So, this Canaanite woman
comes to Jesus and she has this daughter who is demon possessed.
And she cries out for mercy,
she cries in hope. She cries almost
hysterically, on behalf of her daughter, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of
David.”
The agony of her cry
expresses the depth of her concern for her own flesh and blood.
Now, for many of us listening
to the story nearly 2000 years on the idea of being demon possessed is obscure
and maybe even nonsensical.
What was the child’s
problem? Some may in fact speculate
along the lines of a spiritual warfare, literally a demon, others might
consider that she had a mental illness or other intellectual or physical
impairment. In the end it is hard for us
to say, but I do not think any would question that the child was in a desperate
state.
Her mother’s plea though
seems to fall on deaf ears and I think somewhat surprisingly for us Jesus
answer is silence.
Even worse the disciple’s
answer is to ask Jesus to send her away, they want to exclude her and banish
her problems from their presence.
Nonetheless, this would have
been quite a reasonable response for Jesus to make, to understand why means
understanding who the Canaanites were.
There is a story in Genesis
found just after Noah has saved his family and the animals on the ark. Noah gets drunk and shames himself by
collapsing naked in his tent. His son
Ham comes across his dad prostrate on the floor of his tent.
Rather than simply covering
him up Ham ducks outside and informs his two brothers about his Father’s
state. They enter the tent and without
looking at Noah’s nakedness cover him up.
Now it is a bit of an obscure
story but it is important for this encounter.
Because what Noah does in response to hearing how Ham had dealt with his
nakedness is to curse Ham’s son Canaan.
Canaan was to be the lowest
of slaves and the history of the Old Testament bears this curse out. The Canaanites were scorned by the
Israelites.
This is why when Jesus
answers the disciples request his words seem harsh and uncompromising. He addresses the disciples saying, “I was
sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
But the woman humbles herself
throwing herself on her knees before him she begs and Jesus responds once again
in words which would not be surprising for any Jewish reader of the story.
“It is not fair to take the
children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”
Jesus calls the Canaanite woman a dog.
By abasing herself even
further the woman owns the slur of being called a lowly dog and asks for the
scraps from the table.
And here is the amazing part
of the story Jesus changes his mind and acknowledging her faith and her
persistence declares that the daughter has been healed.
It is an amazing story of
God’s grace and for Matthew it was a pointed story.
Matthew wrote his gospel
around 50 years after Jesus had died and ascended into heaven. By this time in the history of early
Christianity a clear split was emerging between the followers of Jesus and the
temple authorities.
Some Jews had become
followers of Jesus but many had not, where the Christian community was really
beginning grow was in converts outside the Jewish people.
In this there appears to be
at least some level of agenda going on in Matthew’s writing. He is demonstrating how in Jesus God had
begun reaching out to people outside the inner circle of the chosen
people. In fact Jesus was reaching
across the boundaries into people whom had traditionally been understood as
cursed.
Why is this important to
us? Simply inasmuch as it reminds us of
God’s concern for we who are not of Jewish heritage and for those of us within
the church who might want to behave as if God’s love has any exclusivity about
it.
But what happens when we push
our understanding deeper in this story and begin to unpack some of the symbolism
of what is going in the characters in the story.
Obviously in the story Jesus
is clearly understood as unique in his authority over the situation that is
occurring, the demon possession. God has
authority over all things under heaven and earth.
But what if we see the woman
in the story symbolically? What if she
actually represents Jesus presence in the world?
Jesus comes into the world
pleading on the world’s behalf for the healing of the world and its people? He reaches out and lifts people from the
predicaments that have interrupted their existence: teaching, healing, casting
out demons, bringing hope.
Like the woman Jesus
intercedes for we who are demon possessed.
Now I use that phrase quite
liberally, not literally. For if demon
possession is about those things which rob us of our humanity and of our lives
then we as people experience that. We
are like the daughter and we need help.
I think about the week that
has passed and I have engaged in personal stories of pain and illness and
immersed in global situations that are staggering.
What drives people to the
brink of violence and inhumanity? How do we come to a
situation that in a world where there is so much violence unfolding in the Middle East - Iraq and Syria and Gaza?
At what point did we as people who understand and have a heritage of being dispossessed and being strangers in a strange land come to treat other refugees with such inhumanity? How do we deal with situations of personal pain and illness and conflict in our lives?
At what point did we as people who understand and have a heritage of being dispossessed and being strangers in a strange land come to treat other refugees with such inhumanity? How do we deal with situations of personal pain and illness and conflict in our lives?
The cursed woman is Jesus who
begs for mercy and for healing for us.
The healing of the girl is
utter grace. She does nothing to deserve
it. She does nothing to earn it. It is not her faith. It is not her belief. The woman pleads and God acts and she is
healed. This is the deepest expression
of our Christian hope. That God will
help us. This may seem confusing at
times when we cry out to God for healing for ourselves or for others and the
answer appears to be silence.
Yet is not Jesus also in the
child? Jesus who shares our human existence and suffers the depravation of
dignity and darkness of Calvary – dying alongside us, as one us: the one curse
and hanging on a cross. The worst that
can happen to any of us, the demon of death, God in Jesus experiences!
And, here is the good news –our
hope, healing occurs. Resurrection! Life
beyond death! Hope beyond the realms of our thinking and possibilities. The demon of death is defeated. The demons we may experience in life and in
the spectre of death are not the final word of our existence – the resurrection
of Jesus is!
This is the message of grace
that we as the church celebrate and we are drawn into living again as God’s
people, no longer cursed by demons we are drawn like the disciples into
following Jesus and as his followers we participate in his mission and his
ministry as a celebration of that self giving love for us.
We become the woman with
Jesus, we cry out for others who are experiences demons in their lives. We cry for justice, for peace, for
healing. It is a fundamental aspect of
our gathering together in worship to do this. We intercede for those who long for healing
and hope – we pray against the hopeless and helplessness we feel and we like
the woman persist for the sake of the daughters and our sons of all peoples.
But here too we are reminded
of the Spirit poured out on the disciples long ago and on us now that empowers
us not simply to be recipients of that unconditional grace and healing but
bearers of it in the world. Here we are
reminded that we have within our grasped the means by which we can change the
lives of others.
To use our wealth generously
in helping others, to reach out to the suffer ones, to give of our time, to
live sustainable. To witness in word and
action that the grace we have found is available for all others and even when
we are suffering and afflicted by the demons that beset us in our lives to hold
on to the resurrection hope – that death is not the final word.
The good news is that Jesus
reaches out and heals a girl, a girl who had not done anything in and of
herself to pursue that healing. She
receives the gift of a new chance and new life and is restored to her mother
and her community.
This is our story, it is my
story and it is your story, that Jesus has reached into our lives which just
such a grace. So receive this good news
and live it so that others might rejoice and share in the hope we have.
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