Mark 7:24-37 Why Jesus did good when He called a woman a Dog
In life there should be a healthy balance between deep and focused engagement with people and solitude. We need both. Dietrich Bonhoeffer once said: “He that is afraid of community, should be afraid to be alone and he that is afraid to be alone, should be afraid of community. We connect with God both through our engagement with other people and our solitude from other people. People can inspire us and sometimes drain us. Solitude can fill our tanks and sometimes make us feel very much alone in the world. Isolation is to separate yourself from people and is an unloving act. Solitude is when you distance yourself momentarily from people so that you can engage better with them later than you are currently able to do.
We all know how difficult it is to achieve this balance. We either veer towards spending too much time with and among others or too little time (depending on whether we are intro-or extroverts). The struggle is real and Jesus knew it very well. We read about crowds gathering around him and we read about him taking a break from the crowds and secluding Himself. Sometimes the crowds wouldn’t let Him. Then other times we read about Jesus standing all alone in his greatest hour of need.
So here in the beginning of Mark 7 it is stated that Jesus sook solitude. He went to an area where he wasn’t known and to a house that He wouldn’t be discovered in. By the looks of it Jesus was quite desperate for a little solitude and rest. Who can blame Him? Can you just imagine the weight of responsibility and toll of his mission on his physique as well as on his emotional and spiritual well-being? So, in comes a woman and falls at his feet. She wasn’t part of the plan to rest or even to minister to. She was a Siro-Phoenician woman, one not considered a Jew, part of God’s people Israel. Credential wise and status wise and gender wise, she had nothing to stand on.
But she was also a mother. And when their kids are in dire situations, a mother won’t take no for an answer, not even from Jesus. It says she begged Jesus. The Greek word here indicates a heartfelt, persistent and desperate cry for help. Now, Jesus often surprises us with his reaction. It is often not what we expect. But this reaction takes the cake. A few years ago the American president at the time called a black woman a dog and he was condemned for it even by members of his own party. And now Jesus replies to this woman by telling her that he cannot feed what is meant for his children, implying the people of Israel to the dogs, implying that she is a dog, a lesser creature than the Jews. Has Jesus lost his mind?
Hang on, we have to get into some details to get what Jesus is doing here. You see, He is actually telling a parable here, one that is meant to test this woman’s insight into who he is. In this parable, he refers to her that doesn’t serve the same God as the people of Israel, as a dog; but the word he uses for dog is a diminutive, and could be translated as “puppy”. Hidden in this parable is a challenge and an offer. In a way, Jesus does acknowledge that He can and will indeed provide for people like the woman. Dogs indeed depend on humans and the food they eat and give for their sustenance, even in Jesus’ time. So, in a very subtle way, Jesu does acknowledge that He can help this woman. But then Jesus also challenges her with the through that He has a certain priority when it comes to his work on earth. That was to attend to the lost sheep of Israel before he can turn to others. He tells her to be patient and wait her turn. To not expect Him to help solely on her terms.
The woman’s response should strike us as even more surprising than that of Jesus. The expected response would have been to slap Jesus. That is what people usually do when you insult their culture or race. What she does instead, is that she actually accepts both the challenge and the offer. She acknowledges that she doesn’t belief in the same God as the Jews and therefore has so to speak, no place at the family table. But she simultaneously also acknowledges that Jesus can give her what she desperately needs and what she can get in no other place. She does this by accepting Jesus’s designation for her. Instead of denying that she is a dog, she admits it. In doing this she appeals not to the goodness or merit of the dog but to the goodness and ability of the owner and says that even the crumbs under the table would be enough for the dogs under the table, for her in her dire situation.
Tim Keller points out that in our western culture, we are quick to affirm our rights, and we stand on them and demand that they be attended to. We do this so often and to the extend that we forget before God, we do not stand on rights. God doesn’t owe us anything. We stand on mercy before God, it is the only way we can remain standing before God. And God is generous enough to give that mercy to us. This woman, even though she came from a different tradition saw that and responded in faith. Instead of standing on her rights, she practices “rightless” assertiveness. Instead of saying to Jesus: “Give me something on the basis of my rights” she tells Jesus to give her what she does not deserve on the basis of His mercy.
To this Jesus responds. Immediately and effectively. He allows his plans and his rest to be interrupted. He fulfills her wish.
But wait…there is more. The plot thickens
With the next healing, the scene shifts. Jesus is on his home turf again. But there is something strange. Compared to the other miracles, this miracle is very hands on. Jesus just healed the woman’s daughter without even seeing her. With this man he uses his hands and spit. Usually Jesus performs his miracles regardless of who sees it or not but this time we read that he took this man aside. All this is because Jesus identifies with the man emotionally. He has been a spectacle all his life, so Jesus takes him aside. His only language is that of touch, so Jesus speaks his language and heals him by touching him.
What is also interesting is that the account so prominently states that Jesus sighed deeply. The literal meaning of the word used here is that of an expression of pain, like in a moan or a cry. Something pains Jesus as he performs this miracle. Now, very interesting: Mark uses a very unusual word to describe this man’s’ condition. It is the Greek word mogilalos. It is rarely used and is used only once elsewhere in the Bible…that is in Isaiah 35: 5 where it is used to describe Israel’s healing. Mark uses this word in order to take his readers back to that text. Isaiah speaks of the Messiah and says that he will come with “divine retribution” to save and heal his people. What Jesus does for this individual is the prophetic sign of what He is going to do for all His people to save them from sin.
But Mark invites us to consider something. Jesus did not come to bring divine retribution. He heals people, even Greek women and He does not punish them for their sins. You see, he did not come to bring divine retribution, He came to bear it. Whilst the Greek woman had the insight to know she doesn’t have to be more than a dog to be saved by Jesus, his own people were unaware what it would take for Jesus to save them. It is no exaggeration to say that to save the woman’s daughter, Jesus had but to say a word but in order to save his own people, He had to become a dog, dehumanized on a cross to save them, and us. Jesus had to give up his own place at the table and become a dog so that we could get a place at the table. He had to become mute so that we can call Him King.
Hopefully, this was as interesting to you as it was to me. But it is time to get to the “so what?” part of this sermon. Surely this is more than an interesting story about a Greek woman and a mute man that got healed long ago. Where does this story leave us?
I told you before that the gospel of Mark seeks to answer two questions in every story it tells us about Jesus. Question 1 is: Who is Jesus? And question 2 is: “How do I relate with him?” Now, let us make this easy. What is Jesus not? How should I not relate to him? I think this story tells us that Jesus is not at our beg and call. It is not for us to decide what He should do when and even how He should do things. Mark tells us that Jesus is a King. A King rules. A king gets to decide. A King even gets to tell you what to do. If you treat a King like a servant, you will get into trouble. So, don’t. But it also tells us that Jesus is a rare type of King. He is accessible and he is merciful. He listens and He cares and He heals rather than to punish and smite.
When it comes to relating to Him, it tells us that unbelief makes him sigh. And there is one of two ways to land into unbelief and spiritual blindness. You can land there because you think too much of yourself. You can miss God and what he is doing if you think by virtue of your race, or financial position or morality or status, God grants you special favours. But you can also miss him be thinking too little of yourself. Thinking I am so lowly and sinful and broken, that God will never bother with me. This is actually just a disguised form of arrogance and unbelief. Because who are you to think that God is not good enough to be merciful to you? He really is that good.
There is really only one thing I want to bring you this morning. It is called the gospel. The gospel is what this woman was able to see against all expectations. The gospel is what made the people who saw Jesus healing the deaf man, remain deaf themselves because they missed it. The gospel is the good news of who Jesus is and what He has come to do for you. There is not one way to state it but from this story we can state it as follows.
Accept this and you will be able to see and hear it echoing every day through all creation. You will be healed in the deepest sense of the word.
Amen