beneficiaries to silence. He just mentions that he did.

Human Wisdom and Divine

If you are the least bit self-aware, you’ve probably noticed you rarely operate with only one motive at a time. Often, several considerations simultaneously prompt or restrain our prospective actions. If we are going to speculate at all about the Lord’s thinking, we should probably be wary of oversimplifying, as his thought processes and anticipation of people’s reactions were orders of magnitude beyond ours.

Why then did the Lord so frequently command others not to talk about him? It wasn’t human wisdom that guided him to veil his own glory. Strategically, his preference for working in secret made no sense to those around him. His own brothers counseled him, “If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” That’s what people normally do: they self-promote. “Go to Judea,” his brothers said. “Go up to the feast where you can be seen.” Interestingly, John puts this down to their unbelief.

To Fulfill Scripture

A rare instance in Matthew gives us the most obvious answer: to fulfill scripture. In ordering many whom he had healed not to make him known, Jesus was simply acting in accordance with his own character:

“But the Pharisees went out and conspired against him, how to destroy him. Jesus, aware of this, withdrew from there. And many followed him, and he healed them all and ordered them not to make him known. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah.”

Isaiah described Messiah as one who would “not quarrel or cry aloud” and would not make his voice heard in the streets. Whether the Lord did this consciously to fulfill the words of Isaiah or simply because it was a natural expression of his humility is beside the point; he did it, and he did it a fair bit. Matthew also points out a secondary consideration here: the Lord was well aware how the Jewish religious leadership felt about him. They were already conspiring to end his life. That did not suit him yet, though he predicted many times it would eventually happen. No, he would give himself to them when the time was right, not before. He had things to do first in obedience to his Father’s will, things a careful reading of the Prophets also required of him. He had parables to teach and a triumphal entry to make into Jerusalem, among other things. How would Judas play his part as the Psalms foretell if the chief priests and Pharisees got their way immediately? No, the scripture must be fulfilled.

Jesus and Demonic Testimony

That’s the obvious answer, in that Matthew gives it right to us so it’s hard to ignore. There may be others as well. At least three times the Lord silences demons who insisted on proclaiming his authority. There is the unclean spirit in Mark 1:

“And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit. And he cried out, ‘What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are — the Holy One of God.’ But Jesus rebuked him, saying, ‘Be silent, and come out of him!’ And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice, came out of him.”

He does this again with more demons in verse 34 of the same chapter:

“He would not permit the demons to speak, because they knew him.”

Yet again in Mark 3 we read:

“Whenever the unclean spirits saw him, they fell down before him and cried out, ‘You are the Son of God.’ And he strictly ordered them not to make him known.”

This could certainly be a matter of timing. It was early in his ministry and he was not ready to reveal himself as he would in the weeks immediately prior to the cross. However, it may also have something to do with the fact that the Pharisees and others kept insisting he had a demon and was performing miracles enabled by Satan. It may be that the unclean spirits simply couldn’t help themselves when they blurted out his identity to the world. It may also be that there was an element of strategy when his own enemies identified and glorified him in public. Either way, he would have none of it. He didn’t need their testimony about him, though we are privileged to have it preserved for us today.

Silence and Evidence

In at least one case, it appears the Lord commanded silence because he wanted a man he had healed to obey the Law of Moses rather than spread the word. Again, in Mark 1 we read him saying to a former leper:

“ ‘See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, for a proof to them.’ But he went out and began to talk freely about it, and to spread the news, so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places, and people were coming to him from every quarter.”

Had the leper done as instructed, it would have been quite a testimony to the authorities. Leper cleansings were few and far between. This raises a legitimate question: Jesus knew the man would disobey his command. Did the leper’s disobedience thwart his will or not? I’ll leave that to our readers to mull over.

This happened again when he healed a deaf man in Mark 7:

“And Jesus charged them to tell no one. But the more he charged them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. And they were astonished beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done all things well. He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.’ ”

The effect of his charge to remain silent was to produce exactly the opposite result. Did he know this and do it deliberately? Was he unaware what would happen? (Surely not.) In any case, the Lord’s fame spread not because he self-promoted, but precisely because he didn’t. Yet in attempting to silence them, he remained true to himself and continued to fulfill prophecy.

Getting the Timing Right

At times, he even swore his own disciples to secrecy. There is this in Mark 8:

“And he asked them, ‘But who do you say that I am?’ Peter answered him, ‘You are the Christ.’ And he strictly charged them to tell no one about him.”

Then, just a little later, after Peter, James and John saw him transfigured:

“And as they were coming down the mountain, he charged them to tell no one what they had seen, until the Son of Man had risen from the dead.”

Yes, they were witnesses of his glory, but the time to declare that was after his days in public were over. By Pentecost, nobody could stop them declaring publicly that Jesus of Nazareth was the Christ of God. And why not? Until his disciples really understood and believed what they were preaching, how could they do it effectively? That didn’t happen until they saw him ascend into his glory.