- Back to the phone lines. Lucas listening in Calgary, Alberta Canada on CHRB. Hi Lucas.
- Hey Hank how are you doing?
- I'm doing great.
- Can you hear me okay?
- Yeah, you sound great.
- I had just a couple things I just wanted to say. I met you a couple years ago at CRI
and it was like a huge honor to meet you and just to see CRI, and you had a huge impact
on my walk with the Lord so I just really appreciate that.
- Thank you so much.
- Yeah. Now so my girlfriend I were having a Bible study the other day, and we were reading
Matthew 15 chapter 21 to 28, which is about the faith of the Gentile woman -
what the subtitle calls it - and we were really wrestling with that because we
didn't understand a lot of it. That particular passage, but particularly that
at first when the woman is crying out for help
because her daughter-- that Jesus apparently doesn't reply at all, and then
not only that, the disciples are all pushing her away or him away, and then and
then he replies to her, but it still sort of seems like there's some sort of
exclusive thing he's saying and we just didn't understand. And especially when it
talks about-- okay we just didn't really understand the metaphor of what they're
talking about with the straps and dogs and all that. Just was wondering if you
can shed some light on that for us.
- Yeah I can, but for everybody listening in I'm
gonna have Christina actually read that passage. Can you find that passage and
read it? I have it. Oh you've got it. Good. You've got-- you know how to use uh, technology -
- Technology? Yeah.
- So it says "Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.
A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him crying out, "Lord, son of David,
have mercy on me. My daughter is demon-possessed and
suffering terribly." Jesus did not answer a word, so his disciples came to him and
urged him, "Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us." He answered, "I was only--
I was sent only to the lost sheep of
Israel." The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord help me," she said. He replied, "It
is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to the dogs." "Yes it is
Lord," she said, "even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's
table." Then Jesus said to you, "Woman, you have great faith. Your request is granted."
And her daughter was healed at that moment."
- And this is one of the most
clever of all passages in scripture. You see the absolute erudition
and wisdom of our Lord the Savior Jesus Christ. You see that he is
truly Theanthropos, the God-Man, because here he's borrowing from the mindset of
the day. The mindset of the day where "Gentiles are dogs."
The Samaritans, in particular, are dogs. And so here you have a Gentile Samaritan
woman, and she is thought of as a dog. Remember when the Assyrians
conquered the Northern Kingdom, they killed or exiled everyone in the
northern kingdom. They did leave some alive, and they intermarried with
Assyrians and they became the Samaritans. They became the "dogs" in the view of the
Jewish people. So Jesus is now taking that particular mindset, and exposing it
for what it is. And he does a very clever thing here. Dogs have more faith than
they're supposed master. So here you have Jesus turning the tables, and the Gentile
woman is used as an example to show the Jews who disbelieve that the dog has
more acumen than the master. So again, it's a classic turning of the
tables, but it's also in concert with what Jesus has always taught. We
shouldn't call someone a "dog" and someone else a "human being."
For all are created in the image and likeness of God. So Jesus turns the
tables in a deft manner and exposes the prejudice going on and laudes the Gentile
woman for her faith - the Samaritan woman - and heals. So it's a beautiful, beautiful
passage, and I think it's a great lesson for us. We can turn the tables as
well. Learn to do what the Savior did.
- Okay, well... and I-- so you're sort of saying
it's like Jesus almost was using the way they were viewed in that day
just to drive his point that they're being-- they're kind of rejected by the
Jewish people of that time? And that he was sort of painting that picture and
then he kind of moved forward to heal her from there and point out as she had
great faith?
- Yeah. Jesus came as the promised Messiah of Israel. But Paul
explains what's going on in the gospel. So you have the didactic
teachings and the epistles shedding light on what's going on in the Gospels.
Or in the narratives. And Paul points out that through Israel all the
world will be blessed. So Jesus Christ never came as a parochial Jewish Messiah;
Jesus came so that the gospel might go out to the ends of the earth, and
therefore the gospel is not only for the Jew but for the Gentile, and even for
what was considered at that time to be a "dog," the Samaritan. So Jesus here is
giving an object lesson to his disciples that Gentiles like the Canaanite woman
could be saved and they could be sanctified through faith in Him.
There's also of course much more going on in the passage. I mean you have a
clear test of the woman's faith being communicated through the passage as well.
So there's a lot of stuff going on. But I think the the deft turning of the tables
is what is so delicious. Jesus again is showing that in this case
the quote-unquote "dogs" have more faith in their masters.
- Okay. And really quick
lastly, does it still tie in to that point but why did he ignore her the first time
she asked?
- Well, here's an example in the context of the passage of where
Jesus is allowing someone to be persistent in order to again drive home
a point. So he's-- and this happens many many times with Jesus. There's a
persistence that is necessary and then with the persistence, not only does Jesus
give the answer I mean how many times you just keep knocking on the door and
finally you knock on the door enough times and the door is opened unto you. I
mean that's part of the narrative that you have in the Sermon on the Mount.
So the persistence itself is a way in which in the narrative you have someone
begging Jesus and it adds to the story. I mean it is part of the narrative, it is
part of what happened, but it really adds to the power of what's going on.