Day of the Dog

Propers: The Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost (Lectionary 16), A.D. 2018 B

Homily:

Lord, we pray for the preacher, for You know his sins are great.

Grace, mercy and peace to you from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Tyre was an island once, quite some time ago. A strong, proud fortress of rock jutting out into the Mediterranean Sea, safely sequestered a few hundred yards offshore. The people who lived there went by many names. The Bible calls them Canaanites, but to the Greeks they were Phoenician, while the Romans encountered them at Carthage.

At a time when most humans did not know how to swim, the people of Tyre ruled a great seafaring empire. They got rich first off the cedars of Lebanon, then from a rare purple dye drawn from a mollusk, which proved to be all the rage. They traded far to the west, even to the Atlantic. And when enemies came, all they had to do was paddle out to Tyre, their fortress on the rock, well-supplied and well-guarded by their fleet, to wait out the invaders who would eventually get bored and go home.

In the time of Moses and Joshua, Tyre was part of the Promised Land, an area covered by God’s Covenant with Israel. By the time of David and Solomon, the King of Tyre was Israel’s closest ally, going so far as to build the Temple in Jerusalem with Tyrian architects and Lebanese lumber. When Babylon came to wipe out the Kingdom of Judah, sending God’s people into Exile, the Tyrians held out on their impregnable island for 13 long years, before finally making peace with the invaders.

Alas, a few centuries later came Alexander the Great, subduing Babylon and Persia, and marching on to Egypt. The Tyrians took to their island, as they always had, confident that they would survive this conflict as they had so many others. But Alexander was not one to let something so trifling as the Mediterranean keep him from his conquest of the world. And so his armies built a massive causeway out to Tyre, literally extending the coast, so that his soldiers could march up, put the city to the sword, and sell any survivors into slavery.

Tyre was an island no longer. Alexander had eaten it.

In our Gospel reading today, Jesus travels north: beyond Judah, beyond Samaria, beyond even His home region of the Galilee. And He comes secretly to Tyre, the ancient ally of His forefather David, still connected to the coast by Alexander’s causeway, which by now is just part of the land. He does not wish anyone to know who He is or why He’s come. Indeed, He appears to be on a spiritual retreat. And who could blame him?

A lot has happened recently. He’s been rejected by His own people in Nazareth. His cousin John, Forerunner of the Lord, has been beheaded. And Jesus, in response John’s murder, caused quite a stir by miraculously feeding 5,000 men along with their families—5,000 men, provocatively, being the size of a Roman legion.

So now He’s come north to meditate, to pray, and to ready Himself for what He knows now lies ahead. The death of John, who preceded Jesus in all things, foretells that the time has come for Christ to begin His long march to Jerusalem, where He knows very well He will be crucified. He has come to Tyre, I think, to prepare.

Yet even here, in the wild pagan north, the Messiah can find no peace. He is recognized by a Syrophoenician woman—whose ancestry is Canaanite, yet whose culture is now Greek—and she immediately intrudes upon His solitude. She completely lets the cat out of the bag. Here He is, having lost His cousin, preparing for death, knowing that betrayal and torture and the Cross lie ahead of Him, and this woman is running up and down blabbing His identity to the world.

She bows at His feet. “Sir,” she pleads, “I know who you are. I know what you can do. We’ve all heard the stories. Word of Your miracles has traveled up and down the trade routes from Capernaum. Now please, I beg of you, heal my daughter, my little girl, who is infested by a demon.”

And Jesus, exhausted, stressed, desperately seeking a moment to Himself—a moment forever denied Him by the crowds wheresoever He may roam—tells her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the little dogs.”

And that sounds pretty harsh, especially to modern ears. Did He just call that woman a dog? Did He just refuse to help a parent pleading for her child? Many preachers, mind you, have opined that this woman is an outsider: a Canaanite, a Gentile, a pagan; a vulnerable social outcast. But just the opposite is true. This is Tyre, not Israel. Jesus is a stranger in a strange land. And to be perfectly frank, Tyre at this stage has a history of violently persecuting Jews. To be outed as an Israelite, as a Judean, risks Jesus’ life. This may well be another reason why He came in secret, came in silence. She has the power here.

Moreover, Jesus’ answer is not “no.” He doesn’t say that Tyre isn’t part of God’s plan. It is, in fact: the whole world is included in God’s plan of salvation, and Tyre especially as part of the Promised Land. What Jesus says to her is “not yet.” First I must save Israel, He tells her, and then I will save Tyre. I will save Samaria, I will save the Greeks, I will save Rome herself, but we must wait for the proper time. Note that this is the same answer Jesus gave to His own Mother when they ran out of wine for the wedding at Cana: “It is not yet My time.”

“But sir,” she presses Him, “even the family pets enjoy the crumbs that fall from the table.” Is there not an abundance of blessing, she asks? Is there not more than enough for us all? And Jesus here relents—just as He did with His Mother.

“You’re right,” He says. “For saying that, you may go. The demon has already left your daughter.”

This is not an incident wherein Jesus needs to be taught a lesson. The woman does not shame our Lord into learning to be woke. Rather, this is a classic example of someone contesting with God, as do men and women of faith throughout the Bible. When God pronounces judgment on Israel, Moses wrestles with Him, contests with Him. And God relents! God listens. God responds to our prayers. He is not made of stone.

It’s not that God is mutable or fickle as we are, changing His all-knowing mind, but God wants us to wrestle with Him, grapple with Him, struggle with Him—as we struggle with anyone whom we truly love. That’s what Moses did; that’s what Job did; that’s what David did. The very name Israel means “one who wrestles with God.” And that’s what the Syrophoenician woman does here. She contests with God, struggles with God, will not let God go until He blesses her.

Ask and it shall be given unto you, Jesus says. Seek and ye shall find. Knock and the door shall be opened! Don’t let God go until He blesses you.

After this encounter with the woman in Tyre—Tyre the ancient foe, Tyre the ancient friend—Jesus marches out into the Decapolis, into the land of the pagans, and works for them all the same miracles and wonders and promises He had previously wrought for the people of God in the Holy Land. He casts out demons, proclaims release to the prisoners, and miraculously feeds thousands of people just as He had in Israel. Let it never be said that our Lord does anything halfway.

This was always part of the plan, mind you. He was always going to save the world, regardless of whether we’re Jewish of Gentile, male or female, slave or free. But because of this woman’s pleading on behalf of her daughter, He goes out to the Gentiles now! The retreat is over. He shan’t have a moment’s peace. Indeed, as soon as He’s done here, He has to start the long hard march to Jerusalem, to Golgotha, to the Cross.

But by God, in the time He has, He is going to heal and feed and forgive as many people as He can—trusting that we, His disciples, will finish the job He has begun.

Wrestle with God. Respond to great need. And remember that all of humanity will rise from the dead. This is the promise of God, the promise for all peoples. And God does not break promises.

In the Name of the Father and of the +Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.