THE LORD WILL REIGN FOREVER
INTRODUCTION
Have you ever been labeled? Most of us have. Many of us have been labeled incorrectly.
In my second year at CMU, some of my friends and I took a trip to Toronto. While there, one Gentleman discovered that we are Mennonites. This was surprising to him because the Mennonites he knew were Old Colony Mennonites. This Gentleman thought that all Mennonites drove buggies, lived on farms, and wore simple clothing. We proceeded to explain that the Old Colony Mennonites were actually a minority in the Mennonite Community and that there are different kinds of Mennonites all over the world.
Part of human nature is to categorize. We have a nasty habit of putting people into categories based simply on first impressions. Think of the last person you bought a car from.
As soon as we met a sales person there are some questions we ask ourselves.
Is this person pushy? Is this person going to listen to my needs? Is this person trustworthy?
When we go to a new church, there are some questions we ask ourselves.
Are the people nice? Is it going to seem awkward if I am introduced during the service?
Is it going to be awkward if I am not introduced? What is the Pastor like?
Before we know it, every person, place and situation we encounter is labeled. Sometimes the label is positive, sometimes the label is negative. Sometimes, the label is enough for us to trust. Other times the label is enough for us to run away.
The Syrophoenecian woman had a label and it followed her for her entire life. Even in the presence of Jesus. Without understanding the nature of this label we cannot understand the reasons behind the exchange between the woman and Jesus.
I would like to give some attention to the context of today’s story of the Syrophoenician woman. Just prior to this story in both Mark and Mathew where the story appears, Jesus is confronted by the Pharisees and the Scribes about the teachings on clean and unclean.
My impression is that the story of the Syrophoenician woman and the discourse about the traditions of the elders are connected.
Lets read the text:
1 Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, 2 they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?"
He said to them, "Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.' You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition."
First of all, who are the Pharisees? The Pharisees are a minority of the Jews. This was a group of people that dedicated their lives to following the Traditions of the elders to a tee.
What are the Traditions of the Elders? We begin with the Law. The Law for the Jews meant two things: The Ten Commandments and the First five books of the bible known as the Pentateuch.
You can find a great deal of rules and instructions laid out in detail but for a long time the Jews followed the Morality Principles laid out in the Pentateuch.
For a few hundred years, matters of Morality were left to the individual to interpret and apply the principles in their own lives. But eventually, a class of legal experts known as Scribes emerged. The Scribes were dissatisfied with the lack of definition in the Law. They made it their life’s work to develop the Moral Principles into thousands of rules and regulations that could be applied to every situation.
Many of the rules are very specific about what is clean and what is not. A Jew was definitely not supposed to come into contact with anything unclean.
If this happened, the Jew had to immediately go through a cleansing ritual specific to the violation in order to prevent contaminating anything or anyone else. This would have been in addition to the cleansing rituals required throughout the day.
The offence the Pharisees and the Scribes were accusing the disciples of was not washing properly before they sat down to eat. Note, the Pharisees were not filling the role of World Health Organization. This was not an issue of hygiene; this was an issue of religion. The Pharisees believed that a person who eats with unclean hands is susceptible to a demon named Shibta.
They also believe that being in the presence of someone who is unclean makes themselves unclean. For this reason, the Pharisees did everything they could to avoid anyone who does not follow the Traditions of the Elders.
Upon being confronted about his disciples, Jesus turns around and confronts the Pharisees and the Scribes on their religious devotion to the Traditions of the Elders. Jesus points out to them that they spend so much time following the Traditions of the elders that there is nothing left to follow God.
Later in the passage Jesus declares that it is not what comes into the body that is unclean. He says that what comes into the body does not go through the heart but it goes through the stomach and then out again. It is what comes out of a person that matters. He is not talking about regular bodily functions here. Jesus is talking about that which comes from the heart. His list includes, evil designs, fornications, thefts, murders, adulteries, covetous deeds, pride, folly.
It is these things that render a person unclean, not the food that one eats. The connection between this encounter that Jesus had with the Pharisees and the scribes and the encounter he has with the Syrophoenician woman lies in the idea that the Pharisees regarded the Gentiles as unclean and it is this theme that underlies this entire story.
Lets read the story of the Syrophoenician Woman.
24From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, 25but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet.
26Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. 27He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”
28But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” 29Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.”
30So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.
From the outset, Mark makes sure that we are aware that Jesus and his Disciples are in Gentile Territory. The next thing he tells us is that the Woman who comes to visit Jesus is a Gentile.
Being a Gentile doesn’t bode well for the woman in the first place. We have already established that the Woman would not have had a good relationship with the Pharisees and probably many of the other Jews. And Jesus is painfully aware of this reality.
Mark next reveals the reason for the woman’s visit. Her daughter has been possessed by a demon and the woman believes that Jesus can do something to help her.
The next part is surprising. The woman begs Jesus to cast a demon out of her daughter. And Jesus says, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.
What a horrible thing to say! But I think, in light of the context, Jesus was making a point.
Then we are surprised again by what the Woman says in return. “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” Now we have some interesting dynamics. Jesus used the same word used by the Pharisees to insult the Gentiles. Sometimes, the Jews would insult other Jews this way for to call someone a dog, was the greatest insult one could give or receive.
But, Jesus is supposed to be all about love and mercy and he is not supposed to call people like the Syrophoenician woman dogs. Does this in any way indicate that the Jesus we see in our text today is not the Jesus we know? The answer my friends is I believe not.
Commentators suggest a couple of things here, both of which work towards the point I am trying to make. And both can exist together.
The first suggestion is that Jesus is testing the woman’s faith. It is easy to approach and ask for healing, especially when you have nothing to loose, but to be turned away and then try again that is an indication of true faith. Menno Simons even lists the Syrophoenician woman among the ten persons in the Bible who convey true faith.
The second suggestion suggests that Jesus used his words here facetiously. I like this word. To say something facetiously means to say something with humor and without being serious. It is a remarkably powerful tool for Jesus when he uses it. Facetiousness has the power in the right situations to reveal the silliness of a sentiment and I believe that Jesus is using it here.
The perfect part is that the woman is also able to pick up on what Jesus was trying to do and respond according to the pattern Jesus began.
And Jesus said, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.”
The point was well made.
Often, this passage is looked at as a lovely story of how Jesus tested the mother of a demon possessed girl. The mother passed the test and the demon was cast out. What is often taken from this passage is if one has faith enough, Jesus will heal and Jesus is powerful enough that he does not need to be present to cast out demons. And these are very good things to pull from this exchange.
But, there is one element that is often left out. The use of strong language leads me to believe that this is more than just the demonstration of Jesus power and a woman’s faith.
This is a demonstration that Jesus came for the sake of everyone, not just the Jews. Jesus, as he threw out the traditions of clean and unclean and cast the demon out of a Gentile woman’s daughter; was screaming to save the lives of the Jews and the Disciples and the Gentiles and everyone else.
He was screaming at us to let go of the things that cause rifts to rise between us. Jesus was telling us to get over ourselves and realize that we are all God’s children and all of us are invited to share in the kingdom of God.
When the Pharisees called Jesus out on the issue of clean and unclean, they expected to catch him off guard. But it was Jesus who had them off guard.
As I said before, they were so involved in keeping the Traditions of the Elders that they forgot about the commandments of God. They thought they had the Law down to the letter and therefore were immune to sin, but they were mistaken, and Jesus showed them.
Now it comes to the time when we ask ourselves who we are in the story. We have a few characters to choose from. There is Jesus who somehow seems to always stir things up and make everyone rethink what they thought they had already figured out. There is the woman who was turned away and could have given up but chose to take her chances and try again, or there are the Pharisees who thought they had it all together and their place in heaven was assured.
For myself, depending on the time of my life, I have been like each of these characters, but most often I am like the Pharisees. The thing that I am trying to say was said best through Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the Tax collector in Luke 19:9-14.
He also told this parable to some
who trusted in themselves that
they were righteous
and regarded others with contempt:
“Two men went up to the temple to pray,
one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector.
The Pharisee, standing by himself was praying thus,
‘God, thank you that I am not like these other people:
thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
I fast twice a week;
I give a tenth of all my income.’
But the tax collector,
standing far off,
would not even look up to heaven,
but was beating his breast and saying,
‘God be merciful to me, a sinner!
I tell you, this man went down to his home
justified rather than the other;
for those who exalt themselves will be humbled
and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
Those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
I think the Syrophoenician woman came out of her story being the one exalted. If someone had insulted us like Jesus seemed to insult the woman, most of us would have said something like, “I am no dog!” and would have stormed out of the room.
But the woman did not defend her humanness, she simply responded with humility saying, OK, if I am a dog at least give me some crumbs. In this action she was justified and Jesus sent her away with exactly what she had come for in the first place.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I don’t think I have many moments like the Syrophoenician woman from the story or the Tax Collector from the parable.
Most of my moments are like those of the Pharisees. Quite often I compare myself to others saying, I don’t do this or that but those other people do. Thank you that I am not like those other people. In fact, keep them away from me; I don’t want to wreck my streak.
It is stories like these that remind me – remind all of us, that we are susceptible to sin no matter how strait of a line we can draw.
Lord, Have mercy on us for we know that we are sinners,
Help us to recognize the sin in our lives and to work with you to become justified.
Help us to recognize the goodness in others, even when we don’t expect to,
And help us to know that you love everyone, even us.
In Jesus name we pray, Amen.