Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost Year B-Br Luke

Andre-Rublev's Saviour

Homily preached by Br. Luke at Springwood Sunday 6th September 2015

Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost Year B

Gospel: Mark 7:24-37

There are two quite separate healings in today’s gospel reading. The Syrophoenician woman’s daughter and the deaf man. On first hearing these two passages, we may wonder what is happening. Usually when a person approaches Jesus and seeks a healing he does as they ask, yet here he does not. We have become accustomed to Jesus speaking the words of the healing, but here he touches and spits. I’m tempted to focus on the reading from James, but no I’ll explore the Gospel.

Let’s start by looking at the Syrophoenician woman. We could, and in today’s world many would, say that Jesus was being both racist and sexist. After she approaches him, he calls her a dog and practically tells her to go away. She however challenges him and he relents. Why? Is he testing her faith, has he suddenly decided that not everyone can be healed, or is he perhaps saying this for the benefit of those around him? There’s a conundrum here and one that we could all tied up in. I think the puzzle is easily solved, but it’s a resolution we have to be prepared to accept wholeheartedly and not try to explain away. And that will be a challenge to be sure.

The key to the passage lies in one little word: Gentile. The woman, and we assume her daughter, were not Jews. Remember that Jesus was, and his ministry had been among and to, the Jews. Yes, the Roman province of Palestine had many Gentiles living there and they had been there for many centuries. Remember also that it was the application of the Jewish law that the religious leaders invoked when they demanded Pilate crucify Jesus.

So why was that she as a Gentile is so important? I would suggest because Mark mentions this fact that makes it important. So let’s look more closely at the passage. Jesus was in a house and Mark says he wanted to be alone. Presumably the house was open and when people discovered he was there, came rushing to him. The woman must have been known to people in the house and they were friendly enough to her to let her approach him. They must also have known about her daughter.

When she approaches Jesus she kneels at his feet. The actions of a supplicant. We aren’t told her initial request, but we are told Jesus’s response. He doesn’t mention anything about faith or healing, but makes a somewhat cryptic comment about the children being fed first. We could ask, what on earth is he talking about? How on earth does food relate to this healing? Her response is equally as puzzling, she talks about dogs eating crumbs under the table?

There are two elements here. Jesus is giving a teaching, to his disciples and to those around him. In other words there is a teaching here, not for her, but his listeners. The people expected him to reject her as she was not Jewish. His comment about children being fed was intended to convey the message that his ministry was to the Jews.
But he is gently chastising the listeners. The woman was not to be deterred. She knew she was not a Jew. I think she knew he was speaking to the listeners, and not to her. I think she was smart and more in tune with Jesus than peopled realised. So her response was likewise, for the benefit of the listeners. She acknowledges that she is not Jewish and then says but please heal my daughter anyway. There is of course a strong display of faith in both Jesus’s ability to heal and her approach to him.

He says her words persuade him to agree to heal her daughter. And again he speaks the words of healing. There is not commending her faith, no instruction about what to do after he healed the daughter. We may have expected some sort of instruction, given she was not Jewish, but there was none. She goes home, and confirms that her request has been granted.

What is happening? Well as I mentioned earlier, this is a teaching for the disciples. Jesus is saying that the message of the Gospel will be for all people. The inclusion of a gentile in the ministry of Jesus demonstrates that the message is to spread beyond the children of Israel. There are hints of this elsewhere in the Gospels. When asked who their neighbour was Jesus uses the Samaritans. The centurion, a roman army officer asks for healing. But the clearest instructions are what we call the great commission and Peter’s dream as recorded in Acts.

Jesus is telling the people around him not become so caught up in the nationality of the person seeking healing. There is no place for exclusivity, the message is for all.
The second component of this passage, relates to the image of food and eating. I think the use food, is to remind us that Jesus is the word made flesh. It points us to the teachings about the Eucharist. It was last week that we read the passages about Jesus being the bread of heaven. As we discussed at Bible Study, Jesus’s words are the bread and when we consume them, we consume him and thus the word, and the Trinity dwells within us.


There’s a lot more here and we may leave this and the healing of the deaf man for Friday’s Bible study.

EASTER 1B: Folding Up the Past! Walking Out On Death!

“Moses said to YHWH, “But, never in my life have I been a man of eloquence,

either before or since you have spoken to your servant.” Ex 4:10

When someone dies, what do we do after the funeral? After the initial shock and sadness, the funeral and wake; What do we do? We eventually get around to giving away the dead persons clothes and decide which of their possessions we will keep or share with family and friends. Time goes by, and all the first time special days without them endured. Some will keep a picture of the deceased in a favourite room, but we do our best to move on with our lives and tend to the living. We don’t expect to see our dead again on this side of the grave. What an incredible gospel hope we hold in our hearts that those whom we have loved and who have died are alive in Christ and will share again in Resurrection life of Christ. What an even harder thing to imagine/believe that this to will and can happen to and for us.

In today's gospel (John 20:1-9) Mary Magdalen gives witness to a typical response to death and grieving. She was still close to the tragic events of 'Good Friday'. So, she goes to his tomb, “while it was still dark.” It was still too soon to pick up the pieces and carry on with life. Mary just wanted to be close to the Jesus she loved and the tomb was the last place she saw him and so she wants to be there. Then she will get on with what is left of her life. Her life she imagines will be different and difficult, because Jesus, now the centre of her life, had totally changed her. When Mary arrives at the tomb and sees it empty, she concludes, “They have taken the Lord from the tomb and we don’t know where they put him.” Later Mary meets Jesus, thinks he is the gardener only to discover he is the Risen Lord when he calls her name. She is then commissioned by Jesus to be the evangelist of the resurrection. Her new life mission, is to witness to the resurrection of the one whom she loved in the flesh. St Peter arrives with St John and goes into the empty tomb. He notes the remnants of death, but he "... failed to understand the teaching of scripture, that he must first rise from the dead." Jesus had to rise from the dead, otherwise we would be only having a memorial of the death of a great man. His rising from the dead makes all the difference for us believers. “Prove it!” our objectors challenge. How can we! We only have an empty tomb. But, what we do have is a heart transformed by the Risen One!

However, when St John the “one whom Jesus loved” arrives and looks into the tomb, he sees the remnants of death "the linen cloths lying on the ground ... the cloth that had been over his head ... rolled up in a place by itself" and, “he saw and he believed”. We are also those “whom Jesus loved” and we are gifted with faith-sight. In John’s gospel to receive sight is to see with the eyes of faith. We have an empty tomb and still we believe he has risen. Like the beloved disciple we “see and believe.” What stirred the disciple to believe? Did it have something to do with the neatly folded burial cloths? After all, who would steal a body and before leaving, fold the cloths? Well, it is an odd detail, but not one that would stir one to believe in the impossible. If those cloths were proof enough why didn’t they help St Peter and Mary Magdalen “see and believe?” The emphasis on the burial cloths left behind, is John’s way of saying, Jesus has left death behind and has been resurrected to new life. The beloved disciple got the message, "he saw and he believed." From his love for Jesus the disciple’s faith blossomed and as a result we, who have not yet seen, are strengthened in our faith. The beloved disciple helps us believe that we too are beloved by Jesus. Through his gospel account he wants us and our communities of faith to be witnesses to our resurrection belief and hope.

Jesus rising from the dead was not just a miracle of resuscitation. Lazarus was resuscitated, and would die again. Jesus rose from the dead, never to die again. His resurrection has brought about a whole new age. Now anything is possible, everything is different. This is seen in St Peter’s conversation with the gentile Cornelius in our first reading (Acts 10:34a, 37-43). In Jewish eyes the Gentiles were pagans and losers before God. St Peter had a vision that God wanted to save the Gentiles. Cornelius through a dream and a voice was directed to seek out the message of salvation (10:1-8). God has acted in a mighty way on behalf of the human family and included all in Jesus’ salvific action. As St Peter says, “... EVERYONE who believes in him will receive forgiveness of sins in his name.” ALLELUIA!