September 5, 2021. Sometimes we might feel we want to hide out. In today’s sermon we hear about Jesus wanting to hide out, and the Syrophoenician woman who comes and begs for his help for her daughter.

Readings: Isaiah 35:4-7a, James 2:1-17, Mark 7:24-37

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Did any of you have a favorite place to hide out? Or maybe you have one now? When I was in junior high and high school, I would go to the library, or the bookstore, get a couple of new books, and then find a secluded booth at a nearby Taco Bell and settle in to read, sometimes for hours. No cell phones, no way to get ahold of me. I could hide out for as long as I wanted. It was the perfect prescription when I needed to get away from it all.

If any of you can relate to that feeling, we can hear in this story of Jesus today in our gospel that we are not alone. Mark tells us that Jesus himself wants to hide in the house and not let anyone know he is there. And here comes the Syrophoenician woman, asking — no, begging — for help for her daughter who is ill. And Jesus, Jesus, calls her a dog, this Syrophoenician woman who just wants to save her daughter.

This is quite shocking, really. Far from drawing lines or shutting people out, Jesus usually claims a place and beloved-ness of people seen as outcasts — people like the Syrophoenician woman. Particularly in Mark, Jesus likes to give us the same message again and again, and most of the time the lesson is: all are beloved. This message starts for us today with our Isaiah text, calling us to know the sacredness of creation, and continues in James as he commands us to love without distinction. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself. But if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.”

There are no limits to God’s embrace, all through the Older Testament, and Jesus’ ministry carries that through. The Good Samaritan was rejected by those around him simply because he was a Samaritan. But he is the one Jesus says will come to our aid when we are lying in the ditch. And there is the woman at the well, who Jesus takes time to talk to in spite of her status as a foreign woman. The woman caught in adultery, lepers, Zacchaeus and other tax collectors, and on and on: countless examples of God welcoming the outsider, Jesus lifting up the outcast.

And still, today, Jesus takes away this woman’s humanity, explicitly excludes her from the message he himself has given over and over, that all are included as God’s children. I think we all have those days, don’t we? When as hard as we try, we just want to hide, and in our humanity we fall short of our ideals. We speak about patience, and turn around and snap at those closest to us. We do our best to embody grace, and then growl through our mask at the cashier at the grocery store, or snarl over the phone at the person trying to solve our internet issues. We preach forgiveness, and then we realize, it means the neighbor whose dog digs up our yard, too.

We claim, as Jesus did so many times, that all are welcome, all are beloved, and then we become aware that although we find it easy to welcome LGBTQIA people, our community, workplace, or school is not actually welcoming for those with disabilities. Or we hear the voices of our black siblings, and come to realize that, in so many places where we take our comfort and our belonging for granted, they do not feel valued, heard, or even safe. We all have those days. We all have those barriers within us.

Mark shows us a Jesus who is fully human, as well as fully divine, and in today’s gospel we see a glimpse of Jesus’ humanity. And caught hiding, Jesus shows us how we are called to respond when we are caught in our blind spots. We don’t know why or how it happened… maybe Jesus was tired and caught off-guard. Maybe he wanted to demonstrate what we shouldn’t do, kind of like a living parable. However it happened, in that moment the Syrophoenician woman doesn’t challenge his words, but says that even dogs need to be fed. She reflects Jesus’ words back to him, highlighting just how awful his comment was. Called out, Jesus doesn’t make excuses or explain why he was right or what he really meant.

With no further discussion, Jesus heals her daughter. And before we can even move on from today’s gospel passage, Jesus does it again: restoring hearing to the deaf man, outcast not only because he couldn’t hear, but also because he, like the Syrophoenician woman, was a gentile. This is no accident. Mark tells us that as he journeys, Jesus is traveling through Greek country and is bound to encounter many who are not Jewish and are seen as outsiders.

In the end, this story is about Jesus, but it is also very much about the Syrophoenician woman. The one with the ill daughter. The one seen as an outcast. The one called a dog. The one who had been unheard, and explicitly excluded. And yet, she didn’t give up. Jesus rejected her, with prejudice. Nevertheless, she persisted.

The Syrophoenician woman seems to have known, as Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and other activists have always known, that persistence is necessary for justice to come. She knew Jesus could heal her daughter. She knew she was worthy of healing. And like Dr. King, Annie Lee Cooper, John Lewis, Rosa Parks, and other leaders of the Civil Rights movement, she didn’t allow attempts to silence her to stop her as she sought what she so desperately needed. And the next thing we know, Jesus is restoring the hearing of the deaf gentile, too. Healing for the woman’s daughter opened the possibility for others to be healed as well.

In all of our history, people claiming their right to justice and dignity and their place among God’s children have done as the Syrophoenician woman did. Slavery ended, women achieved the right to vote, LGBTQIA people claimed their right to exist, and so many other injustices have been righted because of people whose voices have rung out persistently over the years, including today, as black people demand that the long history of brutality against them end.

Even in the ELCA, our church, people who have been shuffled to the side or out the door have claimed their place in the pews and the pulpits, living out the courage and desperation of the Syrophoenician woman in their own times and places. All of this took not days, weeks, or months, but years, of people following the lead of the Syrophoenician woman insisting she be heard.

So we can take heart today. The Syrophoenician woman was tired, too, but her persistence succeeded. And even Jesus wanted to hide away sometimes, and stumbled as he embodied the vision that God’s love and mercy are for everyone. But that vision rekindled. The promise of God to Isaiah, and Jesus’ challenge and invitation to live out God’s justice, persist, just when we think we are ready to find a good hiding place. God’s mercy is wide when we fall, and with so many gone before us, we are far from alone.

Thanks be to God.

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2021, Christ Lutheran Church, Webster Groves, sermon, podcast, transcript, YouTube, video, Pastor Meagan McLaughlin, Isaiah 35:4-7a, James 2:1-17, Mark 7:24-37