During the last several Sundays
we have heard in the Gospel lessons from Matthew
either
parables of Jesus
or
Jesus, through his actions, being himself a living parable.
And here in the second half of the Gospel reading for
today
is another story guaranteed to disturb our sensibilities,
something
we wouldn’t expect from Jesus – another parable.
We have to pay attention to the story and examine it more
closely,
because
on the first hearing what we notice
can
be jarring and perplexing.
Jesus and the disciples are in the neighboring foreign
country.
A woman, native to there, comes and shouts at Jesus for
help.
He ignores her!
Then he claims that the scope of his mission doesn’t
include her.
Then essentially he calls her a dog.
And this is Jesus we’re talking about?!
And amazingly this woman still persists and finally gets
her request.
This story has caused a lot of reactivity in people
listening to it.
Some point to perceived racial prejudice and ethnic
exclusiveness,
and
decide that this is a story about Jesus
coming
to an expanding sense of the scope of his ministry.
But why then don’t we see this story followed by other
stories
of Jesus preaching to multitudes
in other foreign countries?
Some say that Jesus was testing the faith of this woman.
If so, then why such a challenging test for this
particular person,
and not all the many others
coming to him for healing
or bringing their family members
to him for healing?
The thing is that in both cases we tend to read into the
text
what
makes sense to us, how we might think about the situation.
But the Gospels are all very compact, intense pieces of
writing.
They all use an economy of words to convey as much as
possible
who
Jesus is, what he did, and
– most
importantly – its spiritual significance.
There is always something going on in terms of a spiritual
process
in
each chapter, each story, each passage.
So I don’t think the Gospel writer would have used this
story for today
for
any other purpose than to convey an important spiritual lesson
that
Jesus was trying to teach through his actions and words.
So let’s look at this story again,
accepting the fact that it has
some points of absurdity in it,
things that don’t add up for our
value systems,
for our
conceptions of how Jesus ought to behave
or what
would have been a better way
for
Jesus to relate to this woman.
Jesus and his disciples were “on vacation,” we could say.
They
had crossed the border
and were away from the crowds
for a short time. They needed a
break.
But here is a native of this country, a local, who knows
about Jesus.
She calls out to him to get his attention,
and
addresses him by the title, Son of David,
a Jewish
title, a title known to be Messianic,
indicating
that she has some knowledge of the Jews and their hopes,
and
the speculation by many that Jesus might be the Messiah,
the
political and military leader
who
could deliver them from Roman oppression.
But Jesus doesn’t respond to that title.
He
is not that kind of Messiah, not for the Jews or for anyone.
He persistently told people not to call him that,
because
of all the baggage attached to it.
It was too limiting for what Jesus was about in terms of
salvation.
Yet the woman is appealing for mercy,
and
for deliverance and healing for her daughter.
The disciples must have been perplexed.
They knew Jesus as one with immense compassion,
who
healed all that were brought to him, including Gentiles,
such
as the Centurion’s servant
and
the Gadarene demoniacs,
which
appear in earlier chapters in this same Gospel.
So now Jesus has scruples about healing this one Gentile?
His
silence is uncharacteristic.
Driven to distraction by her yelling, they say to Jesus,
“Send
her away,” meaning, “Give her what she wants.
We know she won’t let up until
you do.”
And then, notice this, Jesus addresses the disciples,
“I
was not sent except to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.”
The disciples would have agreed that this was the case,
if
their perception of Jesus was only that he was the Son of David,
the
Messiah, in that political, military sense,
which
is a very nationalistic view.
If he was Son of David,
then
any outside of that ethnic relationship
were
not included in the benefits of his reign.
But now the woman has come and prostrated herself at the
feet of Jesus,
that
profound bow with head to the ground,
the
expression of surrender and gesture of mortal trust.
And now she says simply, “Lord, help me.”
The dialog shifts and is now between Jesus and the woman –
face to face.
“It is not good to take the
bread of the children and toss it to the little dogs.”
“Yes, Lord, for even these house dogs eat from the scraps
falling
from their owners’ table.”
What urgency of necessity and
grace of humility this woman must have had,
and also what sly understanding!
Did
she catch on to the fact that this whole drama was not about her
but for the sake of the
disciples
and the need to expand their
compassion and sense of mission?
And Jesus said to her, “O woman, great is your faith.”
Dogs get fed unintentionally when scraps fall from the
table.
Having a dog now, I have been observing this first hand.
I even have a cartoon posted outside my office that says,
“The
5 second rule for food dropped on the floor
doesn’t
work if you have a 2 second dog.”
So dogs are very attentive at
mealtime, especially when children are at the table.
The power of Jesus to heal and deliver was so obvious in
him,
that even though he was out of his
own setting and supposedly “off duty,”
this
healing power was so radiating from him
that it
was “falling off the table,”
and the Syro-Phoenician woman
could see that,
and was right there to snatch it
up.
Essentially the woman was telling Jesus
that his
power was already at work.
And we could say that Jesus was saying to her,
“Son
of David you call me, the exclusive Messiah of the House of David.
Are you buying into this idea
that I’ve only come to help Israel?”
And this power of Jesus to heal is so overflowing and
abundant
and
falling off the table,
that
the healing of the woman’s daughter takes place
even
from a distance.
She goes home and finds her daughter freed and delivered
and whole.
That is salvation; that is how salvation works, how it
liberates
and
expands our awareness and generosity and inclusiveness.
Today we are blessed to have a baptism, little Daniel.
I don’t know if there is a dog in his household,
but
if there is I know right where that pooch will be as Daniel grows –
right
by the highchair.
Dogs are so handy when there are young children in the
house.
They
save a lot in the clean up!
In the sacrament of baptism we are saying that the love
and mercy and grace of
God is so abundant, so absurdly abundant
that
even babies who have no idea what is happening to them
are
included in this saving grace.
In this Gospel story today the Syro-Phonecian woman, the
gentile,
recognized
the power of Jesus to heal overflowing out of him
like
food spilt and falling off the table.
It was not beneath her dignity to snatch it up,
like the family pet waiting in
eager anticipation by a toddler’s highchair.
Are we alert and attentive
enough to notice the presence of Jesus around us?
the
power of Jesus to heal, liberate, and transform
that is
overflowing in our direction?
It is here – in this place – for all of us.
The meal is prepared and set out on the table, the altar.
And all are invited to come and eat.
I see hands cupped and held out
to carefully catch any crumbs
that might be there
along with that little piece of
bread.
Receiving the bread is a two-handed affair.
So may our realization of just what it is
we are
catching in our hands and raising to our lips
open us, open our hearts
to an
expanded awareness of the power and compassion of Jesus
to
liberate, heal and transform.
