Pentecost XI

Matthew 15:21-28

Jesus and the disciples seem to receive what seems like 'sass' from a foreign, bad sort of religious person as they wander through a region not their own. It is not clear in Matthew's telling why they left the Galilee region -- 'home' -- to head for what essentially is the beach. (I mean, it is August...). They are in the 'region of Tyre and Sidon' which today is the coast of southern Lebanon. Both Tyre and Sidon were Canaanite/Phoenician trading cities, ancient and wealthy -- polyglot and diverse.

So, you'd think the disciples would be expecting to encounter different sorts of people. Yet, they're growing tired of the demands of the crowds who gather around Jesus for healing. They've been sent out to proclaim that the kingdom of God (repentance! justice! forgiveness! healing! transformation! a new way!) is actually at hand, so you'd think they would be expecting the demands of a crowd...

And, there is this persistent woman, who sticks around. 'Please send her away! She's so tedious! And, she's not even one of the people we're supposed to be gathering in -- very much not our demographic...'

It becomes yet another teachable moment -- the reversal of expectation that always accompanies the proclamation of the kingdom of God; the broadening of the circle of grace and healing to include those who can really give nothing useful in return, thus altering the transactional nature of the religious healing of the day.

She has a voice, and she uses it; she is articulating a need for her daughter -- healing. This reminds me of all the other people who come to Jesus seeking healing for others -- the centurion seeking healing for his 'friend' (perhaps his lover, some scholars suggest), other foreigners, too. Healing stories are always there for a reason, particularly when they name the names and social locations of those seeking healing. After all, Jesus and the disciples are constantly healing people in the crowds that gather wherever they go ('they brought out all their sick, and he healed them all...' is a fairly constant image in the Gospels), and the vast majority of these people remain nameless. Of course there is healing going on here -- Jesus is present, and his very presence means healing, whatever healing looks like for any given place, time, or person.

But, when the people are named, it is for the benefit of those hearing and telling the stories about Jesus -- whether in the first and second centuries when these stories were gathered, or now, for us, in our hearing and reading and proclaiming. This story is not 'about' a person being healed (of course she's healed!); it is about the confounding and redrawing of boundaries and expectations in the doling out of the healing, always in the direction of inclusion, and always powered and revealed by grace. Everybody gets to change their mind.

This woman's daughter is not 'supposed' to be the concern of the disciples -- and she's really annoying. Jesus expands the circle again.

What circles can be confounded today, redrawn with grace and for transformation and healing? And, whose voices get to help claim and articulate these things? The usual suspects? Or, something more confounding?

On any given day, where are you in this story? Outside, seeking healing from strange prophets? Part of the Body of Christ offering healing work in the world in strange places (in your own heart, even; certainly in the world together)? A tired disciple who understandably would like to limit the circle of personal/moral scope/responsibility?

GIve it all to God. And, find yourself participating in an 'economy' of healing - a flow - that has a very different sense of economics and circle of belonging from our regular, daily, early 21st century experiences.