Crossing Boundaries September 9, 2012 Humber United Church, Corner Brook, NL. Mark 7:24-30

Then Jesus left and went away to the territory near the city of Tyre. He went into a house and did not want anyone to know he was there, but he could not stay hidden. A woman, whose daughter had an evil spirit in her, heard about Jesus and came to him at once and fell at his feet. The woman was a Gentile, born in the region of Phoenicia in Syria. She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter. Jesus answered, “Let us first feed the children. It isn't right to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs.” “But Sir,” she answered, “even the dogs under the table eat the children's leftovers!” So Jesus said to her, “Because of that answer, go back home, where you will find that the demon has gone out of your daughter!”  She went home and found her child lying on the bed; the demon had indeed gone out of her. *****************************************************************************The earliest of the written Gospels starts "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God." In the first seven chapters Jesus travels through Galilee, achieving fame as rabbi, healer, miracle worker and teacher. The people around him are not quite sure of who he is. In spite of being close to him, the disciples don’t seem to understand who he is, or what his ministry is. Mark goes to great pains to demonstrate that they were rather thick. No one understands how the son of a carpenter from Nazareth can do and say the things he does, with such authority.

By Chapter 6 even the reader, who at least has the advantage of that first sentence of the book - is confused. Jesus performs miracles, but tells everyone to keep quiet. He exorcises demons, but again tells those around to keep quiet. He preaches a good sermon in his home town, but is ineffective at working miracles. He teaches with a wisdom disproportionate to his humble origins, he enters into debate with Pharisees as a rabbi, but prefers untouchable fishermen and ordinary people. His choice of friends is the subject of gossip and rumour.

The first feeding of a crowd leads into the next phase of Jesus ministry. He goes towards Jerusalem, but via a detour through the heart of Gentile country. Tension is building between Jesus and those who oppose him, and it is becoming clearer – at least to the reader -  that the religious leaders want to get rid of him.

It’s right at this point that Mark tells the story of Jesus and the Syro-Phoenician woman. Under the cloud of growing opposition to his ministry, in between two miraculous feedings, just after a debate with his opponents about cleanliness, and just before the story of the healing of the deaf and mute man.

It is also critical to remember that while Jesus valued the tradition and practices of his religion, he sees the leadership as corrupt and ingrown. He sets out to initiate reform, in the tradition of the prophets. He tries to help people remember what their faith and practices are to be. For Jesus the spoken word has much more power than the written word. Against the misdirection of the community, he begins to gather and empower new ministers and leaders from among the lay people. It isn’t going quite the way he would like, and there is a lot of resistance.

So he takes a break. He is tired and probably rather discouraged, and goes for a bit of a retreat by the seashore, trying to keep a low profile. The encounter takes place in Tyre, out of his comfort zone; he is way from home, amongst different people, essentially a tourist, in the most Gentile of all Gentile cities. And yet he is found by a woman asking for help for her daughter who is possessed by a demon.

And even here there is more going on than meets the eye. She is one of the wealthy upper crust of Tyre, part of a community of Greek speaking expatriates who were able to afford food the poor could not. Worse: when the crop failed they would buy the little there was, leaving the local Jewish people to starve in the streets. It is pure irony that she comes asking, and responds the way she does.

So Jesus is approached by a woman described as a Syro-Phoenician – that is, she is an Aramaic-speaking non-Jew who comes from the coastal region of Phoenicia. She asks Jesus to exorcise the evil spirit which has possessed her child. Jesus rebuffs her in the rudest way possible – he compares her, as a female Gentile, to “dogs”. In Gentile territory, expressing the particular Jewish sentiments about cleanliness was asking for trouble – and she gave it to him, gently but firmly. She has the verbal victory over Jesus….and it’s significant how she does it.

This is the only time in Mark’s Gospel that Jesus is addressed as Lord. In spite of being a "dog", in spite of everyone else not understanding who Jesus is, this woman gets to the heart of it in two seconds flat. It is this woman who cuts to the bone and to what will prove to be the heart of his calling. Jesus doesn’t want to help her. She doesn’t fit his ministry profile. He doesn’t want to see her, or help her,  or give her what he feels is not hers. In the Syro-Phoenician woman Jesus comes up against his boundaries, against someone he does not consider to be part of his ministry focus, does not see as someone he has come to serve. And what does she do? She reflects his own gospel back to him, in the spoken word: "Come on Jesus, with all that left over bread you can’t now say there are no crumbs under the table!"

What brings Jesus up short is that she would go anywhere, cross any boundary, for the well-being of her child – regardless of insults or lack of consideration. Her response rocks Jesus where he sits: "But sir, even the meanest mutts under the table get to eat the children's crumbs." In other words, "I know I`m not much and am certainly not special nor deserving, but surely there must be a little bit - which is more than enough, for people even like me and my daughter." There is a long moment of silence all around the room.  Jesus is faced with the fact that a Gentile woman has just pretty well hit him over the head, albeit with grace, the very point he had been trying to teach his own disciples about purity and cleanliness; that what comes out of the mouth defines us far more than what goes in – that social conventions are meaningless when there are people in need. She was in need of grace, she knew it, and she believed that grace would be given if she asked in humility.

What does it mean, if even Jesus needed his boundaries stretched, his views broadened to include people he assumed did not share in the abundance of all those baskets of left over grace? This shift in Jesus’ view of himself and ministry meant that we here and now, are part of the body. In this story, we are the Gentile dogs, wealthy, and having no part of the poor peasant Jews in Galilee. Without this woman’s courage challenging Jesus’ somewhat xenophobic preconceptions, we might still have been outsiders.

One more thing needs to be learned in Mark’s gospel before the full picture of Jesus has been painted. That serious growth only happens if we give of ourselves. True healing and redemption only occur where the seed dies to its self and grows into giving of itself without restraint or caution. We are called to extend ministry to the whole creation, even those who we have serious trouble accepting. We are called to stop panicking about what the future may or may not bring, and open our ears to hear the truth about ourselves and God’s will for us. We are called to be transformed into people who, like Jesus, are able to make a real difference in the world because they trust God and are willing to take a chance, recognizing that it won’t look like it does today. We are bound to the trust that what today may seem to be beyond hope, will burst the boundaries of its grave tomorrow.

And trust that we are made worthy by faith; nothing else does make us worthy - not church attendance, not family membership, not the size of donation, or our history in the community – none of those things make us more worthy or more deserving than any other. It is in those words “Help me....” Everyone who comes through the door of the church, searching, in humility, is made welcome and worthy by the Spirit of God. What they want is acceptance, and grace. What will they find here at Humber?


Sources:
1. “Crumbs from the Table” by Rev. Brian Donst, Fifty United Church, Winona, Ontario

2. Chilton, Bruce. “Rabbi Jesus” The Jewish Life and Teaching that Inspired Christianity”. Doubleday. New York, 2000. P. 181.
3. Feasting on the Word, Year B Volume 4