God's Response to Tenacious Faith

Jesus addressed Jewish food purity tradition.

“What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”

“Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. Leave them; they are blind guides.”

Some believed in ‘covenantal nomism’ [covenant law], which holds that salvation is a consequence of being born into the covenant. Jesus said in referring to the people of Israel that not every plant [person born of] Israel will be left standing. Those not planted by the Father will be removed.

“The things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. For out of the heart come evil thoughts…these are what defile a person.”

[What one receives does not defile them, it is cruel and bitter criticism always comes from evil residing in the heart and mind.]

Exalting the merely legal over the truly moral is sheer hypocrisy, Jesus claims, because it professes allegiance to God’s law while disregarding God’s will. - IC

The passage moves from Pharisees complaining about how other people ate to a mother crying out to Jesus for mercy for her terribly suffering daughter.

Jesus did not immediately answer this pleading mother.

The disciples ask Jesus to send her away, which in this case could mean that they pleaded for her to be released from her torment.

She is a Gentile and Jesus Galilean ministry was to gather the “lost sheep” of the people of Israel, his own people.

Instead of giving up, this Gentile woman did as any mother would, she humbled herself before Jesus. She kneeled before him, cried out for help, and called Jesus “Lord” and “Son of David,” the Jewish Messiah.

She was tenacious, having faith that Jesus was not only able but also willing to heal her daughter.

Jesus said that it would not be right to give what belongs to the children (Israel) to others. But the term he actually uses for Canaanites or Gentiles is “dogs.”

Trouble in the World: We desperately cry out for help.

Just like the daughter we experience terrible suffering and pain in this life.

We need to know that there is somewhere or someone in whom we can find mercy.

We know that life is not easy, and that it will not be easy for long.

Just like the mother crying out to Jesus, we cry out to God desperately for help.

And sometimes, it can feel like God does not have much to say about it, or that God cares to respond to our cries.

It may feel like a response is never going to come, at least not while we are alive, but who needs an answer to prayer after they have gone through suffering?

Sometimes, the answer to our suffering comes at he end of our lives as we rise to live eternally with Christ.

I will not promise you that God responds with immediate healing or deliverance when we cry out to God, but I will say that God responds as we cry out to God in faith.

Many are experiencing hardships in life because of things that they could not choose for themselves, where they were born, into what kind of family, the color of their skin, or how much money their family had. Yet, others seem intent to remind them of their beginnings, as if they had forgotten. Still others, are intent on making life miserable for people they consider to be different.

Instead of doing like the Pharisees in making other people life them, Jesus had the opportunity to show his grace to a Gentile mother and daughter, even before his ministry spread to them specifically.

Grace in the Text: Jesus heals in response to tenacious faith.

Notes:

While addressing the Pharisee’s mistaken belief that rituals make people and things pure or impure, Jesus uses the opportunity to explain that pure intent of heart and mind acted out in faith is what determines what is good or evil.

Instead of the mother giving up, she contradicts Jesus statement saying, “Yes it is, even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”

If Gentiles are the “dogs” in this example, then the crumbs are the leftovers of the blessings of God given to the children of Israel.

God’s promise to Abraham was that all people [Jew and Gentile] would be blessed through his descendants.

The mother is content that even the crumbs of God’s grace are sufficient to relieve her daughter’s suffering.

This is the faith that Jesus recognizes, and he responds to effect the healing and release of her daughter.

She did not give up in the face of delay.

She did not give up in the face of testing.

She did not give up in the face of Jesus’ missional priority.

She did not give up because she loved her daughter and would see her healed and whole.

Jesus would not give up on her either, not just because of her mother’s tenacity, but because of faith in the good grace of God!

Jesus responded to her recognizing her faith that whatever God would give her would be right for her and her daughter.

Jesus gave her what she was begging him for. He healed her daughter in that moment.

Grace in the World: God responds as we tenaciously pursuing his grace.

Notes:

God is alive and present in the world finding opportunities to show us grace.

Are there opportunities for God’s grace among your family, friends or neighbors?

Is there anyone crying out to be helped from a terrible situation, suffering, or danger?

Is there anyone feeling unsafe among their own neighbors? Is anyone lacking food to eat, clothes to wear, or a roof over their heads?

Hearing of God’s gracious activities of healing and hope, we are encouraged to seek out God in faith to help us. In being helped by God, we know that others can be helped also.

It is Jesus who said:

Matthew 7:7–12 NIV

7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! 12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.

So, never give up in continually asking, humbling yourself, acknowledging Jesus as Lord, because God will bring God’s very best.