Sermon for 8 September 2024 - 23rd in Ordinary year B

We start with that most remarkable story from Mark’s Gospel when Jesus appears to be calling a gentile woman, a dog.
The passage follows on from a discussion about clean and unclean food which we heard last Sunday. Now the passage moves on to clean and unclean people, in the Jewish sense, of being acceptable or unacceptable people in the sight of God.
When it comes to the clean/unclean food argument, Jesus demolishes the whole concept that certain foods make one unacceptable before God.
In this passage concerning the Syrian-Phoenician woman, despite how it looks at first, the argument is continuing in the same direction. There are no intrinsically unacceptable or unclean people to God any more than there are any intrinsically unclean foods. It’s what lies in the heart that matters to God, not ethnic origin, be that child of Abraham or gentile.
In the healing of the gentile woman’s daughter, we see Jesus extending the frontiers of his kingdom. Tyre and Sidon were supposed to be part of the Promised Land, and in Joshua 19.28 the area was allotted to the tribe of Asher, but the Phoenicians proved too strong, and the area was never incorporated into Israel. Today, we see that where the Law of Moses failed to reach, Jesus can bring into the kingdom by his healing touch.
The following story of Jesus going again to a gentile area beyond Galilee to heal the deaf mute is a symbolic announcement of all that is to come. Jesus makes those who were mute in singing God’s praise (the gentiles) to be able to speak, and those who were deaf to the call of God (the gentiles), to be able to hear.
In Paul's day, it became very important that Jesus had himself inaugurated the mission to the gentiles.