Genesis 45: 1-15 (Common English Bible)
Matthew 15: 21-28 (New Revised Standard Version, Updated Edition)
If this reading from the gospel of Matthew could be given a title, it should be called “The day a spunky Canaanite woman gave Jesus a lesson in faith.” Now this is not a popular reading because it makes Jesus look somewhat bad. In this scene Jesus is calling a woman a dog! What’s going on here? What happened was a learning experience, for Jesus and maybe for the rest of us. Remember Christ was the human Jesus in this story and not a doctrine. He was brought up in the Jewish culture which viewed the Canaanites as their pagan ancestral enemies.
The background of Matthew’s story was to convince the Jewish readers that it is OK to include the gentiles into the Jesus faith. It was the only way to expand the Jesus Movement. Sometimes we are accustomed to the same socio-economic class attending worship, so our minds are stuck in park and hesitant to move forward. That was the situation of the Jewish believers in Jesus in late 1st century Judea and its immediate surrounding areas. Their minds were stuck in the past and the majority of Jewish people still rejected Jesus as the Messiah. They needed a Plan B if the Jesus Movement was going to move forward.
Jesus’ encounter with the Canaanite woman, an outsider, was a sign of moving forward. It was but one of many examples of God’s plan for the redemption of the entire world. The woman’s story is not simply a story to be heard once, it’s also a symbol of everyone who is ignored or marginalized and needs to be heard.
In this story, the Canaanite woman is the hero. She alrighty had the odds stacked against her. After all, she was a woman living in a very patriarchal society in the 1st century. And to make matters even worse, she is a pagan Canaanite, people the Jews despised. But even with all that against her, she would not be quiet. I am Woman. Here me roar. Her daughter’s life was at stake, possessed by a demon, so the mother said. Back then many diseases were diagnosed as demon possession, especially epilepsy. No doubt the fame of Jesus as a healer gave the woman hope. Jesus was her only hope.
The remarkable thing the woman did was some linguistic Ju-Jitsuo on Jesus. One thing to remember, the Greek of the New Testament often has many different words for the same object, whereas English might have just one. When Jesus called the woman a “dog” the Greek word used by Jesus was for a scavenger dog, both dangerous and dirty. But when the woman spoke “dog” in her rebuttal to Jesus, the Greek word for “dog” is “kunaria” which means “puppy.” Now everyone loves a puppy, don’t they? Can you imagine the heart of Jesus just melting with love when the Canaanite woman said those words? I certainly can.
Things were changing in Jesus’ ministry. Earlier in Matthew’s gospel, Jesus was telling his disciples not to go to the gentiles or into Samaria. By the end of this gospel, Jesus sends his students to make disciples of all nations. Until Jesus encountered the Canaanite woman, he didn’t realize how expansive God’s kingdom could be. Jesus begins to broaden his mission and offers healing to those outside the Jewish faith. Now it’s time for many churches to wake up and do the same. A Church should have fellowship with those of many faiths. It’s the only way to live and exist in our pluralistic world.
The Canaanite woman stood with Jesus, even if it took Jesus a minute to get there. We should learn from Jesus’s example. Anything that tries to label anyone of a different religion, color, economic class, or place of origin as inferior, is a sin against God. Often many immigrants are disliked just because of that. What migrants seek is what immigrants have always sought - equal treatment under the law, a better job, better education and political freedom. Do some Americans think immigrants may take away God’s blessings, either spiritual or physical? I don’t think so, but unfortunately many others have that negative view. God invites us to share and enjoy with others what we already have in abundance. But we must also remember that God will judge those harshly who tolerate and perpetuate those who treat immigrants cruelly. Just look at that barbaric and sadistic barbed-wired barrier that was erected recently on the Rio Grande River between Texas and Mexico.
Concerning foreigners and migrants, God says this in Leviticus chapter 19, verses 33&34, “If you have any resident aliens in your country, you will not molest them. You will treat aliens as though they were native-born and love them as yourself, for you yourselves were once aliens in Egypt. I am Yahweh, your God.”
Restorative justice is woven throughout the Bible and the best story concerning this is about Joseph and his brothers. And what makes this story so beautiful, is that it’s a real true historical story from the Hebrew Bible. Jealousy was what fueled the sin that drove Joseph’s brothers to get rid of him. What “sin” really means is “missing the mark” your actions are going the wrong way. And Joseph’s brothers were definitely taking the wrong way. Now, God never wanted Joseph to be betrayed and later enslaved. But God took the bad and made the outcome very good. Good for Joseph and his brothers and even good for the Egyptians for saving Egypt from famine, thanks to Joseph’s divine insights through dreams.
What Joseph says to his brothers is this, “All this evil you have intended, that you let loose in the world, there was God’s broader intention that moves the world toward good. What you intended for evil, God can use us toward God’s ultimate intention for good, life and love.” What providence tells us, there is never a moment that God is not with us.
When we think about God’s eternal observance over us, that does not mean God intends bad things to happen to us. God never intended harm and grief. But God has chosen us to live within freedom and our own choices. We are given the freedom to partner with God, or not to partner. But God never leaves us and always hopes for the ultimate good in everyone. Even during the height of any pain, either physical or mental, God is suffering with us.
The Canaanite woman shows how a woman can be bold and brave in approaching God. She had her eyes on the prize of having her daughter healed, and nothing was going to stop her, even an insult from Jesus. Even the rules of her society were not going to limit her faith or prevent her from going beyond her boundaries. She reminds me of Sacheen Littlefeather. If you were watching the 1973 Academy Oscar Rewards, she took the Oscar, Marlon Brando told her to take and told the truth how Native Americans have always been unfairly portrayed in American movies. Of course, the reaction to her truth was not friendly. Truth does have the tendency to anger people. But silence is not an option, speaking the truth is the only option.
Both Joseph and the Canaanite woman opened a path that shows the inclusive love and justice of God, which has no boundaries or borders. This is the priority in the justice world of Matthew 25 Churches. It is realized that systematic evils are created in many societies. The evil appears in many power structures, both in business, political structure, and even some churches. We must listen to the victims who have been abused by these evils. I’m shocked that 158 years after the Civil War, slavery is debatable again! I believe there is an old statement, “those who fail to learn their history, are doomed to repeat it.”
I think our society is going through a crisis of self-identity or what we should be or not. Sometimes it takes humble people like the Canaanite woman to change evil to good. And also a powerful but gracious person like Joseph showing the way of forgiveness. Can we do no less, than those two did, to create systems of equality, justice, love and forgiveness?
AMEN
