by CCW | 1 March 2015 15:16
Such a powerful and instructive Gospel. It highlights so many things which are distinctive and important about the Christian journey of faith so wonderfully concentrated for us in the season of Lent. Here is the story of a remarkable woman who gets it, who gets what we so often forget or deny. Here is the story about sticking-with- it and not giving up, no matter what the obstacles.
She is a Canaanite woman, Matthew is at pains to point out. Mark describes her as a Syro-Phoenician woman. The point is abundantly clear: she is a non-Israelite. She is from outside the religious community of Israel.
And yet, she comes to Jesus seeking the healing of her daughter “grievously vexed with a devil,” possessed we might say, emotionally troubled, the therapeutic culture of our day would euphemistically say. She sees in Jesus something of the power of God which might heal her daughter. She has, quite simply, an insight into the truth of God in Jesus Christ. For who else can restore and redeem except the God who has created and made us? Such is the logic of redemption. It always turns us back to the doctrine of creation without which redemption – salvation and wholeness – really makes no sense.
What she senses in Jesus is a truth which she will not relinquish. It is her sticking with it in the face of adversity that makes her story so compelling. Yet at the same time, the responses to her request must trouble and disturb us. She is met, first, with silence; secondly, with what amounts to a rebuke; and, thirdly, with what must utterly seem to be a grievous insult. What is going on here? Simply the way in which we learn how the Christian Gospel is for all people and not the possession of a few. This gospel particularly challenges the tribalism of our churches and communities. It opens us out to what is for all people and in all places. The whole dynamic is not only about the woman but about us.
Jesus’ responses not only put the woman to the test as it were but also test the disciples. The whole story is about a kind of break-through moment for the followers of Jesus about who he really is. That said, the whole scene is surely troubling unless we can begin to see the underlying logic. She names her request. “But he answered her not a word.” In a way, that is the most troubling feature of the Gospel. In her hour of need, she is completely and utterly ignored, her request for the healing of her daughter mere words on the desert air. Nothing more troubling, perhaps, than to be completely ignored as if you didn’t even exist.
What is going on? It is really all about us and our tendency to want to keep the truth for ourselves. Jesus is silent but clearly she is not. The disciples come to Jesus and beseech him to “send her away, for she crieth after us”. It reveals something of the tenacity of this remarkable woman. Jesus’ response, which seems like a rebuke to her, is really a part of a larger question about the role and mission of Israel in relation to the whole world. They ask him to send her away because she is bothering them. Jesus’ response challenges them about the true role and mission of Israel. Jesus is putting them to the test when he says, “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel”. Is that the whole story of Israel? What about Israel as “a light to lighten the Gentiles’? Jesus is merely confirming their prejudices; the idea that salvation is of the Jews has become the idea that salvation is only for the Jews, therefore ignore the rest of the world.
This remarkable woman forces herself into Jesus’ presence at this point. She comes and “knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me.” Stark and simple, profound and beautiful, so elegant in its simplicity. “Lord, help me” she says. There is a striking directness about her request. Would that we could be so direct in our prayers to God!
But Jesus’ second response, this time to her, is even more disturbing. It seems like an insult. “It is not right to take the children’s bread and to cast it to dogs,” he says. Wow. That should shock us. To be sure, in responding to her he is once again criticizing the prevalent Jewish perspective of his day. The children’s bread here is about what belongs to Israel. He is merely stating what belongs to the everyday understanding of Jewish life. And yet, it seems so harsh. For it must seem that he is saying that she is but a dog, of little worth in comparison to the children of Israel. Yet she does Jesus one better in response.
She says, “truth, Lord, yet the little dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.” She refers to herself not just as a dog but a little dog and goes on to recall all of us to the wilderness journey of Exodus in which God feeds and provides for his wayward and confused people. We live in so many ways from the crumbs which fall from our master’s table, the table of the heavenly banquet. Crumbs are quite sufficient for a feast in the wilderness of sin and despair. God provides for us always far more than we desire or deserve.
Her words are a kind of break-through moment. She has a hold of something about the truth of God in Jesus Christ which she will not relinquish. Truth is truth and it must come out, on the one hand, and yet, on the other hand, we have to persevere in seeking to grasp God’s truth for us. It means a struggle, a struggle to will God’s truth until it finally is made manifest in our lives.
There is nothing presumptuous about this remarkable woman. In a way, she embodies the true nature of humility which is always about an openness to truth and which will not be put off by any obstacles that might lie in the way. She embodies a strong faith and commitment to Christ and is a witness to us to persevere, to stick with it and not give up. God seeks something from us. We cannot be the passive receivers of heavenly grace. We have to stick with it, learning all the time. Such is the journey of Lent. It reminds us, too, that grace is never cheap. It always makes demands of us. Only so can there be healing and salvation not just for us but for all.
Fr. David Curry
Lent II, 2015
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