Marcan Redaction - The Literary Form of Mark

Why would Jesus give the direction to "tell no one" ?  
The reading for this upcoming Sunday (Mark 1:40-45)  brings up this very old and troubling question for me.   

Jesus must have known it would NOT be carried out.

I remember one priest telling us in a homily that perhaps Jesus said this precisely because he knew it would work in reverse. He likened it to reverse psychology.  I hated that explanation. If that truly was the case then might there not be more instances of Jesus using reverse psychology? in what other instances was Jesus telling someone one thing and expecting them to do the opposite? That is just too much like setting someone up for a fall. Jesus wouldn't do that. Would he? That explanation troubled me. 

Mark1: 40-45 highlights such an occasion. The following is a "look at the scripture" by Reginald H. Fuller. Please note I have taken great liberties in editing, bolding for my emphasis and responding (in red ala Fr. Z style). You can find the full commentary here.

The Gospel reading for Sunday (Mark 1:40-45)  has been overloaded with the 2 motif of the messianic secret, a fact that shows it to be 1 Marcan redaction. (Remember this book of the Bible is Marcan construction rather than a historical fact.)

The cured leper is told to say nothing to anyone, but he disobeys this command and his cure becomes the talk of the town. (My first reaction is, I cannot fathom disobeying Christ especially after such a healing . . . . and then I stop and think . . . . . . I do it all the time. I am a sinner. Thank God for His infinite forgiveness and mercy and the graces of Confession.)   The result is that Jesus withdraws (unsuccessfully) to the country.

Mark adds this motif because of his 3 polemic against the understanding of Jesus as merely a wonder-worker. We saw that Mark uses commands to silence in order to forestall the misunderstanding of Jesus and to point forward to the supreme miracle of the cross. (That makes sense both at the time and now)
A puzzling feature here is the fact that the command to secrecy is disobeyed. The man goes out and freely talks about his cure (cf. similar features in Mark 1:34; 3:13; 5:43; 7:36; 8:26). Evidently we are dealing with a characteristic element in Mark’s theory of the messianic secret. It is being repeatedly penetrated.

Since we are dealing with a Marcan construction rather than a historical fact, we have to ask, not what Jesus’ purpose was in giving an injunction he must have known would be broken, but what Mark intends theologically by these injunctions to secrecy and their constant breach.
The answer would seem to be that Mark wants to show that while the messiahship of God is a mystery that must not be prematurely exposed.  (Wow! Thank you! Finally an answer that makes sense and that I understand )  The messiahship of God is a mystery that must not be prematurely exposed because it is rightly understood only in the light of the cross.

Yet because it is the mystery of God’s presence at work in Jesus’ words and works, it cannot really be suppressed but must come out. 

It comes out, for Mark, in the proclamation of the post-Easter Church, which the irresponsible gossip of the healed leper is meant to foreshadow.

(key sentence for me ~~>) The difficulties disappear when we realize that at this point we are dealing not with history but with an artificial theological construction of the evangelist.

Vocabulary help:

1  re⋅daction:   a)  literary form      and, of course: Marcan = of Mark

2. mo- tifs     a) recurring structures, contrasts, or literary devices that can help to develop and inform the piece’s major themes. The narrative motif is the vehicle of means by which the narrative theme is conveyed

3. polemic:   a) controversial argument