August 17, 10:30am (Sare Gordy)
There are many things we can take away from this story – including the idea that even Jesus can be wrong, and that sometimes flip-flopping on issues can be a good thing. There’s a certain humility about that – because if Jesus can be wrong about anything, so can we.
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I had planned to talk about love this morning, but instead I want to say a word about faith.
Now, when I say ‘faith’, what I don’t mean is a checklist of incredible, semi-credible or totally credible things that must be swallowed back like a bitter pill as an entrance fee to a society. I don’t mean faith, as in reciting a certain creed or being filled with a profound and overwhelming feeling of devotion to a person, idea, event, or deity.
I mean faith, as one of its ancient definitions: trust. Faith defined as trust.
Think about it: when we collaborate with someone, weather a project at work or school or something around the house, we either trust that the other person is going to do what they say, or we don’t. When someone is holding the ladder as we paint above our heads, we’re trusting them to do that job. When we trust something or someone to be true, we can go about our own lives, our own doings without having to worry, because we know that the other part, the part that they are responsible for, is being taken care of. Or, perhaps, there isn’t any trust, or not much, in which case we do have cause to worry.
The woman who approached Jesus trusted. She had faith. But it’s interesting to note in this story that we’re told – this story in which Jesus is actually on his way to heal and exorcise great masses of people, though our story cuts off just before that happens – simply having faith, simply trusting, the internal act of trusting wasn’t enough to get her what she wanted. She had to trust, and she had to act in the world around herself.
She went to the famous (or infamous, depending on your perspective) traveling Rabbi and approached him before he arrived at his destination, and proceeded to pester him. Her first approach was perhaps not one of a pest, but she was a Samaritan, and of all the deeply questionable people Jesus regularly hung out with Samaritans weren’t among them. And he refused to see her. But this woman was persistent – her child was afflicted with a demon, and she knew, she just knew that this Rabbi had the power to heal her child. Maybe it’s easier in situations like these – being persistent against all odds – when it’s for someone you love, rather than yourself. All the same, she was persistent, and finally, at length, was able to ask the Rabbi for help. At which point, he insulted her. Called her a dog – which, then and now was not a term of endearment. And she countered with the sort of play on words, the sort of verbal repartee which you can find all throughout the scriptures, though it doesn’t always get translated that way.
Jesus calls her a dog, and tells her he can’t waste himself on the likes of her.
She points out that even mangy mutts get the occasional scrap from the head table.
And suddenly, Jesus does a 180. He completely flips his prior position and agrees. And then without another word to actually heal her daughter, to exorcise the demon, to do anything at all, he pronounces the daughter healed because of the mother’s faith. Period. The end. End of story.
There are many things we can take away from this story – including the idea that even Jesus can be wrong, and that sometimes flip-flopping on issues can be a good thing. There’s a certain humility about that – because if Jesus can be wrong about anything, so can we.
But another thing to take away from the story is that faith defined as trust is a good, solid definition, but it is lifeless if it is not accompanied by action on our own part. We may, for instance, be the sort of person who trusts in the inherent goodness of people in this world, but if that trust isn’t backed by action on our own part – action, say, to be a good person to strangers and acquaintances as well as our own family and friends – then that trust threatens to be lifeless and lacking in integrity.
And this isn’t to say, or even imply that we’re supposed to be perfect. Integrity is, after all, the space between what we say and what we do, and that the space is ever closing, inch by inch. We don’t need to be perfect. Jesus wasn’t perfect. But Jesus, when faced with the truth, even a truth he didn’t like, always owned up to it, in the end. We can strive to do the same.
Amen.
