Today’s Sermon focus

Today is your opportunity to engage with the text during Brunch Church! And it’s not the easiest text, but we can do hard things.

This is one of those texts that make pastors groan when it comes up in the schedule of texts we follow. I groaned when I saw it was this text, knowing we were going to be doing Brunch Church and ask you to talk about the text with each other.

This one is hard. What are we supposed to do with the Jesus being not very Jesus-y here? For the most part, it seems that folks like to skim over that part and focus on the healing parts. But, it’s hard to ignore, isn’t it?

Anyone here find this to be hard? Anyone worried about what to say in your conversation about this text? Anyone find themselves wanting to make excuses for Jesus’?

I get it.

But have no fear. We can look at these texts without apology and see what we see. The Bible is trustworthy, even when it’s hard.

In advance of your conversation, there are some things to keep in mind to help us understand this text:

These places, Tyre and Sidon were enemy lands.

These were not just Gentiles, not just people who are non-Jewish. They were hated, long-standing enemies. It’s like reading about Nineveh in the story of Jonah. Nineveh was also not just some random place that was neutral to the storytelling. It was a stronghold of a brutal and terrifying enemy.

Does that change the story for you?

The Gospel of Mark is the gospel where Jesus is portrayed as his most human self.

He doesn’t always know what’s going on. He’s in the middle of it all, much like us humans are. He’s also figuring out God’s movement and action in his life. In the other Gospels, Jesus’ story is told from the point of view of his all-knowing-ness. He’s not confused by his identity or what he’s to be doing, but in Mark, we get a different vantage point on Jesus’ story and about him.

Does that reminder change how we might hear this? How might we respond to our nation’s enemy when they are begging us for a gift when we really are wanting to be left alone?

This is the beginning of Jesus’ inclusion of people outside of his group, his “tribe” into his ministry in the Gospel of Mark. This is a point of change.

After this interaction with this woman who had this total mic drop moment, his very next action is to go to another place of an enemy and not just heal someone, but heal someone in a way that is very much up in someone’s body. This wasn’t healing at a distance, like some of the healing stories or even like the story of the Syrophoenician woman’s daughter. This is getting all up close and personal for the sake of healing. And the prayer of healing he gives is the command to ‘Open!’.

So, three key pieces of information:

These were enemies
The Gospel of Mark shows Jesus’ humanity more than other gospels. As in, he may not be acting in his fullest expression of his identity as the Son of God. Maybe he’s also learning?
The Good News of Christ starts in the Jewish community, but it expands beyond that with Jesus.

Questions to consider:

What do you think about back-talking Jesus? Do you feel free to wrestle with God? Do you feel like your sass might be welcome?
Have you experienced a time when you wrestled with God?
What stories of wrestling of God in the Bible can you think of?
What are all the ways you think Jesus’ command to open might be healing in this case? What needs opening in your life? In our world?
What do you think of Jesus’ being taught by an enemy woman? Have you been surprised by the source of wisdom in your life? Is that sometimes painful? Shocking? Did it change you like it changed Jesus here?
What other questions might you want to explore?

AMEN

Gospel Reading – Mark 7:24-37

²⁴From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre.^[a] He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, ²⁵but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. ²⁶Now the woman was a gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. ²⁷He said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” ²⁸But she answered him, “Sir,^[b] even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” ²⁹Then he said to her, “For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.” ³⁰And when she went home, she found the child lying on the bed and the demon gone.

³¹Then he returned from the region of Tyre and went by way of Sidon toward the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. ³²They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech, and they begged him to lay his hand on him. ³³He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. ³⁴Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, “Ephphatha,” that is, “Be opened.” ³⁵And his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. ³⁶Then Jesus^[c] ordered them to tell no one, but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. ³⁷They were astounded beyond measure, saying, “He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.”

Service Recording

Sermon at 37:45

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