FAITH SO STRONG
IT CHANGES THE MIND OF GOD
Sermon preached by Dr. Mark Smutny
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Pasadena Presbyterian Church
From 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, but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. He 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.” But she answered him, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone. Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.” And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. They were astounded beyond measure, saying, “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.” - Mark 7:24-37
The Syrophoenician woman had many strikes against her when she pushed her way into Jesus' presence, demanding that he heal her little daughter. She was a woman in a man's world. First Century Palestine was as patriarchal as any society could be.
Not only was she a woman, she was a Gentile in a Jewish crowd. She came from the other side of the tracks. She came from an area as culturally distant as South Central Los Angeles is from South Orange Grove in Pasadena. She came from territory where Jews for centuries had come to expect nothing but crime, immorality, and even contamination.
This Gentile, Syrophoenician woman simply had no right to engage Jesus in conversation. It would be like a smelly, homeless person going right up to the President of the United States, and saying, "Could I have a favor from you?" It just isn't done.
Only, she was afraid. She was terribly afraid because, you see, her little girl "had an unclean spirit," and she was desperate. What's an “unclean spirit?" We don't know. In the pre-scientific age of First Century Palestine an unclean spirit could have been many things. Maybe it was epilepsy, a brain tumor, meningitis or something else.
What we do know is what possessed her mother: fear, rooted in a mother’s love; fear of losing her baby, the baby she bore inside her body for nine months; fear of losing her daughter who only a short time ago had taken her first steps; the daughter with the dark curly tresses and the perfect olive skin. It was fear and love that possessed this Gentile Syrophoenician woman.
She took her mother's fear and her mother’s love and she converted it to faith: a bold, gutsy faith that said: “I don't give a damn what barriers are in the way of my getting help for my little daughter. I'll do anything for her. I'll move mountains. I'll face racial prejudice. I'll bust through layers of sexism and I'll get the help I need for my daughter. I'll cross over obstacles of language and culture and centuries of stereotypes. I don’t care about being told I’m a contaminant or that I’ve been racially profiled. I love my daughter. In my fear of losing her, I'll demand from God, himself, healing for my daughter. I’ll demand a miracle. She’s all I have.”
Her faith is the kind of faith that the Psalmist expressed in the 27th Psalm, "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?"
This gutsy, Gentile, Syrophoenician mother hears rumors of a traveling entourage of Jews whose rabbi has gained a reputation throughout Palestine and now in the City of Tyre of being a healer. His name is Jesus. Maybe this healing man Jesus can help her and help her little daughter.
Let’s acknowledge that fear of losing one's child is a terrible fear. Parents’ losing their children is one of the worst things human beings can face.
There are other kinds of fears:
· There's the fear that comes with unemployment. Unemployment is nearing ten percent in the United States and more than ten percent in our own State of California.
· There's the fear of losing one's job and the fear of not finding a job. One in four recent high school graduates now have no job in these United States.
· There's the fear of serious illness.
· There's the fear of having no health insurance – by some counts, 40-50 million people in this country have this very real fear of falling sick and having nowhere to turn except overloaded emergency rooms because they have no health insurance.
· There's the fear of natural and manmade disasters: horrible fires that burn mountains and turn homes and hiking trails to ashes.
· There's the fear of taking risks in relationships.
· There's the fear of strangers, the fear of encountering people of different ethnicities, and the fear of people with different sexual orientations.
· There's the very real fear of death itself.
Our faith has a whole lot to say about these fears – and especially the fear of death. It says that in Christ, the fear of death and all other fears are defeated through the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I'm getting ahead of myself.
The Syrophoenician woman takes her fear of losing her child and her love of her little girl with the dark, cascading curls and the perfect olive skin and she takes her gutsy, pushy, demanding faith and she busts through the Jewish crowd. She breaks through the barriers of protocol, ethnicity, and expectations of what a woman can and cannot do in First Century Palestine. And she finds Jesus, the healing man, and bows down before him at his feet, and she begs and begs and begs, "Please Jesus. Please Jesus. She's my little girl. She's all I have. Please heal her. Cast the demon from her. Please do it for me. Do it for her."
What we hear next from Jesus has always shocked listeners of the Bible. We expect our kind, loving Jesus to say, "Of course I will save your daughter." What we hear, instead, is Jesus in a moment of compassion fatigue saying something we'd expect out of the mouth of a bigot. He says and I quote, "Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs" (vv. 26-27). Yes, he calls her a dog. It's no term of endearment. He's not calling her a warm and fuzzy puppy dog, a pet. The word is dog and he means it like it sounds, a term of derision.
Many who suffered such harsh words would have crept away crushed by their acidity. Not this Syrophoenician woman. She boldly responds, “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
Jesus' own prejudice, yes, his own narrow view of the Gentile woman, gets caught up short and confronted. Right there on the spot, he's convicted and converted. His own views are expanded. His own vision of God's love becomes ever more expansive. He tells her, "For saying that, you may go--the demon has left your daughter" (verse 29).
Yes, I know. How could Jesus, being without sin, possibly have his moment of narrow mindedness? I guess the old creed that says he is fully human, must mean he is fully human. Doesn't that violate some theological doctrine about Jesus being perfect? Yes, I suppose it does.
All I know is that this story in Mark's Gospel about a Syrophoenician Gentile woman is about a faith that is so strong and gutsy that she conquers her fear and will do anything to demand of God a miracle for her little daughter.
Somehow her story about changing the mind of Jesus made it into the Bible and here we have it to confront us about something we need to hear. It’s in our Bible and I think we need to ask ourselves what does her gutsy, bold faith teach us about the nature of what our faith ought to be?
I believe we need to begin where she began: with our fears. She feared losing her daughter, but she didn't allow that fear to immobilize her. Instead, her faith became something that was an aggressive, active, pushy, and demanding gift.
Likewise, we need to take our fears, acknowledge them, and then not let them control us or paralyze us. You may not feel gutsy like the Syrophoenician woman after years of battling a chronic or serious illness, but you can discover something of her boldness of faith if you let go and place your trust in the Lord, with complete abandon and absolute trust and ask and demand God's healing.
You may not feel gutsy like the Syrophoenician woman after graduating from college more than a year ago and still not finding a job, but here at PPC in this community of shared suffering, shared caring, both in our joys and in our sorrows, in our Bible studies, in our prayer life, you can find a community of intimacy and discover a powerful faith that you didn't know you had. You can find a gutsy faith that will see you through. I know you can find strength here like so many do, because here at PPC we are in the business of changing lives, of finding courage beyond ourselves, of discovering miracles, of asking and demanding miracles, of finding hope in the face of hopelessness. You will find here a gutsy faith.
If you are a person who has been victimized by sexism or homophobia, if you have been treated badly because you don't fit due to the color of your skin or the accent of your voice; or because your education has not been fancy; if you have been beaten down in one way or another, then you can gain strength through the witness and faith of this gusty Syrophoenician woman, who loved her little daughter so much, who feared for her little daughter so much, that she changed the mind of God by demanding that Jesus, God's own son, heal her daughter. She wouldn’t let Jesus go until she got results, until she got the healing she wanted and the healing her daughter needed.
Imagine yourself caring so much, believing so passionately, wanting something so completely that you begged God on your knees. You said to God, "Lord, I want you to heal my beloved. I want you to usher in peace. I want you to build a world so welcoming that no one will ever be a called a dog again. I want you to bring healing to the nations. I want you to heal me." Imagine praying for these things passionately. You beg God and Jesus for these things with your whole head and heart, your entire soul and complete strength. Maybe they would come true, especially the healing part, especially for oneself. Maybe it is coming true as you believe.
My friends, may your faith be bold, gutsy, and strong, like the faith of the Syrophoenician woman. Thanks be to her, this gutsy Gentile, Syrophoenician woman. Thanks be to Jesus who changed his mind. Thanks be to God whose healing is for all, and for you and for me. Amen.