The Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost
September 8, 2024
Mark 7:24-37

The audio of this sermon can be found here. The video of the worship service is available on the Trinity Episcopal Church YouTube channel.

Jesus said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs” (Mark 7:27). Though there are parts of the Bible which are far more unpalatable, this one strikes a nerve with us. Because this runs against everything we seem to know about Jesus. Jesus is the lover of souls, he’s the one to whom people can go for healing and grace; and yet here he is, calling a woman a dog. And not only that, but the woman approached Jesus for simple reason that she is desperate to help her daughter who is possessed by some sort of demon. She begs him to cast out the demon, and he says, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” This either shows us that Jesus isn’t who we think he is, or it shows us another side of Jesus we would rather not know about.

But, I think there could be more going on than meets the eye. Remember, all of these stories were set in a certain time, with real people involved. Real people, and real geopolitics. The Bible was not written in a vaccum. So here’s the situation on the ground. 

This story takes place in the city of Tyre. Populated by Syrophoenicians. They are not Jews. Tyre is a port city; we know something about port cities. Port cities, like ours, has people who are incredibly wealthy, because they have made their money in trade. Plus, port cities, like ours, are full of people from every nation under the sun. It would not have been strange for a man, like Jesus, a Jew from another country, to show up in town.

Jesus has come to Tyre in order to get a break from ministry. Remember, Jesus is from the region of Galilee. Galilee is adjacent to Tyre. And of course, Galilee is populated by Jews. Galilee is mostly agricultural. Think of the people Jesus goes around with – they are small time craftsmen, farmers, and fishermen. These are not the wealthy merchants and ship owners in the city of Tyre.

And that’s the issue. Tyre is wealthy. Galilee is poor. And we know this, for centuries the people of Tyre had been using Galilee as their breadbasket. The Syrophoenicians of Tyre have been buying up the grain from Galilee, meaning that the Jews of Galilee could hardly afford the food they produced. It was Galilean farms and farmers, it was Jewish fishermen and boats, that fed the people of Tyre; even as the Jews of Galilee went hungry.¹

This passage sounds different now. “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” You can hear Jesus’ anger. Not at this woman per se, but at the economic oppression of his own people. Jesus has seen his own people go hungry, on crumbs, while the food they produce gets shipped off to these foreigners. Also, the gospel story says that this woman’s daughter is on a “bed,” not a “mat.” Beds were signs of wealth in the ancient world. And when the Gospel of Mark means bed, it says “bed.” When Mark wants to use the word, “mat,” like poor people would use, it says, “mat.” The fact that this woman’s child, her child, is on a bed, means that she is far wealthier than most any Jew from Galilee could even imagine. And now this wealthy Syrophoenician woman comes begging to Jesus, a Jew from Galilee. Because of this history of oppression and mutual resentment, we can imagine that both groups had long called each other dogs. This is not based on gender so much, as it is based on a grudge.

And then the woman answers Jesus’ riddle with a riddle of her own. “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” You see what she’s doing, right? She’s putting herself in the place of the Galilean Jews. She’s acknowledging that the Jews of Galilee have been treated like dogs by people like her, the Syrophoenicians. The Jews of Galileee have been begging for crumbs. And the Syrophoenicians have been throwing crumbs their way. By begging of Jesus, the Galilean Jew, she is reversing the whole social dynamic. She gets it. She gets what it must be like for people like Jesus. 

Jesus is feeling the pain of his own people. The woman is feeling the pain of her daughter. And in this incredibly human, sacred moment, they learn about each other’s pain. The woman gets the pain that Jesus and his people are feeling. Jesus feels the pain of this desperate mother. But it’s also more than a feeling. The result is grace. The effect of all this is that Jesus frees the woman’s daughter, thank God, from the demon that was possessing her. And not only does Jesus heal the woman’s daughter; he heals the wound of prejudice that stands between them. I’m telling you, this Bible stuff is dynamite. 

The fancy church word for this is “reconciliation.” Reconciliation is the spiritual capacity to feel someone else’s suffering. To hear their pain, to walk in their desperation, to know their hunger. And then, to do something about it. This is what Jesus embodies. Jesus hears the suffering, the pain, of both his own people and of this woman who is so very different from him. And to both groups, so opposed to each other, to Galileans and to Syrophoenicians Jesus gives hope, and healing, and compassion. 

In all the sound and the fury of our world today, this gospel lesson shows us who we are. You know it as well as I do – we are at each other’s throats like Galileans and Syrophoenicians. Some people get wealthier day by day, some people get poorer day by day. And sometimes, those people live just blocks apart. This makes us weaker, for the only thing that seems to be growing is resentment. And all the while, our children suffer for it, for they will inherit this divided world of ours. It’s as if this passage is playing out right in front of us, if only we would open our eyes to see it. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

Take that empathetic step. Listen to the cries, the anger, the hunger from people you don’t like. And admit it, there are people in this world, maybe even in this room, that you do not like. Listen to them. And let them listen to you. Because what we could all learn is that each of us, in our own way, is suffering. We are all hurting from one thing or another. And we’re taking it out on each other, calling each other dogs and giving each other crumbs – we Christians can do better. We can call each other beloved brothers and sisters. We can look into the eyes of our neighbors who are not Christians, and still call them our neighbors deserving of our love. We can give each other our best. And, we all need to acknowledge the pain we have inflicted on others. To swallow our pride and acknowledge that we have hurt others, and others have hurt us. This is the path to reconciliation. And it will not be easy. It will be as hard as this incredibly uncomfortable gospel passage. But it will be good for us. Because the people who will benefit from our honesty, and our compassion, and our empathy, is our children. And we will be healed from the resentments and grudges that we carry around with us. We will be healed from the stories we tell about other people.

Jesus stretched wide his arms open the cross, bringing together God and people and people to each other. It was not easy for him – it cost his blood. And yet, we benefited from his most gracious sacrifice. We saw him do that here, too. He reached out to someone that should have been an opponent. And instead, Jesus sees her with compassion and love.

By the power of empathy, Jesus liberates us from the evil powers of the world. We can do the same. So stretch out your arms, stretch out your heart to those you would not normally love, like Jesus did, and you will be set free. 

1. Rhoads, David M. “Jesus and the Syrophoenician Woman in Mark: A Narrative-Critical Study.” Currents in Theology and Mission 47, no. 4 (January 1, 2020): 36–48. ↩︎