The Faith of a Gentile Woman

Mark 7.24-30

Transcript:

[Sometimes], when they'll cross obscure passages, they will then take and leap off of those things. And I tell you that at the beginning of this because many have even read of this text and certainly liberal theologians would say that the woman the Syrophoenician woman was actually correcting Jesus and that Jesus was sinning. Well, obviously if you are in any text based upon how he addresses her, obviously if you're in any text and you begin to veer away what has been from Orthodox Christian truth you have to check yourself. And if you're reading something perhaps that is leading you astray, then you know, you're, you're reading it wrongly. I think of a couple of things. We believe that the Bible itself, both the old Testament and new Testament is Christ centered. It is telling us the story of redemption. And I don't think that's any different here as we'll try to unpack this.

And so when we look at what Mark is telling us and really the gospels that large is, there are two things that we're going to observe. First of all, that Jesus himself is the true Israelite, that Jesus himself is the Israel of God. That's why we read from the text this morning from the old Testament of Isaiah chapter 49 verse one through seven, Jesus becomes the true servant of the Lord. And then we're going to back up after we look at that to look at the contrast of the Pharisees self-righteousness over against the faith of the Syrophoenician Gentile, Gentile woman. So when we say that the Bible is Christ centered and it is a story that is telling us the story of redemption, right all the way back from the beginning to when sin enters into the world. And of course all the way through to the end in terms of of how it ends.

The story of the Bible is the story of Jesus. It is the story of telling us how God redeem man. And he does this in, in through Jesus, but the gospels themselves are also telling us the story that we first want to kind of dive into to help us that Jesus himself is, is the true Israel of God. And he is one who should have been recognized. The Pharisees should have recognized that Jesus was this and yet they didn't and had built their own self righteous code even in terms of how one is made clean before God. Now to illustrate this, I think it's, it's, it's important that we turn to the text because I think when we reach this point, this is what Mark is doing when we dive in to this section. So we're just going to go to a couple of places.

So hold your spot there in Mark seven and turn to Galatians chapter three because we know that church and Galatians was getting overrun by legalism. So extremely so that Paul addresses the church and said, I wished you were a cursed. If Christ be not a preached and the gospel be denied. Okay. And, and I think one important point that oftentimes maybe we even miss an elements of our Christian heritage in our own country. I w I just want to point this out. Look at verse 16 in reference to the Abrahamic covenant. And really even beyond that to all the covenants. Paul writes this in verse 16, he says, now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, and to offsprings, plural, referring to many, but referring to one and two, your offspring. Look at this. Who is Christ?

Now, anytime, you know, we hear of the, of the word promise in the Bible, we, it's, it's easy for us to, to drift off and think about certain specific individual promises. And you know, that wouldn't be necessarily wrong. But what we do want to understand is what particularly the promise met to the early church. And certainly the old Testament saying promises came to God's people and the promises came through the covenants. When you see a covenant, and it has a tendency maybe to intimidate people, but I want to leave you with something. Anytime you see the word promise that is used or covenant that is used in the Bible, it's a divine promise. God is giving a divine promise. And all of the covenants of the old Testament point as symbols in shadows and in types lead us to the fulfillment of the promise, which is Jesus. And that's what Paul literally is telling this group of people, that the point that God's promise made to Abraham is that Jesus was the offspring. Well, let's go to another place. Let's to second Corinthians chapter one second Corinthians Chapter one we're going to see this pro word promise used again, verse 20 bless you. Verse 20 chapter one bless you again, verse 24 all the promises. What's Paul talking when he's talking about the, the covenants, the covenants are God's divine promise to his people for it says they're all the promises of God. That's the only way God ever gave a promise was through his covenants. Fine there. Yes, their answer of yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter out our amen to God and for his glory. And of course the him is Jesus.

So the, so the Bible itself, the old Testament as, as it works together as one book to the new Testament is the promise of Jesus in the old Testament. It is the fulfillment of Jesus when Jesus arrives. And so in one part we want to pick that up that all of the covenants find their fulfillment in Jesus and who Jesus is and what Jesus did. Now, when we go specifically to the ministry of Jesus, when Jesus introduces this to us in Mark chapter one verse 15 and 16, he says, repent and believe the gospel for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And he's fulfilling that. But Jesus is, we'll see as we unfold this had a specific thing that, that he was proving that is true throughout the gospels. Turn back with me to Mark chapter six.

What I am saying is that the gospels are pointing us to that Jesus is the true Israel of God. That Jesus is the faithful servant, that Jesus is the fulfillment of all that was promised through the covenants. They obviously had been missing that when we get into the conversation in, in, in Mark chapter seven that we look at in this dialogue, Jesus even sets forth the parallel gospel to this is Matthew chapter 15. The Jesus had a specific ministry that was ordained by his father to take the gospel to the, to the the, the lost sheep of the house of Israel. That phrase is actually used in, in Matthew's gospel here. Jesus is fulfilling that as he goes. And he does this. Back to Mark chapter six, you'll recall when he sends out in that very fast pace mission of the 12 apostles, verse seven of chapter six, and he called the 12 and began to send them out two by two.

And he gave them a 40 over the unclean spirits. And he charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff, no bread, no bag, no money in their belts, but to wear sandals and did not put on two tunics. And he said to them, whenever you enter a house, you stay there until you depart from there. And if any place will not receive you and they will not listen to you when you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet as a testimony against them. So they went out and they proclaimed that people should repent. Same message messages always been consistent through John the Baptist, through the disciples, through Jesus DePaul. There's not mixed messages. There's not a message that saves one group of people say Israel and another group of people, the church, the message has always been to repent and to believe the gospel. Adam and Eve told their sons, the two sons that we read about Abel and Cain to repent and to believe the gospel, that Jesus would send a Messiah, one who would crush the head of the serpent, verse 13 and they cast out demons and they anointed with oil and many who were sick and he healed them. What are they doing? They are filling Jerusalem and Israel itself, the kingdom as it was known to Israel with the gospel that Jesus is the promised Messiah. The Jesus is the fulfillment of all the divine covenants. Now.

Well, one regard, Jesus' ministry was physically centered on to the house of Israel. We also know that eventually, particularly after Jesus dies and resurrects, the Holy spirit comes, it expands right to the glow. Jesus is continuing to unfold his plan of Ephesians one for the ages for a salvation to go to the ends of the earth. That text that we read from Isaiah chapter 49 I want to call it to your attention real quick. Again, turn back to chapter 49 of Isaiah.

Isaiah 49 so while Jesus' ministry as the true Israel of God as the true and faithful servant of God, as Jesus is demonstrating and being what the nation Israel is to be, and while his ministry is focused to the lost sheep of the house of Israel, yet he is fulfilling. He is. He is taking salvation. Verse six as the faithful servant to the ends of the earth, he is a light to the nations. Verse six it is to light of thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob to bring back the preserved of Israel, and that's what's going on. Jesus' ministry. The disciples were Israelites and many, many more. We know that were converted to Jesus through his early ministry. He says, I will make you as a light for the nations that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth. Jesus is the true Israelite. Jesus is the faithful servant of God. Jesus is the Israel of God because as we're going to see now, he's going to take the light in a specific way to a Gentile and this Gentile for us. As we go back to Mark, chapter seven is the Syrophoenician woman. So on one hand, while Mark is fitting this in, I believe, to the text that is so close, right in light of who the Pharisees are, he is revealing to us a type of fulfillment of of Isaiah chapter 49 verse six that Jesus is the faithful Israelite who takes salvation to the ends of the earth and to the gospel. And of course that explode. We know after Jesus ascends dies and he resurrects.

What we want to do here is to not miss this is to not forget of what we've looked at the last couple of weeks. So we want to look at this section of scripture, of the Syrophoenician woman, a Gentile woman, her faith over against what we have already heard, right? Cause the book is written that way. We want to think about her faith in light of how the fair she's respond. There's a contrast that I think is clear that is a part of God's design. He is giving us a contrast to how the Pharisees approached Jesus over against how one who belongs to Jesus, one who has true faith, how they are, how they are to approach Jesus. You'll recall that one of the questions that was being asked by the Pharisees over against all of their extra laws and and, and laws on pots and pans and all of these, these items, anything that you had been touched in the world, think of the contrast of this. They had so written laws to, to, to hate Gentiles. To think if you got connected with any Gentile you were, you were in sin and need to be made clean over against Jesus who extends himself to this Gentile woman.

Through the course of this conversation, we enter into verse 24, and it says, and from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon and he entered the house and he did not want anyone to know yet he could not be hidden. This is just like we've seen elsewhere throughout the gospel. He has an immense amount of people that are following, but I really think as this transitions to this, Jesus was just simply getting away because Jesus was a human and Jesus was one who would grow tired and Jesus needed to get away. And you think about the consistent following of this obnoxious group of self righteous people would have to be physically exhausting. He needed a time to get away. He probably just wanted to separate himself from from that to just kind of just get away from that. And then we get an, and I, I want to read this from both text. We just read this, but immediately, actually we've already read the text and in Mark, flip over to Matthew chapter 15 this is the same conversation in Matthew chapter 15 verse 22 through 28 that's held there in our text in Mark.

Follow this with me. And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, have mercy on me. O Lord, son of David. My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon, but he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him saying, send her away for she is crying out after us. And he answered, I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Jesus is stating his specified ministry that the father gain, that he was fulfilling, right. He was the father's plan, but she came and knelt before him saying, Lord, help me. And he answered it is not right to take the children's bread and to throw it to the dogs. And she said, yes, Lord. Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table. And Jesus answered her, Oh woman, great. Is your faith. Be it done for you as you desire. And her daughter was healed instantly. What the Pharisees should've recognized in Jesus, this Gentile woman does. And I think a lot of the dialogue even in this, this response as we go back to our text in chapter seven of Mark, where Jesus responds to her as she approaches him and he says to her, let the children be fed first for it is not right to take the children's bread and to throw it to the dogs.

Now it's first kind of explained this what this is what Jesus is referring to and being fed is the gospel and that the gospel was going to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. They are the children. They were the people of God as Paula. And fold this, I think it's in Romans 11. They were the people to God. They were given the covenants. They were given the promises that should have been recognized by these people. But ultimately we know as a nation though, there were the preserved of the elect inside the Israel. There was a a ransom group that the nation itself and totality would reject him. They would want him crucified. Particularly the leaders as we've, we've watched unfold. They've reached the point in Mark's gospel. They can't even hear it. They just want him destroyed. They want him killed. They, they, they want him dead. The last thing are the dogs, which would be to her, a Gentile. So the, there, there's an element here in the awkwardness of that conversation. Like what, what exactly is Jesus saying?

And I want to offer this to you, this where some liberal theologians would indict Jesus as being sinful, as being a massage penis, those mistreating women obviously, which is bizarre, bizarre that it, any time your reading a taxed or you're studying a text and it seems odd or seems obscure, if you're deriving something that's false, you go back to what we know, right? What we know the Bible to teach and to preaches to us to be true and that, that Jesus is a great lover of the law. He loved the law, he lived the law and that he never sinned and that it's important to us that Jesus never sin. Elsie could not be our sacrifice for sin, so we'll clear that out of the way. Not that anybody in here would believe that, but I think that's important because you may, even as I'm reading this texting while it feels kind of weird.

I think what's transpiring here is that Jesus is testing her faith better yet, I honestly believe he's drawing it out and he's leaving us a written example, which contrasts the very sight, self, righteous nature of how the Pharisees were trying to approach God.

Yeah, and their own self righteousness. Well, let's begin to look at this, how she does respond.

First of all, for anyone to be in a right relationship with God, all of us must come to a proper view of who we are and who God is and the Syrophoenician woman. This Gentile woman has a right perspective of this. She has acknowledged both who she is in the text and who Jesus is and we'll, we'll see this as this unfolds. Verse 26 now, the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. Look at what the text says to us that she came and that she had fell at his feet and that she begged him. She begged him. One identification of proper faith that points to genuine faith is that people are made humble. People are made humble. This woman knows that Jesus has the power to heal her daughter. She approaches him in Matthew's text. She comes down and she falls before him. I think it's an, it's an action of worship. She humbles herself before Christ. That is a an attribute, if you will, of genuine faith. Genuine, genuine faith is found in this. It persists because during the course of the conversation when perhaps people would have just quit, she persist. And so this is the Mark in your faith and my faith when we are being drawn to God. We persisted as we were coming to a right understanding of who we are and who got his, yeah.

Remember, she's a Syrophoenician by birth. She's a Gentile woman. I believe the text, when Jesus gives us this in verse 27 and 28 let the children be fed first for it is not right to take the children's bread and to throw it to the dogs. Look at her response. She didn't take offense. She says, yes Lord. Yes Lord. Yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's chromes. She recognizes herself as a center.

A dog would have been seen in that culture, even in house pet, some of the ones that we have, and I get it, dogs can be worshiped in our culture. It was seen as filthy. Even the house pets would be felled crumbs, but it was seen as filthy. It picked up dirt. She recognizes in humility to Jesus that yes, Lord, I am a sinner and I would not want to get in the way of your program, that you have been sent to take the gospel of the kingdom to the nation Israel, and it's evident to me that she understood this program, what Jesus was doing in Israel as it were known because she cries out, Lord, and she identifies him in Matthew's gospel as the son of David. Please don't miss this. This dear woman is so desperate in her faith. She comes before Jesus who she recognizes is the King. That's what the expression of the son of David is. You are the King. You are the Lord, if you will, but say it, my daughter can be healed.

Yeah, she's got a proper view of herself. She's got a right view of Jesus. She's humble. She continues to persist. I believe Jesus is drawing out her faith. She sees herself as a center, a dirty soul, unworthy and undeserving of Jesus and inside of this, dear friends, please get this. She begs for God's mercy.

Yes, too oftentimes we tried to get in the way and make people to make decisions.

This manifest to us a genuine understanding of the gospel and a genuine understanding of the gospel will always have a right view yourself. It's always going to have a right view of who Jesus is and if either is skewed, it's not genuine faith. Jesus is a friend to center's. Thank God he's our friend to centers, but Jesus is the God man. Jesus is above us. He's to be rightfully pursued because Jesus is the Holy one. The sinless son of God. We must recognize ourselves as centers and that's what the woman does here. She's humble. She persists. She sees herself as a, as a center. She cries out. She begs the Bible, tells us, Oh Lord, have mercy upon me, Lord, please help me. She says in Matthew chapter 15 verse 22 she's a sinner in need of forgiveness.

And God hears this. When Jesus, the son of God, hears this immediately, her daughter is healed. That for us is another. Just sign the Jesus was drawing out her faith because when we approach God rightly, he pours out his grace. He lavishes upon her much more than she deserved. The household is restored. What I love about this is should she comes to him and she recognize it, that it's Christ and Christ alone. It's Jesus who is Lord, who is master. It is Jesus who is the son of David. You are the King. That's what she's saying. Jesus your Lord. You're the King. You're the master.

You see the difference over against what we've looked at the last couple of weeks. The response that the Pharisees have, the Jesus over against the response that the woman has, the Jesus. Jesus responds to her faith. He pours out his grace. He does it immediately. He does it completely and I think what you see expressed in her heart and in her soul when grace invades, please listen to this. When grace invades the heart, it sweetens and softens the heart and the soul. That's what she is over against the Pharisees in their own self righteousness. They're filled with hatred and their hearts are hardened to the only one that can save them. She recognizes that Christ alone is the one who saves. Mark is telling us the story that Jesus is the true Israel God.

Yet as Jesus heals the Syrophoenician daughter, it's proof that Jesus is not only the King of the world, but Jesus is the savior of the world.