OUR FATHER WHO CANNOT BE PLEASED WITHOUT FAITH

The Lord Jesus, having antgonized the religious leaders who had come to the Capernaum region to take stock of Him, travelled westward to the Mediteranian coast to visit the cities of Tyre and Sidon.  

While ministering there, a woman of the Syro-Phoenecian culture heard of Jesusˋ miraculous power and decided to track Him down and ask for His consideration regarding her daughter who was terribly demonized. The passage from Matthew chapter 15 verses 21 - 28 captured the interaction between Jesus and the woman.

21 Then Jesus went out from there and departed to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22 And behold, a woman of Canaan came from that region and cried out to Him, saying, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! My daughter is severely demon-possessed.”

23 But He answered her not a word. And His disciples came and urged Him, saying, “Send her away, for she cries out after us.”

24 But He answered and said, “I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

25 Then she came and worshiped Him, saying, “Lord, help me!”

26 But He answered and said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”

27 And she said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.”

28 Then Jesus answered and said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be to you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed from that very hour.

The Lord Jesus did not respond to her when she cried out to Him to help her with her child who was at home completely debilitated by the affliction and so she turned to the disciples and badgered them so persistently that they pleaded with Jesus to send her away.

Jesus said to them that He was specifically sent to the children of Israel and thus, she, being a syro-phoenician rather than a child of Israel, was excluded from His ministrations.

The woman elbowed her way through the disciples and worshiped Jesus and pleaded with Him for assistance.

Jesus spoke to her in a parable to clarify for her why he couldnˋt take what was alloted to other people to give to her. The parable described a scene where the children of a household were at the table eating and there were dogs under the table who were begging for food but it would be inappropriate to divert the childrenˋs food to the dogs. Jesus was asking how, in good concious, one could take food away from children in order to feed the little dogs?

In the parable, the children were the people of Israel to whom Jesus was sent. The bread was the teaching and healing ministry that Jesus was dispensing. The little dogs were the non-Israelite people such as the syro-phoenician woman. 

Jesus categorically told the woman that it would be a misappropriation for resources to expend effort on her case but she pressed him with an irrefutable response.

She said to Him that while it was true that taking food from children to give to dogs was wrong, if the children were not eating everything that was being offered to them and some fell off the table, surely the dogs could eat what was being discarded without harming the children.

This answer was very perceptive. 

The children of Israel had been ambivalent about the arrival of their Messiah and as a nation, had not wholeheartedly accepted the fact that the kingdom of God had touched ground in their midst. The woman noticed this and claimed for herself the crumbs that the children of Israel were dropping off the table.

The Lord was arrested by that response. He said to her:

“O woman, great is your faith! Let it be to you as you desire.”

The ˋO womanˋ phrase was an exclamation of surprised admiration that Jesus expressed for this woman.

Because of her great faith, He granted her what she was seeking because she had perceived the unseen substance of the thing she had hoped for.

As the book of Hebrews chapter 11 verse 1 says, 

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

Amen.

4