If you knew in advance that this message was entitled “Faith that
Mark tells us here that Jesus has gone into the region of
This particular woman in the passage has a daughter, and the diminutive form occurs in Greek—a little daughter—who is afflicted in the grips of demonic possession. The woman has heard of Jesus. Perhaps she has heard a buzz around town that Jesus is there. It may be that she didn’t even know who Jesus was, but someone told her of His teaching and His miracles—how he had healed many diseases, how he had fed a multitude with just a couple of fish and a few loaves of bread, how he had cast out demons. And believing that this Jesus was the only one who could help her little daughter, this woman comes to Him immediately (Mark’s favorite word), and fell at His feet repeatedly asking Him to deliver the girl from her affliction. And in so doing, we see her tremendous faith overcoming several mountainous obstacles.
I. Faith overcomes the mountain of social status
This woman is given a thorough introduction in the passage. But it is not her impressive credentials which demand our attention, but rather the lack thereof. As James Edwards says that the description of this woman “reads like a crescendo of demerit.”[1]
First of all, though it does not offend us as much as it would a first century Jewish male, this is a woman. It would have been deemed highly inappropriate in the prevailing sense of decorum for a woman to approach a man as this one has. The fitting thing to do would be to send her husband to Jesus rather than coming herself. But that brings us to our second consideration of her social status.
Secondly, she is mentioned without relationship to a husband, which some believe implies that she was possibly widowed, divorced, or had never been married. If she had been divorced or never married, then she would have born an additional social stigma of being an undesirable woman at best, an unclean and sexually immoral one at worst. We aren’t told anything about her marital status, so it would be speculative to suggest which of these situations might be true. Nonetheless, it compounds the cultural scandal for a woman to come to a man in this way, when nothing is known about her husband, or if she even has one.
Third, you will notice that she is called a Gentile, or more literally as the original language reads, a Greek. Though she was not from
Next we see more specifically that she is not just a Gentile, but “of the Syrophoenician race.” Now the word “race” in the NASB is sort of a modern interpolation. Prior to the rise of evolutionary thinking, people were not thought of as being part of different races. In fact, most folks are unaware that Darwin’s most influential work, The Origin of Species, was subtitled “The Preservation of Favored Races Through the Means of Natural Selection.” Before Darwinism came to prominence, it was generally accepted that all peoples shared a common origin, just as the Bible declares in Acts 17:26, “He made from one man (or one blood as the KJV says) every nation of mankind.” The Greek word used here in Mark 7:26 is genos, and literally carries the idea of family. It is much more biblically accurate to speak of different ethnicities as families of people, people groups, or nations rather than races. And this woman’s ethnic roots were Syrophoenician.
There was scarcely a rabbi in ancient
Today there are many who are separated from God because they have not the faith to overcome what they perceive as a stigma on their social status. Perhaps it is the color of their skin, their ethnic heritage, their marital status, or some other factor. These things stand in their way looming large as an insurmountable mountain. But we see in this woman a desperate and determined faith that would not keep her from the God who could help her, and she overcame that mountainous obstacle to encounter Jesus. So what is it that is keeping you from Jesus? Is there some shame you bear, that you fear will cause Him to turn you away? Oh no. Jesus has said, “The one who comes to me I will certainly not cast out” (Jn 6:37). Faith overcomes the mountain of social status.
II. Faith Overcomes the Mountain of Demonic Devastation
The woman’s little daughter “had an unclean spirit” we are told in v25, and it is explained to us later in the passage that this is a demon. We are not told how it happened or why. Those things are of lesser importance than the fact that her present state is one of absolute devastation. Mark does not supply detail about how this demon manifested itself in the daughter, but he has done so elsewhere. Most notably, we saw a severe case of demonic possession in Chapter 5 where a Gerasene man was possessed by a legion of demons. He lived among the tombs running about screaming and gashing himself with sharp stones. And we are told there that no one could bind him, for every time they tried to shackle him with chains to subdue him, he would break the chains. While we are not told that this little girls case was as severe as that man’s, we do know it must have been similar, even if on a smaller scale. And though the neighbors likely feared and jeered this little child, and pointed blaming fingers at her and her family, there was one who could not do so. This little girl was someone’s child. And her mother loved her and was concerned for the life of her daughter.
As a pastor, I have on too many occasions had to minister to families where a little one was sick with a terrible illness. Some of you have experienced this in your own family, or you know someone who has. And you know in those cases how the mother will pace, and worry, and she won’t sleep and she won’t eat until she knows that something is going to help her child. And we can only imagine how much more intense that must be when the child suffers not from a disease but from a demonic affliction. Where could this poor woman turn for help?
A doctor can do nothing about a demon. A psychiatrist cannot help. There are no medications or surgeries that can help. No human agent or invention can compete with the supernatural powers of Satan’s forces. In fact, in the epistle of Jude, we read about a confrontation between the archangel Michael and Satan – two ontologically equal beings, both being created angels. And there Jude says that Michael “did not dare pronounce against him a railing judgment, but said, ‘The Lord rebuke you!’” But the Syrophoenician people did not worship the Lord.
Her people were historically pagan idolators, but idols would be of no help. Jezebel, the pagan queen of
So no idol could help her. No human could help her. No angel could help her. This woman’s only hope was the true and living God, and somehow she had come to believe that Jesus was the only answer to her daughter’s demonic devastation. You may not be battling demonic possession but you are in the crosshairs of a spiritual battle that is being waged. Satan is at war with God but he is powerless to strike Him directly. And so he is out to bring devastation to God’s image-bearer—mankind. And when we find ourselves under attack, like this woman, we must overcome by faith in Christ. The faith that this woman had in Jesus would overcome the mountain of demonic devastation.
III. Faith Overcomes the
David Garland writes, “Pride stiffens the knees so that they will not bow down and muzzles our voice so that we do not call out in humble supplication.”[3] It might have that effect on many, but we don’t see a trace of it in the woman in our text. She is not concerned what others think of her when she runs to Jesus and falls at His feet begging Him repeatedly to meet her need. She was neither too proud to bow, nor too proud to beg. And when she put her case before Jesus, if there was any vestige of personal pride in her heart, it would have surely been revealed when she heard His response.
He speaks to her with a parable, saying in v27, “Let the children be satisfied first, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Now in the mind of the first century Jew, they were the children of God, and the Gentiles were dogs. They spoke of them often with that very term. And what Jesus seems to be saying here is, “Leave me alone woman! I didn’t come to help you Gentile Dogs, I came for the children of God.” That is what it seems like it He is saying.
Now, we don’t mind reading about Jesus calling the Pharisees a brood of vipers and a bunch of hypocrites. They deserve it. We kind of like it when He says those things to them. But we don’t like it when He calls a helpless and desperate woman a dog. That is shocking to us. Numerous efforts to soften it don’t do much to help us. Some have suggested that He spoke this with “half-humorous tenderness,” and others “with a twinkle in the eye,” perhaps nodding and winking at the fact that this is how she would expect to be treated by the average rabbi. Some have tried to make much of His use of the diminutive form, not the wild pack of dogs that roam the streets, but the “little dogs” that people keep as pets. But all of these efforts of interpretive ingenuity are without warrant. Famed NT scholar F. F. Bruce said, “A written record can preserve the spoken words; it cannot convey the tone of voice in which they were said.” All we have to work with here are the words on the page, and they are sharp and jagged. But although we may be tempted to be offended at these words, the woman who had come to Him was not.
Personal pride would have stimulated her to argument and accusation. She would have called Him a hypocrite, and plead that her case demands special treatment. She would try to change Him into who she wants Him to be to satisfy her need. But she doesn’t do that. She recognizes the parabolic nature of what Jesus is said, and enters into it in her response. She perceives that the word First has not shut off herself or her people from the gospel’s power. She recognizes the ordering of His mission – to the Jew first and then the Gentile, just as Isaiah had prophesied. In Isaiah 49:6, God says that His Messianic Servant would raise up the tribes of Jacob and restore the preserved ones
How shall we describe such faith? Humble, desperate, determined, persevering—yes all of these and then some. And Jesus says to her, “Because of this answer, go; the demon has gone out of your daughter.” And she went back home and found that it was so. Her faith overcame the mountain of personal pride, the mountain of social status, and the mountain of demonic devastation.
Let me conclude now with some points of personal application.
1) Perhaps you find yourself in a desperate situation in your life. Do not let any mountain stand between you and the God who can help you. Are you of a different cultural heritage? Have you come from a religious background of false belief or unbelief? Are you poor, single, widowed, divorced? Have you been cast out by those who claim to be religious? Perhaps some are on the other side – too wealthy, too successful, too happy in this life to see their need for Christ. Every person is in need of God’s help: high, low, rich, poor, urban, rural, Jew, Gentile, American, International. These mountains are not insurmountable. Come to Jesus in faith and find that those mountainous obstacles crumble beneath you as He makes His help available to you.
2) As you read the Bible, you will come across many sayings like the one in this passage which at first glance are very bitter pills to swallow. What will you do in those cases? Will you pretend those words don’t exist? Will you turn your back to God in anger? Will you turn to gods of your own making who are less offensive than the true and living God? Many have done just this. But to do so is to cut yourself off from the only possible source of real help. Embrace the mystery and the scandal of His truth, find yourself in it, and respond to Him from within His word, and you will find His grace falling, not just as crumbs from the table, but a satisfying feast of mercy in your life.
3) Jesus is the Savior of all nations, and He will receive all who come to Him in this state of humble faith, regardless of their ethnicity, their gender, their social status, their shame, or their present circumstances. The world needs to hear this message, and the church needs to hear this message. For the church is the body of Christ, the visible manifestation of His Kingdom in this age. And many churches have been derailed from the purposes of God by personal prejudice and pride. Historically, this church has not, and for that we praise God. But we must not rest on memories of the past. We must ask ourselves what we are doing in this day to make Christ known among all people. Would we venture into
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