Be Opened
Mark 7: 24-30
I am certainly not an expert on the human condition, but from what I have learned as a pastor and a teacher, it seems to me that one of the hardest things for any of us to do is to change our mind. It is not as if we don’t want to do what is best for us or for our families or for our friends or colleagues, but most of us struggle when it turns out that we are wrong or that our thinking was inadequate or that the course we chose was somewhat off the mark. Maybe this is true simply because each of us yearns to be satisfied with who we are and how we are in the world or perhaps we just prefer to be right in order to ensure that our egos are not too badly bruised.
But as difficult as changing course or changing our minds can be, it would do us some good to remember that even Jesus struggled with just such a dilemma. Even if we want Jesus to be above all of this, or if we need him to be, our scripture for today from the Gospel of Mark invites us to see him in a bit of a battle with himself. Theologians and faithful alike find this story so challenging that they nearly dismiss it entirely by claiming that it is not authentic. And it is easy to see why- the Son of God basically calls the woman who comes to him for a healing, a dog. Jesus says, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” One commentator attempts to minimize this by claiming that Jesus didn’t really call her a dog, but simply a household pet…but this, for me isn’t much better. This scripture is difficult for us in part because Jesus’ behavior seems less than appropriate for a Messiah, but I suspect there are other reasons that this scripture pushes us. It is difficult for us to see Jesus change his mind or to be opened anew. After all, he is Jesus and many of us have been told that if he is God’s son, then he must be incapable of changing because changing implies that he wasn’t perfect to begin with and if that is true, then how can he be who we know him to be? If he is our Savior, how could he change his mind?
Sharon Ringe says that his encounter with the Canaanite woman is an example of Jesus being "caught with his compassion down" which is hard for us to imagine. I am sure he was exhausted. I imagine that he and his entourage had been traveling and visiting people for miles around. Maybe they needed some time to pray, eat and renew their spirits. So Jesus and his disciples venture to the other side of the “tracks” to the place where those people live…none of his people were there, so surely no one would bother them. Perhaps they were doing their usual rounds and decided to go a little further north, where they have never been before. Silence at last…
Then the Gospel of Mark tells us that the woman with a sick child, a gentile, came running to him and fell down at his feet. …a woman in a time good for no woman…on the border of a place not her own, a non-believer.
Jesus and his crew sum her up…it is obvious that she is a Canaanite…a descendent of those destroyed and removed from their homes when Joshua led the Jewish people into the Promised Land. It is obvious she has no status; they think…for she would certainly have a male relative or a husband with her if she did…She is a woman with no home, no living roots, and no man to protect her in a patriarchal world…
It is no surprise that we hear nothing from her, at least not right away. She knew her place in this world, and yet she approaches Jesus anyway. This foreign gentile is so desperate to help her baby that she challenges all of the categories and barriers and boundaries of her day. The group of men are in her neighborhood after all…She wouldn’t dare leave Tyre and Sidon…She knows these are not her people, but her daughter is sick and getting worse, it is worth whatever the cost, she will try anything. She would never approach a group of strange men by herself, let alone men outside of her class, her religion, her group, especially not in public, but a mother has got to do what a mother has got to do.
She is irrational, exhausted, emotional, worried sick about her daughter…and this is her only chance…
And when she reaches his feet, her eyes hungry with hope, without hesitation, Jesus says, “Let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.”
It is not right to feed the dogs- that’s what he says. “You are not one of us.” But a mother with a sick kid is a force to be reckoned with…arms flailing, tears flowing, she comes for help and Jesus ignores her. This is where the support staff is supposed to jump in…this is where you would imagine the Disciples would put to test all that they have learned. We might expect them to pipe up and say something like, “Um Jesus we are here anyway…God is with us…we might as well heal her daughter!”
But, the disciples, apparently more annoyed at her than concerned, ignore her too…now this is the group of people who are supposed to carry on Jesus’ message of abundant life for each and every heart. The group of people who is supposed to carry on the Message ignores her too…
But, the Canaanite woman, to whom the text does not give a name because according to her world, she is not worthy of a name, persists. After Jesus tells her she is not one of them, that she is not worthy of the food he offers, after he calls her a dog, she says with all of the courage she can muster, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
This woman begs Jesus to cross a boundary that threatens to “undo him”. She is begging him to open his ministry beyond his own world…she is begging to be given a chance…she is asking him to be opened…she is asking him to change his mind.
Perhaps it is nearly impossible for us to really understand what it was she was asking Jesus to do. She is challenging his very identity both because of who she is and who he is. She is out of place, in the wrong place, the wrong time, the wrong side of history, misplaced, misunderstood, dismissed, misled… I have passed her a thousand times on the street…dropped her a nickel a time or two, offered a silent prayer...We have all seen her, she is here among us, her silent requests, aching for a break, aching for that next check just to break even, that woman who has done it all and then some for her sick kid…I know her, you know her…
And I wonder if she changed Jesus mind. I wonder if this foreign, nameless gentile woman with no status opened his heart and widened his welcome. I wonder if it was this woman that set Jesus on a different path, a wider path, a deeper path, a path that was truly open to God’s Spirit of radical love.
Jesus says to the woman without a name, “You may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.” Subtle words perhaps but indeed Jesus is changed…
But how could that be? After all, he is Jesus and many of us have been told that if he is God’s son, then he must be incapable of changing because changing implies that he wasn’t perfect to begin with and if that is true, then how can he be who we know him to be? If he is our Savior, how could he change his mind?
But he did and not by someone he knew and loved, not by his mom or his best friend or the Disciples who had traveled with him and prayed with him. Jesus is changed by a double outsider. So could it be that even Jesus could not yet fully see the vastness of God’s love for all people and the true meaning of his ministry until this moment? Could it be that it wasn’t until his encounter with the Canaanite woman that Jesus really got it? Could it be that God sent this woman, just as she was, to teach the Teacher?
As much as we like to tell ourselves that we are who we are or this church just is how it is going to be or our lives are stuck because that is just how it has unfolded and there is nothing we can do about it, perhaps this is not the end of our story. If our Messiah, our Son of God, our Prince of Peace can change his mind, then surely there is hope for us. If this woman can open Jesus after he labels her as one of the dogs, what does she have to say to us? What turning has she to offer us? Will she show us the work of God where we have told ourselves “don’t belong?”
She is all that pushes us. She is that person who finds a place in our pews, whose name we do not know and have yet to find out. She is that person among us who says things that are so true we cannot bear to hear them. She is the symbol of all that we try to avoid because her presence shows us the limits we have set on our faith and the battle we have with ourselves. This woman opened Jesus’ eyes to see the depth and breadth of his ministry. She introduced him to the Good News: Even the dogs, the forgotten, the hungry, the sick, the lonely, the left out and the lost are at home in God. Our Christian faith compels us to look under our Table. Our walk with Jesus compels us to see who is outside waiting to be welcomed to our Table? Who is our Canaanite woman and what challenge does she have for us? What question has she posed to us? Where is God asking us to be opened?
Sharon Ringe in Letty Russell's "Feminist Interpretation of the Bible"
Taken from www.textweek.com lectionary commentary.
Taken from a letter entitled, “Dear Canaanite Sister,” written by Mary Hinkle
from the Igniting the Imagination of Jesus http://maryhinkle.typepad.com/pilgrim_preaching/2004/08/igniting_the_im.html