Being Human

Sermon based on Mark 7:24-37; James 2:1-10, 14-17

There are two things I want you to take away from today’s sermon (and I’m going to tell you that up front)–first, that Jesus really messed up.  And second, he learned from his mistake and went in a new direction.

Let’s talk about his mistake.

Jesus went somewhere quiet–I’m sure he was mentally and physically spent.  He escaped to gentile territory for a silent retreat, but it was not to be.  He was recognized by a woman who was not Jewish, and who came from a rival territory.

And she begged him for help.  “My daughter is possessed by a demon–please help!”

And Jesus said no.  Not only did he say no, but he also referred to her a dog.

Now there are plenty of theologians that say “He didn’t really call her a dog.  He was using a term related to her status, her race, her gender.”  But, I’m not going to be one of those pastors that defends Jesus.  Jesus called this woman a name, he categorized her as something other than human, when she was in a desperate situation.

I’m not going to defend Jesus here.  In fact, I’m going to paint him in a really bad light.  Jesus forgot who he was.  He forgot his humanity in this moment.

It’s tempting to get angry with Jesus here.  It’s tempting to be feel bitter about his treatment of this woman, to want to put him in an undoing oppression training.  Jesus was not on his best behavior here.  In fact, he was pretty awful.  Nowhere else in the scripture does he refuse a direct request to heal someone–whether they be Israelite or otherwise.  Nowhere else in the gospels does he respond to someone asking for help with such insulting words.  No where else does Jesus treat someone so poorly.

What he said to this woman is completely out of character.

Now, it would be a more awful story if Jesus had said this, and the woman slunk away into anonymity.  It would be awful if the story ended with an insult from Jesus to a helpless woman.

Thankfully, Jesus had met his match with this strong, determined, self-possessed woman.  She knew of Jesus’ power, and come hell or high water, Jesus was going to help her daughter.  So, using the language Jesus used against her, she turned it around, and reminded Jesus who she was.  She was a beloved child of God, a human made in God’s image.

Jesus, for a moment, forgot his humanity and hers.  He forgot.  He gave a stock response to the woman–one that he had probably been taught in his own community–and he forgot his humanity.  He forgot that he was God’s beloved child, in whom God was pleased.  He forgot his proclamation in the temple just a few weeks earlier–the reign of God is near.  He lost touch.

But this woman snapped him back to reality.

If I was tempted to be angry with Jesus for using a derogatory term towards the Syrophanecian Woman, I’m more impressed with Jesus’ quick response.

Jesus doesn’t get defensive.  He doesn’t get indignant.  He doesn’t insist he’s right, or justify his words.  He basically said, “You’re right. I will heal your daughter.”

Jesus was schooled by this gentile woman, and he understood his error as soon as she pointed it out.  And he changed.

Jesus really messed up, and when he was corrected by this self-possessed woman, he changed his ways.

During my sabbatical, I spent a few weeks in the West Bank.  I visited Palestinians in Jerusalem, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Hebron.  I’ve taken this trip before, but this time, I led the Christian Peacemaker Delegation.

Many of the stories were ones that I’d heard before, but it was good to hear updates from my Palestinian friends and deepen my relationships there.  I did meet with a new group of people in Beit Umman–they were from a group called Roots.  Roots is made up of Palestinians and Settlers committed to engaging in dialogue towards social change.  It’s led by a Palestinian peace activist–Ali Abu Awwad–and a Rabbi who lives in a nearby settlement–Rabbi Hanan Schlesinger.

I was pretty skeptical about this group.  Why would Palestinians talk to settlers?  Wasn’t that inviting pain and victimhood over and over again?

Rabbi Hanan started our visit to Roots by talking about the first time he ever met a Palestinian.  After living in the West Bank, surrounded by Palestinians for 34 years, he met Palestinians for the first time in 2014.  He was invited to a gathering of settlers and Palestinians, and was shocked that they lived just on the other side of the wall from his settlement.  Hanan was confronted with the reality that though he had walked right by Palestinians for years, he never really saw them.

After meeting a Palestinian, Hanan had this awakening, this opening of his spirit.  He remembered serving in the army, pulling Palestinians from their homes in the middle of the night, arresting them, and detaining them, and it broke his heart.  He realized that while he had been settling on this land that God promised his people, others were being pushed from their centuries old homes.  He realized that while he had a truth–that this land belonged to the Israeli people–there was another truth that needed to stand beside it.  The Palestinian truth.

Hanan then introduced his Palestinian partner in peace, Ali Abu Awwad as his Rabbi, his teacher.

Ali talked to us about the importance of not playing the role of victim, the part that was given to the Palestinians by the government.  But he went further than just refusing to be a victim.  He said this, “The problem is not with the convinced people.  The problem is with the people that disagree with us.  If we are real leaders, our work should be done with the people that disagree with us.”

So, Ali has developed relationships with settlers, with the very people that have taken his family’s land, have raided his home, and have imprisoned him.  He’s working to meet people where they are and to give people their humanity back.  He enters the world of the settler, and the settler enters his world, and in doing that everyone has the possibility of becoming human again.

I have to admit:  I had a really hard time with what I was hearing from both Hanan and Ali.  I was angry with Hanan for not seeing Palestinians sooner.  I wanted him to be in a different place with his beliefs.  I wanted him to be more radical than he is or probably ever will be.

And I worried about Ali.  Did he have support in the Palestinian community for this?  Was his relationships with settlers going to be the death of him, either at the hands of Palestinians or settlers?

But I continued to come back to this thing that Ali said–at a certain point, folks have to be willing to talk with their “enemies.”  We have to be willing to return our humanity into our relationships and civil discourse.  And for that very important reason, I’m grateful to Ali and Hanan for their courage and persistence.  I’m sure that their relationship is not an easy one.  I’m sure they disagree in more areas than they agree.  But, they stick with it.  Sometimes, as ridiculous as it seems, we have to be willing to see each other as “human” and that is what they are trying to do.

The syrophoenician woman refused to be a victim, and she refused to let Jesus off the hook with his inhuman words to her.  And for that I’m grateful.  But not every person we dehumanize is going to have the presence of mind to call us out.  And it’s not really their responsibility.  It’s a kindness they do for us, and we should not expect it.

This week the reminders of our humanity have come in the form of children washed up on the shores, of families crawling through barbed wire for the possibility of safety, of hunger strikes for freedom.  We’ve had plenty of opportunities to have our humanity returned to us.  The people in the stories and images we’ve seen this week have show us what humanity looks like–and most of them did not do this by choice.

To be human is to be made in an image and likeness of God.  To be human is to be known and beloved despite imperfections and inadequacies.  To be human is to make mistakes, and to learn and grown from them.

I’m going to stand by my words here–Jesus made a mistake.  He called the syrophoenician woman a dog.  He had a moment of not seeing her as the beloved human God made her to be.

Instead of being angry with her for the correction, he healed her daughter.  And he went on to heal others–to open their ears and eyes to God’s reign.

This is what Jesus did, and what we are asked to do–to see each other as human, as people made in the image and likeness of God, as God’s beloved.

This seems like it should be easy.  But when I think about the difficult moments in my last few weeks, I immediately think about the words I use to describe people that have wronged me or people I love.  I think about the soldiers that demolished Issa’s village in the Negev for the 88th time.  I did not call the soldier’s “beloved of God.”  I think about the settlers that chase sheep herders in Danya’s village in the South Hebron hills.  I did not think of those settlers as God’s children.  When I lamented a broken relationship this week, I did not seek understanding.  I resorted to labels and name-calling.

Beloved of God, we proclaim the reign of God with our mouths and our very lives.  And we mess it up–all the time.  Beloved, we proclaim the word of God with great inaccuracy.  And when we are corrected–by conversation, by images, or by the words and stories in scripture–may we take those corrections and use them to continue to open eyes and ears to God’s work in the word.

AMEN.