Here's some extra first thoughts on the passage this week to get us thinking a little. Good to have a discussion here.
You can’t keep God tied down. Just when you think you’ve got the Realm
of Love worked out, or at least you’ve worked out a manageable portion
of it, it just goes and bursts its seams and spills out all over the
place. It generally gets a bit like that in the places of theology and
faith, and the lesson is always the same: don’t tie God down. God’s the
best escapologist there is.
Here is Jesus on the edge of Israel,
taking a short tour outside the Chosen Nation’s borders and the passage
is a great description of the Reign of God as it explodes in the Gentile
world. A woman who was not Jewish asks Jesus to help her daughter and
Jesus says he came for Israel only and not for the Gentile dogs and the
woman says that as a Gentile dog she was prepared to have just a crumb
or two from the banqueting table of what Jesus brought for Israel. Then
comes the moment and it hits Jesus on the solar plexus: this realm of
love is bigger than Israel, and as if to prove the point he then cures a
man who cannot see or speak (a Gentile) as if he is saying: go witness,
go proclaim this reign of love that has just found a new playground
outside of Israel, and then he goes off and feeds 4000 Gentile people as
if saying, ‘This banquet is open for all.’
What Jesus actually
says to the man who cannot speak is, however: don’t tell a soul. This is
one of Mark, the Gospel writer’s, techniques for trying to explain why
the Jews didn’t take Jesus at his word by suggesting Jesus himself told
them to keep it all a secret.
Perhaps Jesus has been caught with
a theology that is too small and the Gentile woman broadens his mind a
little, or maybe he is just playing verbal word game with the woman.
Either way, the kingdom rolls out into the Gentile world and things are
never the same again.
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