Grace, mercy, and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ! Amen. When Jesus journeyed with his disciples to Tyre and Sidon, he was attempting to retreat from the excitement in Galilee and Judea. Opposition from the Jewish religious authorities threatened his death before the proper time. Jesus’ miracles inspired an enthusiasm by the crowds to make Jesus king by force—a kind of popular king crowned by the mob (cf. John 6:15).
Jesus needed to get away from his fellow Jews, from Jewish culture, from Jewish politics, and from the Jewish religious scene. He needed a break. So he withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon, a place with relatively few Jewish people. This was Gentile territory. While Tyre and Sidon had traded with Israel in ancient times, those ancient cities lay outside the boundaries of ancient Israel and the Roman provinces of Judea and Galilee. The prophet Ezekiel foresaw the downfall of those pagan maritime port cities during the magnificent conquest of Alexander the Great. This would be God’s punishment for their pride and idolatry. The term “prince of Tyre” may even be an oblique reference to Satan (cp. Ezek. 28:2ff).
Yet Tyre and Sidon were only a short hop and a skip away from Galilee. It was the perfect place for Jesus and his disciples to lay low for a while, although he probably had to drag them kicking and screaming.
But even here Jesus could not hide his identity. Matthew tells us that a Canaanite woman sought him out with a petition for him to heal her daughter. Mark’s Gospel describes her as “a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth” (Mark 7:26). In other words, she was descended from the ancient inhabitants of Israel prior to the exodus. The Canaanites and Philistines were ancient enemies of God’s people, and it was because of their terrible sin that Yahweh commanded the conquest of Canaan, in which Joshua and the Israelites were to kill every man, woman, and child in the cities they conquered. This Canaanite woman was probably the very lost person on the planet whom you’d expect to seek Jesus.
And yet this pagan woman did find Jesus and cried out to him, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David!” (Matt. 15:22, ESV).[1] She called him “Lord” (kyrie in Greek). Sometimes kyrie is just a polite way to say, “Sir.” But it’s also the Greek equivalent of the divine name Yahweh in the Old Testament. Which did she intend? There can be little doubt that she was being more than polite, for her appellation, “Son of David” was a messianic title—and a Jewish one at that.
Can you imagine? A pagan Canaanite woman, an ancient enemy of the people of God, cried out to Jesus Christ, the Son of God come in human flesh, to have mercy on her: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon” (Matt. 15:22).
Her daughter was “oppressed by a demon.” She was demonized. Perhaps she wasn’t entirely possessed by a demon, but she was afflicted and attacked by an evil spirit, one of Satan’s minions. Demons don’t have to take over your body to make a wreck of your life. Whether this took the form of deep depression, suicidal thoughts, self-harm like cutting, or some other terrible symptom, we do not know. But we know it wasn’t a good thing. The woman’s daughter suffered mightily, and she needed Jesus’ help.
We can relate to this poor woman’s heart cry. Which of us hasn’t been distraught at the awful discovery that somebody we love is suffering? Your spouse has cancer. Your friend becomes paralyzed in a car accident. Your child has a rare chromosomal disorder or birth defect that the doctors can barely explain, let alone treat. Or maybe somebody you love has chronic pain or a disability that, while not life threatening, is certainly life altering. You would do anything you could to help them. And yet it seems there is nothing you can do.
Lisa and I are experiencing some of this desperation right now. Just earlier this week, our son’s doctor told us that Michael’s arm is damaged beyond repair. There is no more cartilage in his elbow, only bone on bone. He suffers tremendous pain and cannot move his arm properly. He cannot fully extend, flex, or turn his arm. While specialists may be able to help reduce his pain or restore some motion, his arm will never be normal again. He will suffer the rest of his life. Thank God, this is not a life-threatening condition. But it is certainly life-altering. As a parent, it’s impossible not to be heart-broken for him. Such a desperate state in which to be! Lord, have mercy, indeed.
Yet Jesus does something entirely unexpected and very un-Jesus-like. Instead of going with the woman to lay hands on her daughter or driving away the demon with a word of command, he does nothing—absolutely nothing. He doesn’t speak. He doesn’t help. He seems only to ignore the woman.
So she cries out all the more, driving the disciples mad until they beg Jesus to send her away. Finally, Jesus speaks: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (v. 24). His answer to the disciples sounds like a non sequitur, but in fact it makes a lot of sense. Jesus reminds his disciple that his mission is to save the Jewish nation. He has not yet clearly revealed that he came to save the whole world (John 3:16). Spoken in the woman’s hearing, this statement has the rhetorical effect of pushing her away.
But she refuses to budge. “Lord,” she pleads, falling on her knees before him, “Help me.” Was there ever a simpler plea? “Lord, help me.” Author Anne Lamotte writes that there are three essential prayers in the Christian life: “Help!”, “Thanks,” and “Wow!” When we are at our weakest point, when we hit rock bottom, sometimes we are all “prayed out” and don’t know what to say anymore. The Bible teaches us that in those times the “Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Rom. 8:26). If the groaning of the Holy Spirit counts as a prayer, then so do our silent tears and screams. Yet this woman’s prayer, comprised only of three words, is so much more than that. “Lord, help me.”
She persists, but Jesus still resists. “It is not right,” he says, “to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (v. 26).
Ouch! Wow! This statement is very disquieting. Jesus’ initial attempt to ignore the woman certainly makes you wonder about the efficacy of prayer. But now he compares her to a dog—a common Jewish pejorative for Gentiles. Jesus appears just as common as anyone else, perhaps even a little bit racist.
How could Jesus say such a harsh thing? Bible scholars offer different answers, but they’re all conjecture, and the Biblical text doesn’t prove any of them. Some say that Jesus must have called her a dog sort of tongue in cheek, perhaps even with a smirk. William Barclay points out that tone matters. For example, if you call someone at work “an old rascal,” you could say it in a loving, endearing kind of way, or you could say it in a nasty, invective kind of way. Perhaps so also with Jesus calling this woman a dog.
Others have suggested that he was trying to draw the woman a little more, that his apparent delay at answering her petition was an attempt to prove her faith to his disciples and make sure that she really wanted that for which she asked. Yet I don’t know how much more faith-filled she could be than when she called Jesus both “Lord” and “Son of David.” Clearly, she saw something in Jesus that only faith could reveal to her.
In a previous sermon, I have suggested that Jesus may have been play acting when he called the woman a dog. He was engaging in a kind of satirical performance art, by which he adopted the common racist disregard that other Jews showed to Gentiles, in order to demonstrate to his disciples the foolishness of such cruelty and prejudice.
But at the end of the day, we don’t really know why Jesus called her a dog or how he said it. All we know is that he did call her a dog. That’s never a nice thing to say about anyone, let alone a woman barely hanging onto the end of her rope.
But if that’s how Jesus is going to deal with her, the woman can take what he dishes out. She accepts his insult and allows that she may be only a dog and inferior to the children of Israel. Then she extends his negative metaphor, noting nevertheless that “even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table” (v. 27).
Any of you who have dogs at home know all too well that of which she speaks. Not only do your dogs beg at the table for scraps and tasty tidbits, but they also know which humans are most likely to cave into their shenanigans and whining: the children.
Some children absolutely delight in throwing food from their plate onto the flood and watching as the dog pounces on the scraps and wolfs them down, even licking the spot on the floor so that none of the juices go to waste. Children are also clumsy and more likely to drop food by accident. So even though the meal isn’t intended for the dogs, Fluffy and Fido benefit nonetheless by eating food served for the rest of the family.
So it was in ancient times. Forks and spoons were not yet invented. People ate with their hands. And because they didn’t have napkins or paper towels, they would wipe their hands on little chunks of bread. The bread would soak up the grease, and then they’d throw the bread to the dogs, who enjoyed a rather scrumptious treat. Was it as good as the main course? Of course, not! But was it tasty and nutritious all the same? Absolutely! That is what the woman meant when she countered, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Crumbs. That’s all she was asking for—just crumbs. Yes, Jesus was Israel’s Messiah. Yes, Jesus came from the Jews and for the Jews. But even after the Jewish nation had its fill of Jesus and was satisfied (or rather so unsatisfied that they killed him on the cross), nevertheless, there was enough of his grace leftover to throw a bone to the Gentiles now and again. Couldn’t he, wouldn’t he, shouldn’t he do the same for her?
Jesus marveled at the woman’s faith. “O woman, great is your faith!” Many even in Israel did not have such faith in Christ (cp. Luke 7:9). In fact, most Jews did not believe in Jesus. Yet here was this woman, calling him Lord, Son of David, and Master. Even as she argued with Jesus, she kept calling him “Lord” (three times in the entire story).
Jesus said, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire” (v. 28). And from that very instant, her daughter was healed. The devil departed and left her alone, and whatever ailment previously afflicted her was gone—just like that. [Snap] It took a while for Jesus to get there—for whatever reason—but he did eventually answer the woman’s prayer and granted her request. He healed her daughter. At first he resisted, but she persisted, and she discovered the power contained her plea, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David.”
The point of this story is not that we should expect God to give us everything we ask for in prayer. After all, God is God, and we are not. He does not come and go at our beck and call. He is not a genie or Santa Claus. He knows what is best for us, and sometimes he must refuse our requests. God answers prayer in one of three ways: yes, no, and wait. And while it may be hard to accept, “no” and “wait” mean that God has something better in store for us than we can imagine for ourselves. After all, in the Lord’s Prayer, we pray “thy will be done,” not “my will be done.”
Nevertheless, even though we must approach God in prayer with humility and submission to his will, he also welcomes our prayers. He wants us to ask him for all things. He is our loving heavenly Father who delights in giving his children gifts. Elsewhere, Jesus says, “Whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith” (Matt. 21:22).
The Canaanite woman in our Gospel lesson had faith, and she proved it by her persistence in prayer. Like the persistent widow in Jesus’ parable, who would not let up on the wicked judge until he gave her justice, so also this desperate mother refused to go away, shut up, or stop asking for help. “Lord,” she prayed, “help me.” “Lord, have mercy.”
Have you noticed that the woman’s plea sounds like the liturgy of the Church? “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David” is the Kyrie: “Lord, have mercy!” (it’s the same verb in Greek). Her cry in verse 25, “Lord, help me,” echoes the Psalmist’s prayer (Ps. 38:22, LXX; cf. 40:13; 70:1; 71:12), which is taken up in Matins and Vespers: “Make haste to help me, O Lord!”
This Canaanite woman, excluded from Israel by birth, speaks the liturgy of the people of God. “Lord, have mercy!” Liturgy is real. It does something. It’s not just funny incantations or rote memory. It is the living Word of God. When we pray and sing the liturgy, we repeat back to God the words he first gave us. Liturgy places Scripture on our lips, and it places us in the Scriptures. For we too are like the Canaanite woman, crying out for Jesus to heal our daughter.
So when we come to church and gather for public worship, we must remember that we aren’t just going through the motions. Heaven and earth are moved by the words we utter. The Lord who made all things is the very same Lord who died and rose again for you. He shed his blood on the cross so that your sin would no longer separate you from God. Through Jesus’ blood, we all with boldness and confidence may approach his throne of grace to find help in our time of need (Heb. 4:14-16). Not sin, not race, not religion, nor geography can keep us out of God’s presence. Nothing—absolutely nothing—can separate us from God’s love in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:34ff). And so, like the Canaanite woman, we draw near to Jesus and pray: Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy. Amen.
[1] All Scripture references, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version.