He was her last hope. She had spent months going from doctor to doctor, specialist to specialist only to be told the same thing, “I can’t do anything, I’m sorry.” She had tried every kind of alternative medicines, herbs, health food and vitamins and none of it worked. As much as she tried, as much as she did her daughter remained the same, and he was her last hope.
She had heard so much about the one from Galilee, heard about his healing, heard about his compassion, and heard about his love. Not only was he her last hope, he was her only hope. And so she sought out the one she had heard so much about and when she saw him all of her emotions rushed to the surface and she broke out of the crowd shouting to the master and pleading with him to help her daughter. But he just ignored her. And so she kept it up, crying out and pleading with Jesus until finally in frustration the apostles went to him and said, “Lord this woman is really getting on our nerves why don’t you get rid of her.” And so finally he turned and told her “I was sent only to help the people of Israel—God’s lost sheep—not the Gentiles.”
That wasn’t exactly the response that she had expected, where was the compassion, the caring, the love? And so she pushed on hoping that maybe she could find what everyone had talked about. She fell to her knees in front of the one called Jesus and begged him “Please help me, Lord!” She was so sure that he wouldn’t turn her down, how could he possibly deny her when all she wanted was that her daughter be healed. And so when he opened his mouth she knew that he would agree but instead he said, “It isn’t right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs,”
This incident in Jesus life is snuggled in between his walking on the water and his feeding of the 4000. In Verse 21 of the scripture that Mike read this morning we saw that Jesus left Genesserat and went to the territory near the cities of Tyre and Sidon. The cities that are referred to here are in what is now Lebanon and what was then known as Phoenicia. There is the only recorded incident of Christ travelling outside of the Holy Land and into Gentile territory. The story is recorded in Mark chapter 7 as well and Mark makes the observation that Jesus didn’t want people to know where he was.
It’s interesting to watch as Christ isolates or attempts to isolate himself from people and things in order to commune with God, his father. And this is what Jesus does, leaving the arena of action, to a place where he was simply another man, attempting to ease the building pressures which have come to bear upon him.
But it doesn’t work because even here, in these great cities of commerce with all the hustle and bustle and decadents that often accompanies urban life a whisper starts about this man Jesus. Jesus who makes the blind to see, Jesus who makes the lame to walk, Jesus who makes the deaf hear and the mute speak. This Jesus who calls himself the Messiah, who confounds the authorities and controls nature. And as the rumours begin to be whispered up and down the streets of Tyre a Cannonite woman, who Mark said was a Greek, a Syro-Phonecian by birth heard them.
And as this woman, a mother heard the stories of a man who could make a withered hand straight, who could make leprous skin like new she began to think and dream and wonder. “Here is a man who can heal my little girl, here is someone who can take away the pain and the anguish. This man Jesus, he might be the one, he’s my last hope.” And somehow in that milling throng of humanity she discovered where this Jew from Nazareth was staying and she made her way to him and cried out saying “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! For my daughter has a demon in her, Now we don’t know exactly what was wrong with her daughter, we may never know but we do know that she attributed it to demon possession. At first she got no response from Jesus and so she pleaded even more and that got some action. From the apostles, the compassionate bunch they were “Get out of here, you’re bothering us.” And Jesus turned to her and explained how he had been sent to the people of Israel, but she wasn’t going to be put off and so she fell to her knees pleading with him to help her. This mother who had come to plead for the life of her child wouldn’t be put off that easily. Again he explained that his mission was first to the Jews but it’s how he said it that confuses some people. End of nlt replacement
What he said was “It isn’t right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs,” Words that could have gently explained the situation or needlessly hurt. Have you ever noticed that the contents of the message are not necessarily as important as the way you convey your message. You can say “sure”, or “sure”.
My father told me that when he and his twin were growing up that their grandfather used to call them idjits. He’d say you’re both a pair of idjits and you’ll be hung for horse thieves before you’re sixteen. When Dad turned sixteen he memorized “Crossing the Bar” Most of Grampy Guptill’s old age cheque was spent on us.
Idjits
Jesus could have spit the words our , “It isn’t right to take food away from children and feed it to the dogs” But I think there was a glitter in his eyes and a lilt to his voice as he told her it’s not good to take food away from children and feed it to dogs.
Was Christ testing the faith of this concerned mother? Was he seeing just how far she would go for her daughter? Let’s look at his words and what the original language can tell us.
When Christ starts by telling the woman that “it wasn’t right” to give the children’s bread to the dogs, he is trying to explain why his ministry was limited to the Jews at that time. It wasn’t because he was a racist or a bigot. He didn’t have something against Cannanites, it was simply that an effective start had to be defined.
There was a time in discussing ministry the term your wedge or my wedge was used fairly frequently. The analogy of course comes from the wedge that is used to split wood. The part of the wedge that is most effective is the sharp edge at the bottom. The focus of the wedge is very narrow and that allows it to penetrate the wood. If you turned it around and tried to use the blunt end it would prove to be very ineffective. In ministry you find the thing that you can use most effectively to reach people and you refine that edge and sharpen that edge. You don’t ignore other aspects, but your focus is on your wedge.
It’s the same with our personal lives and talents and gifts.
The wedge of Jesus’ ministry was his reaching the Jews. Because he had fulfilled all the prophecies of the Old Testament relevant to the coming Messiah his message would be more easily accepted by the Jews then the Gentiles. Their acceptance would then become the width of the wedge which would finish the job. You with me? Jesus was simply saying “this is the most effective way for me to accomplish the task set before me.”
He continues by saying “It isn’t right to take food from the children . . . The word children is used hundreds of times in the Old and New Testament and it’s primary function is to describe the Jewish people as “God’s Children” The food he speaks of is more properly translated bread and the bread he speaks of is himself. You might recall that time and time again he refers to himself as the bread of life.
And so it is the children of God or the Jews, who the bread of life, or Jesus was promised. And because of that it wouldn’t be practical to give the bread to others. His next words are the ones which would appear to be less then kind, as a matter of fact they almost sound nasty. “It isn’t right to take food from the children and throw it to the dogs,”
And yet these are the very words that this frantic mother grasps and holds on to like a life ring. We don’t see or hear these words in the same light as she did because we’re not hearing them as she heard them.
Throughout the Bible the word “dog” is used to describe someone or something undesirable. In the book of Revelation Chapter 22 verse 15 there are a whole list of folks who will be outside the gates of heaven. Outside the city are the dogs—the sorcerers, the sexually immoral, the murderers, the idol worshipers, and all who love to live a lie.
And right at the beginning are “The DOGS”, kind of sounds like an Alfred Hitchcock movie.
You see 2000 years ago most dogs weren’t pet’s but were dangerous strays who roamed the streets, feeding off the trash and whatever or whoever else they could find. The word used most frequently in the New Testament was a Greek word, which is fitting seeing the New Testament was written in Greek. The word was , koo´-ohn and it means “Dog or Hound”
In this story though both in Matthews account and Marks account Jesus uses a different word, he uses the word , koo-nar´-ee-on which means a little dog, or a puppy. You see even though most dogs of that day were dangerous strays or work dogs, the very wealthy families of the day kept small lap dogs as pets.
Now I don’t know if it was something that this woman heard in the voice of this Nazarene Carpenter or something she saw in his eyes but there was something that caused her to push on and she said, “Yes, Lord, but even dogs are permitted to eat crumbs that fall beneath their master’s table.” She didn’t get argumentative, she didn’t deny what he had said was true, but as Martin Luther said, “She caught him with his own words.”
The woman simply claimed her rights under the conditions that he had set down. She didn’t demand a spot at the table, she didn’t want the children’s portion, she was content to accept her place in the household that she had been assigned. But she wanted the privileges that went along with that position.
How many people here own a dog now or have owned a dog at some time or another in their life. Then you know the cardinal rule of owning a dog, which is “If it falls on the floor then it belongs to the dog.”
When I was growing up we owned a mutt named Spike. And my Dad always bragged on how good Spike was, how Spike would never take any food that he hadn’t been given. Point in fact. One night I had been asked to pick up a box of meat from a cousin of ours who had just done in a cow. I brought the meat home and got ready to go out and forgot the meat on the kitchen floor, in a box, with the dog. Mom and Dad got home and the meat was still intact, the dog hadn’t touched it. Spike was such a good dog, you could leave treats on the coffee table and never have to worry about the dog getting into them, Spike was a great dog. One Christmas a couple of years before Spike went to doggie heaven my father was standing in the kitchen looking over the half wall that separated the kitchen from the living room. As he watched Spike came into the living room, carefully looked around to make sure he wasn’t being watched, obviously not too carefully because he missed Dad. And then very deliberately he stuck in nose in a bowl of chocolates rooted around until he found one he liked and ate it leaving all the rest. Aren’t you glad you never visited our house during those days and ate chocolates?
Our dog was not one of the children, but he was a member of the family and as such he had certain privileges, and one of those privileges were the crumbs that fell from the table.
This would appear to be the only time in the Bible that someone came out of one of these verbal jousting matches with Jesus, where they had the last word. Christ was a pro at this. Throughout the gospels we see him turn questions and statements around to his advantage. It would seem at least in this instance that he was bested and he seemed to enjoy it.
The response that Christ gave, the healing which Christ performed would indicate that he agreed with the woman and awarded her with what to the children may have appeared to be crumbs but to her, it was a veritable feast.
But what are the crumbs that the dogs have received.
1) Crumb of Grace. 1 Corinthians 15:10 But whatever I am now, it is all because God poured out his special favor on me—and not without results. For I have worked harder than all the other apostles, yet it was not I but God who was working through me by his grace.
But what is grace. The standard theological definitions is that Grace is God’s unmerited love. In other words grace is a love which we didn’t deserve.
We defined it before in this manner. Justice is getting what you deserve, Mercy is getting less then you deserve and grace is getting what you don’t deserve. Kind of like the woman who goes into the beauty salon and says “do me justice” when what she really wants is mercy.
To illustrate, if when my kids were little one of them did something to merit punishment, heaven forbid. I know that is highly unlikely but just bear with me for illustration purposes ok?
Say one of my children deliberately disobeyed me. And I feel that I had no recourse other then to apply the board of education to their seat of understanding. And so I sentence them to say, 5 whacks that is justice, they’re getting what they deserve. While in the course of administering the 5 whacks I get smitten with a sudden case of remorse and stop at 3 whacks, that is mercy, getting less then what they deserve. Perhaps later I go up and say, hey kid lets go to Tim’s for a hot chocolate and donut, that is grace getting what they don’t deserve.
Now some people say “all I want from God is justice.” Wrong, because justice is based on some absolute, that says if you do this then you receive this. In our case that absolute is the scriptures. One of those absolutes is found in Romans 3:23 where it is written For all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious standard. That is an absolute, each of us is a sinner.
A second absolute found in the book of Romans is only 3 chapters away in Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death,
Justice then is this. If I am a sinner, and I am, and if the wages of sin is spiritual death, or hell, and it is. Then justice or getting what I deserve, for me as a sinner is going to hell.
Now if we sought mercy or getting less then what we deserve, I am convinced that would be annihilation. Zap our soul would stop existing, period.
However there is something more because in John 3:16
16 “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life. That was unmerited love. We did nothing to merit it or to deserve it. That’s what Paul was telling Titus about when he wrote him and said in Titus 2:11 For the grace of God has been revealed, bringing salvation to all people.
That grace hasn’t just come to Canadians, or Americans. It hasn’t just come to Wesleyan’s or Baptists or Pentecostals. It isn’t just for Protestants or Catholics. It has appeared to all men, and all women, regardless of their race or colour or nationality or for that matter their denomination.
It has appeared to righteous men and women and praise God that same unmerited love was able to reach down and touch a 19 year old Fisherman, cleanse his heart from sin and set his feet on higher ground bound for heaven and that was me 24 years ago. And that is the same unmerited that has touched your life, or can touch your life. All of the other blessing which we receive ultimately flow out of the grace of God.
2) Crumb of Forgiveness And the greatest thing that grace does is to cleanse us, no matter how vile we have been, there is no sin so great that God cannot forgive it if we ask him to.
When Peter preached his second sermon after Pentecost he summed up the entire Gospel in Acts 3:19 when he proclaimed Now turn from your sins and turn to God, so you can be cleansed of your sins.
I marvel at God’s memory he knows the number of hairs on our heads and yet he will forgive and forget the greatest sin in the world if we will only ask.
In other translations Peter begins by telling us to repent. And according to Collins dictionary Repent means “To feel such regret over some past action as to change ones mind.” We’ve said before that simply put that means being so sorry for something you don’t do it again. So people won’t miss what he’s saying Peter reiterates his statement by adding, and turn to God. The promise that follows is exciting because the Bible the word of God says that if we repent and turn to God then our sins will be wiped out and times of refreshing will come from the Lord.
Did you catch that if you repent, then your sins will be wiped out, not just some of your sins, not just the little sins or the easy sins, but all of your sins will be wiped out. In saying that it would be good for us as Christians to learn to forgive ourselves and others, there is no unforgivable sin in the eyes of God unless it’s rejecting His forgiveness.
We have made some sins into the unforgivable kind in our own wisdom, but that’s not what God says. I don’t approve of divorce, I don’t think the Bible approves of Divorce, as a matter of fact I’m sure the Bible doesn’t approve of divorce. In my understanding of the scriptures when you are married you are married for life, and I believe that if anything less then that is not God best for us. And yes I feel that if you divorce your spouse for reasons other then adultery then that is sin. But it is a sin that can be forgiven. It wasn’t all that long ago in the Wesleyan church and a lot of other evangelical churches that if you were divorced you were a second class citizen. God might have forgiven you but we weren’t going to. It would have been better if you had done her in out back behind the barn, at least you would have had a great testimony when you got out of jail.
God’s grace transcends all or our sins, divorce, abortion, homosexuality, gossip, backbiting, drunkenness, you name it his grace can forgive it when you seek his forgiveness and accept his grace.
That grace and forgiveness added up to some mighty powerful crumbs on the floor. Earlier in the message we read from Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, that’s only the first part of the scripture and it’s followed by a comma not a period and the rest of the sentence tells us about 3) Crumb of Eternal Life says Romans 6:23 but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.
I hope you enjoyed the message. PowerPoint may be available, contact me at denn@bccnet.ca
If you could build a church for a dollar. . .
Would you?
