The faith. (Part I)

The Faith of a Canaanite Woman

²¹ Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. ²² A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.”
²³ Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
²⁴ He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
²⁵ The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
²⁶ He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
²⁷ “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
²⁸ Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.

Jesus Honors a Syrophoenician Woman’s Faith

²⁴ Jesus left that place and went to the vicinity of Tyre.^[g] He entered a house and did not want anyone to know it; yet he could not keep his presence secret. ²⁵ In fact, as soon as she heard about him, a woman whose little daughter was possessed by an impure spirit came and fell at his feet. ²⁶ The woman was a Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia. She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter.
²⁷ “First let the children eat all they want,” he told her, “for it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
²⁸ “Lord,” she replied, “even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”
²⁹ Then he told her, “For such a reply, you may go; the demon has left your daughter.”
³⁰ She went home and found her child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.


This passage is a very difficult passage. When i first read this passage, i was like WHAT?! Are you serious? Gentiles = dogs? In our modern perspective, to be called a dog is a huge insult.


But as i mediate on the word and research further, that was not the intention for Jesus. Jesus did not mean for all of us to be referred as dogs in today's context and meaning.

Jesus "withdrawn", from a fanatical crowd, refer to Mark 6, where it was mentioned that He fed five thousand. Jesus wanted to rest(after all He is in a Human body) and to provide for his disciples' rest. this was the extent of his ministry: Mark 6:31
³¹ Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”

²¹ Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.

 ²⁴ Jesus left that place and went to the vicinity of Tyre.

Then, while Jesus was "escaping from the crowd", and just wanting to rest and provide rest for His disciples,
Mark 7:24
He entered a house and did not want anyone to know it; yet he could not keep his presence secret.

This woman appeared after HEARING Jesus's arrival, stopping everything she was doing to come and plead Jesus for healing of her daughter. She was a Gentile and yet used the name Son of David. Not Jesus, but Son of David. She may have heard other people talking about Jesus and mentioning something about Son of David and the prophesy, but the fact remains that she probably did not read the bible and understand the full meaning of the title "Son of David".

So Jesus was here inside the house resting and ministering to his own disciples and this woman was crying out outside the house calling His Name and His Identity and yet His intention was to rest and keep his presence secret. 

Then Jesus did not respond to her. 
 
²³ Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”

Then His disciples suggested sending her away, healing her child. They went ahead to opening the door and letting the woman in without asking Jesus about it. After all Jesus just needed to command and the child will be healed. But the fact is that Jesus stayed silent. Silence, that is what many of us do not look forward to. Imagine you ask Jesus for something and yet He did not reply, he was just silent.   In many ways like this, Jesus wanted to test our response. And in this case Jesus was pleased with that response. 

Why?
Jesus was the Jewish messiah and He was sent for the Jews(and the rest too) and then through the Jews the word would be fulfilled and spread. In a way the woman being a Gentile, Gentile ministry was not Jesus's ministry, but the ministry of the Jews. 

It was clearer when the verse that proceeds.

²⁴ He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
²⁵ The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
²⁶ He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”

²⁷ “First let the children eat all they want,” he told her, “for it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”

lost sheep of Israel is referring to the Jews. 

Now, then it would be very clear that  non-chistians = dogs.

Continued below...

bury the dead

¹⁸ When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side of the lake. ¹⁹ Then a teacher of the law came to him and said, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.”
²⁰ Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”
²¹ Another disciple said to him, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.”
²² But Jesus told him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”

I found this passage interesting! Especially 21-22! Firstly we must recognize that the verses are not literal, when Jesus said in 22 let the dead bury their own dead, Jesus was not talking about the physically dead! To ask the physically dead to bury another physically dead does not make sense. After all how do you make a dead person bury another dead person? 

Jesus is talking about the dead spiritually, the people who are far away from God, that they do not walk with God. Jesus in other words were saying let those spiritually dead bury the dead, and do not deviate from your spiritual responsibilities that Jesus have given you. 

After all when Lazerous was dead, Jesus went to see him to raise him from the dead.

Authority

What does it mean to have authority?

What difference between 2 persons who do the same thing, one with authority, one without.

Let's all take a look at Jesus,

²⁴ “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. ²⁵ The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. ²⁶ But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. ²⁷ The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”

²⁸ When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, ²⁹ because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law.

People preached; Jesus and pharisees both preached the same teaching. But there is difference in the teaching because one of them had the authority to do so. 

We can do a whole lot of things in out life. We can read the bible and do all our stuff. But if we do not do with God's AUTHORITY, then what authority are we performing it on? Authority is a very powerful word. Authority can do a whole lot of things and do it well.

Imagine if you are an person who is very good in war tactics. Now imagine you are a general in the army, then you would be able to use the authority vested to apply your knowledge. However, if you are just some Tom, Dick and Harry, then you would not be able to make a difference, even if you told some general about your plans it would just be a suggestion. Suggestion.

Words without authority is a suggestion but words with authority is a command. 

When Jesus teaches He taught with authority and that is the reason people were amazed, because he was responsible for the word and he was put in a position to teach. But authority comes with a price. The price is working hard at it. To be come an army general you have to work hard at soldiering skills. To be come a teacher you need to go through NIE. To be come a Prof you need to take PHD and get professorship. To be come God's servants we need to take obey him and gain his trust. 

The question is do we have Godly authority vested upon us?

Presence of God

²⁴ Then Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, “Do not let anyone know about this conversation, or you may die. ²⁵ If the officials hear that I talked with you, and they come to you and say, ‘Tell us what you said to the king and what the king said to you; do not hide it from us or we will kill you,’ ²⁶ then tell them, ‘I was pleading with the king not to send me back to Jonathan’s house to die there.’”

I find this verse very interesting, in fact the king ordered the prophet to lie. Which makes me wonder.

Through out Jeremiah, i really felt sadness in my heart as God turned away from the people of Israel, Really, Israel was destroyed as i read more and more of the Book of Jeremiah. I am thankful of God's grace that we are able to enjoy worldly peace. I know it would not be long, but I thank God that we are all living in this decade enjoying such privilege. In hindsight, it is very dangerous to sin and not repent, truly repent. We see the consequences of sin that Israel brought upon themselves. Their everything was destroyed. EVERYTHING. Nebuchnezzar II destroyed everything but spared the prophet Jeremiah, just as his prophesy declared. It is always better in the presence of God than in sin.

God the Rod

^8-11 God explained, “This is the way I am going to ruin the pride of Judah and the great pride of Jerusalem—a wicked bunch of people who won’t obey me, who do only what they want to do, who chase after all kinds of no-gods and worship them. They’re going to turn out as rotten as these old shorts. Just as shorts clothe and protect, so I kept the whole family of Israel under my care”—God’s Decree—“so that everyone could see they were my people, a people I could show off to the world and be proud of. But they refused to do a thing I said.

God really loves Israel, first and foremost, the most basic reason is that God promised Israel's people in  Deut7:7-8:

⁷ The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
⁸ But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

This promise that kept Israel from withering out! God talked here about Israel being the fewest of all people that is why God chose them. 

In spite of that, in Jeremiah, God really turned away from His people. He was really angry with His people.

“Watch closely now. I’m going to teach these wrongheaded people.
    Starting right now, I’m going to teach them
Who I am and what I do,
    teach them the meaning of my name, God—‘I Am.’”

 

Wow, if somone said that i am going to stay far far away from him, but when its God who said it, i would really tremble in fear.