aThese two healing stories aren’t just about healing. They show Jesus expanding the circle of wholeness beyond his own expectations.
on learning and growing
Proper 17B | Mark 7:24-37
The gospel should never seem boring. If it isn’t surprising or challenging us, that’s a sure sign we’re missing something.
This story, with its two more healings, seems like it could be more of the same. Like it’s just what Jesus does. He heals people.
It also has an air of old hat. Like this is soooo chapter 3. Why are we reading about these healings now?
Well, because this actually is pretty shocking.
Let’s remind ourselves where Jesus was not that long ago. For us, it was the beginning of summer.
Jesus the Healer
Jesus called a group of students, which is another word for disciples. And he began healing people. Healing so many people that he became incredibly famous.
Crowds followed him everywhere. And like modern fame with its poparazzi, these crowds became physically dangerous and a constant threat. He couldn’t get away to do even the most mundane things like eat lunch, pray, or chill with his friends.
No matter where he went, crowds followed and collected even more people. Not to hear what he had to say, but to get healed or have him heal a loved one.
Even when Jesus crosses the sea, the crowds even get in boats and follow.
So now Jesus heads north. Way up north, beyond the borders of their homeland. About as far away from the people who want a piece of him as he can get. And guess what happens? That’s right. More crowds!
And in a moment of trying to get some peace and quiet, Jesus is interrupted. A woman comes to him like all the rest. Someone is sick. Her daughter. (Of course it’s a sick kid.) She needs her help.
What does Jesus do?
He insults her.
We’ve all been there. Tired. Frustrated. Not up to it. And then we say something regrettable. I think it is easy to sympathize. Call it no big deal. Brush it off.
Of course it’s a big deal to her. She persists. Wears him down. Gets him to help her. It all reminds me of the parables in Matthew’s gospel about persistence.
This response to Jesus here has a way of ignoring the cruelty, though. The poignancy. Even the context. Why this moment is happening now.
This isn’t about Jesus being tired and irritated. It’s about who he takes this woman for.
He thinks she is subhuman.
I know we can’t read Jesus’s mind, of course. That’s the problem of our human condition. We can’t tell someone is racist by what’s in their heads. Only by how they treat others. And this moment really sticks. At the very least, she asks for help and he says no. He’s healed thousands of people and this is the one he says no to. Why?
There’s really only one reason. She’s not Hebrew.
And he doesn’t just say no either. He says no and then insults her. Not just by comparing her to a dog, which considering some dogs, might be a complement. He suggests that healing this woman’s daughter would be like throwing God’s grace away. Wasting it on trash.
As much as we want to come up with excuses for Jesus here, I can’t. I just don’t buy them. So what do we do with this?
As usual, context is king.
What did Jesus do before traveling to Tyre? We talked about this last week.
Jesus redefined our relationship to the Law.
Remember he pushed his followers to see how legalism obscured the purpose of the law. How our obsessions with the letter and scope of the law can find us undermining the purpose of it.
He himself said that it isn’t what goes into our bodies that defiles us, but what comes out of us. Hatred, abuse, manipulation, pride.
Jesus had just gotten us to turn the camera on ourselves–not to condemn us, but to invite us into seeing just how committed we are to things which don’t lead to human flourishing. How committed to tradition and practice and comfort we are. How much we love comfort and predictable expectations of lukewarm faith.
And then what happens to Jesus? He finds himself in just such a moment. A place of pride. Of commitment to human tradition. This woman makes him confront his hypocrisy like he confronted the Pharisees.
And what does he show us? A changed mind.
And at this point everything changes for him.
As much as his rhetoric of compassion and generosity was all true–he believed everything he taught–he had never confronted the problem in himself.
He had challenged the leaders to widen the circle, to see who was missing, to include those people the rules left out. But he had never interrogated his own prejudice or what it was built upon. He was not applying the radical welcome he preached to everyone.
Being confronted with his own hypocrisy led to his learning. And changing his mind. But more importantly, he changes his belief based on human tradition to match the command of God. God’s command stayed the same. It just means a whole lot more when it applies to everyone. Not just the insiders.
So Jesus immediately heals the child and heads home.
And on the way, he gives hearing and speech to another gentile.
In Jesus there are no outsiders. No borders.
That isn’t an easy message to hear. And now we see that even Jesus struggled with it. But he was also open to seeing the truth.
As I was writing the sermon last week, the truth of what Jesus was suggesting really hit me. Because I could see all the ways we make idols of our tradition. Of our liturgy, practices, and even our expectations of each other. Things that don’t come from God. They are merely our best attempts to serve God.
And yet, Jesus also doesn’t want us to obsess about our failure as another means of condemning. We’re invited to focus on the command. Which is to love.
For me, seeing Jesus confront that in himself is not only challenging. It is full of grace. That we can also confront this in ourselves. Not just as individuals, but in our church, our community, and our world.
And as hard as this is to do, it is very much possible.
To open our hearts and minds, expanding our welcome and grace, and sharing the incredible generosity shared with us. Because identity–all that goes into who we say we are–is a construct. We create it. And we can recreate it. To match what God wants: wholeness, grace, and love.