If you have been reading and studying the Gospel of Mark along the way, you have seen that Mark groups stories together to make a point. Knowing that helps us to understand the point of some of the stories. And the main point here is that Jesus brings grace and salvation not just to the Jews, but also to the Gentiles.
Mark 7 opens with Jesus having a confrontation with the Pharisees and Scribes over the fact that his disciples ate without washing their hands.
This is not a matter of hygiene, as when your mom made you wash up before dinner. It is a matter of ceremonial purity. If you did not do the ritual washings, you were ceremonially impure, or defiled. In verse 3, Mark explained to his Gentile readers that this requirement came from the “tradition of the elders”, meaning the rules the Jews had added to the law. They had many of these required washings.
In response to this allegation, Jesus taught his disciples that external things did not make you unclean. Things you touched, or ate, or drank, did not defile you. What defiled you was what came from your heart, your evil thoughts, actions and attitudes. In verse 19, Mark observed that Jesus was declaring all foods clean. This idea of what defiles and what is clean is important to the following stories.
The disciples, though, had a hard time understanding this. Knowing this, Jesus knew the disciples needed further teaching.
After this encounter, Jesus left Galilee and went north to the region of Tyre. That is north of Galilee in what is now Lebanon. There is all kind of speculation about why he went there, but it appears he went there specifically to encounter this Gentile woman and, through the encounter, to teach the disciples the full meaning of his lesson on what is not unclean.
The disciples need to this lesson to understand Jesus’ mission and what their mission will become after he is gone.
This is a Gentile area. The Pharisees believed contact with Gentiles made you unclean, or defiled, requiring ceremonial washing before you could participate in religious activities. This continues the theme of 7:1-23 regarding what does or does not make you ceremonially unclean.
This was also a pagan area. Most people in the region worshipped Canaanite gods, including Baal. This is the area Jezebel was from many years before. She married Ahab, the king of Israel. She led the king and the nation to worship Baal. (1 Kings 16)
The disciples must have been puzzled. Surely the Messiah would not come here and be defiled. Mark does not present the disciples as very understanding.
The disciples also did not connect this trip to the same trip made by Elijah many years before. God had previously sent the prophet Elijah to Zarephath in this very region. (1 Kings 17:8) There he raised a widow’s son from the dead and miraculously provided bread for them. He was a Jew who provided for Gentiles at the command of God.
Jesus had also referred to this story when he first went and spoke in the synagogue in his home town. He said there were many widows in Israel, but God only sent Elijah to the widow in Zarephath, and many lepers in Israel, but God only sent Elisha to Naaman the Syrian. (Luke 4:16-27) Again, these were Jewish prophets sent to minister to Gentiles.
Still, the disciples did not understand that God intended to offer grace to the Gentiles as well as the Jews.
When Jesus arrived there, a woman with a problem immediately found him. (25) This woman was a Gentile. She probably spoke Greek, which was the common language in the Roman empire.
She was also born in this area (“a Syrophoenician by birth”). “Syro” refers to the fact that the Roman province was called Syria, and “Phoenician”, because the natives of the area were descended from the Phoenicians.
So, Jesus was in an unclean area and dealing with an unclean Gentile woman.
The woman’s problem was a daughter possessed by an unclean spirit. She did not bring her daughter to Jesus. She might not have been able to. She left her daughter at home.
But she came to Jesus in faith, believing he could he could cast out the demon. (26) Matthew’s account records her calling Jesus “Lord” and “Son of David”. She has more understanding of the mission of Jesus than the Pharisees and the disciples.
And she came in humility, falling on her face before Jesus. (25) She was lying in the dirt in front of him. It was a recognition of his exalted status and her inferior status. Contrast this with Peter, who, in chapter 8, will take Jesus aside and rebuke him for saying he would be killed.
Yet, even in her humility, she was persistent in her faith: she kept asking him to cast out the demon. (26) It was a dramatic scene with the woman running to Jesus, falling on the ground in front of him, and continually begging him to help her.
Jesus’ response seems harsh at first glance. He said to let the children be fed first because it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs. (27) He spoke metaphorically. The children are the Jews, the bread is God’s provision in grace, and the little dogs are the Gentiles.
Some Jews of that time, such as Pharisees, referred to Gentiles as dogs, lesser beings that Jews. But Jesus’ response sounds a little less harsh in the original Greek, as the word used for dogs here is not the word for feral dogs that roam the streets, but small dogs kept as pets (part of the household). The New King James Version captures that by using the term “little dogs”.
Notice that Jesus does not say “don’t ever feed the little dogs”, but “feed the children first”.
The principle Jesus mentions here is that it was God’s plan to send the gospel to the Jews first, then to the rest of the world.
Paul stated that principle this way:
“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek”. (Romans 1:16) Paul also practiced this principle, going to the synagogue first to preach the gospel in every city he visited.
The Jews were the people to whom God chose to reveal his plan of redemption. Jesus told the woman at the well that salvation was from the Jews. (John 4:22) The promise of a savior was that he was to be the descendant of Abraham, who was the father of the Jews, and of David, the most revered king of the Jews.
In Romans 2:9-10, Paul also says judgment for rejecting Jesus will come first to the Jews, then to the Gentiles. So, the blessing is first offered to the Jews, and they also have the first responsibility to receive Christ.
Although God’s plan was to give the gospel to the Jews first, his plan was for the gospel to go to all people, not just the Jews. God’s promise to Abraham was that his descendant would be a blessing to all nations. The Old Testament said the Messiah would be a light to the Gentiles.
So, Jesus did not turn away Gentiles who came to him in faith, as this woman did.
In response to Jesus’ statement, she claimed a right to the “crumbs”.
She seems to understand the metaphor, or parable, better than the disciples have been understanding parables. She does not attempt to usurp God’s plan or her secondary place in it. So, she asks Jesus, believing he has enough grace to give her, just as the master of the house would have enough to feed the pets.
In response to her persistent faith, Jesus cast the demon from her daughter. Matthew 15:27 makes this clear, recording Jesus as saying “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire”.
Ironically, this Gentile woman is the first person to understand a parable of Jesus. She understood and accepted his word. She asked for grace according to his word.
Martin Luther put it beautifully: She took Christ at his own words. He then treated her not as a dog but as a child of Israel”.
The theological significance of this encounter is that the gospel may be first offered to the Jew, but it is offered to the Gentile on the same basis. The mission of Jesus included both Jews and Gentiles.
The Gentile does not have to become a Jew first, or satisfy any other criteria of righteousness. The Gentile must simply have faith in Christ. And that is very good news for us, for we are Gentiles.
So, we have seen the mission of Jesus. But this story also shows us something about the character of Jesus. Jesus has compassion on broken people and acts toward them in grace.
This woman and her daughter were broken and suffering. The daughter was debilitated by a demon. The mother’s whole life was taken over by fear and sorrow because of her daughter’s suffering.
Jesus had compassion for their suffering. He did not blame them for their situation, saying its your own fault for worshipping idols. He did not send her away because he was busy doing other things. Rather, when she came to him in faith, he acted out of grace and compassion; he helped her out of her brokenness. He did not say she had to do something to deserve his attention. He did not say she was too messed up to be helped. He had compassion and gave grace.
Some of you here today feel broken. You are suffering. You may be suffering because of outside forces, but you may also suffer as a result of mistakes you made or sins you committed. Because of that, you may feel that you do not deserve help from Jesus or that he has given up on you.
But that is not the picture of Jesus in the Bible. He has compassion and he gives grace. He just wants you to come to him in faith. So, come to him today. Come in faith and in repentance and ask God to heal you and save you.
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