Dogs to Daughters

“ It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour. ”

So what's wrong with dogs? Man's best friend comes under a hail of insulting language when we read about dogs in the Bible. In the Middle East, dogs are feared, distained and seldom made into the pets we have here in America. Part of that is, since they are not domesticated, they often run in packs killing other small animals, eating garbage, and threatening children. It's a bad thing to run into a pack of yellow dogs in a Damascus back alley.

But in Israel, dogs were used to guard sheep and people's homes. And yet a dog was not considered worthy of love and respect. Gentiles were called “dogs,” especially male temple prostitutes. St. Paul calls false apostles “dogs,” and those who are shut outside heaven St. John calls “dogs.” Poor dogs. Goliath asked David, “Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves?” 1 Samuel 17:43 And as prophesied, the evil queen Jezebel was eaten by dogs. Finally, Proverbs of Solomon poignantly comments that, “As a dog returneth to his vomit, so a fool returneth to his folly.” Proverbs 26:11

So when Jesus is accosted by a wild Phoenician woman in the borders of Tyre and Sidon, the ancient cities of these Canaanites, he first ignores her cries, then calls her a dog . Our image of the compassionate Jesus staggers at the words He uses. It seems racist, abusive, and cruel. Knowing our Lord not to be any of these things, we must recast the situation. She comes seeking a deliverance from a devil that has possessed her daughter.

I have been in this situation, pretty close. A woman I don't know calls me up and says she has heard I do deliverance prayer. She says her parents had her subjected to satanic ritual abuse as a child and that she is tormented day and night. Can I come and do a house blessing and pray for her? Can I come over right now, or tonight? If you don't feel a bit uncomfortable with such a request, please understand: this may be a witch who wants to compromise a Christian minister in her home. She may be in earnest, but will never come under the authority of a priest and his church and the healing will ultimately fail. This could be a demon talking through her . This woman, even if she no longer is involved with the cultic practices she was once subjected to, may not be any kind of a Christian.

So I ask some pointed questions. Have you been Baptized, and how was it done? Where do you go to church? Who is your minister? Have you asked him for help? Are you married and is your husband home? If a person is not part of the church, how can a priest extend his authority, which comes from the church, to rid a pagan of her demons? If the demonized comes into the church, submits to the authority here, and wants help: that's an entirely different circumstance.

Jesus was in the woman's territory. He knew what the Phoenicians practiced. Their religion was close to being a Satanist cult, offering children to demons for power. This daughter of hers may have been offered to Ashtaroth , a goddess of fertility, or to Ba'al , her mate. This daughter may have been sold into temple prostitution. How does a young girl become demon possessed? This was not a Jewish situation. Jesus was sent to the Jews, and His Father had not extended His mission beyond those parameters. The Jewish followers He called to be His Apostles would take the Gospel to foreign shores. This was not the time for seeking and saving the lost Phoenicians. What did she believe? What authority did she submit to? What would be the value of this deliverance if, tomorrow, she turned again to the temple of the goddess and sold her daughter to be used by them? All this was behind Jesus' statement: “ It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs.”

I am also frequently hit on by people with needs. As a minister of the church, and one downtown especially, I hear a lot of stories. These stories are sometimes interesting, often heart rending, but seldom true. “My wife and seven kids are here in Chico. Our pickup broke down and we've had to fix it. We're traveling from Portland to Denver and got stuck here. The shelter isn't good for the kids and we don't want CPS to take them. Can you help us with a room for the night?” Wouldn't you want to help him? Do you know his real story? Neither do I, but you don't get to Chico traveling from Portland to Denver. The road doesn't get here that way. I have to refuse, saying the church isn't a gas station, or it doesn't have funds for such things. I'm not really saying, “No,” just yet, but I'm waiting for the rest of the story. “How did you get here from Portland to Denver?” I might ask. Or, “Where's the family now?” If they begin talking, another story comes through. “Well, right now they're at my brothers place, but we can't stay there.” Or, “It's not really my family. She ain't really my wife, but we mean to get married when we get to Denver and I get a job.” If I help a man under false pretenses, it makes the Church of Jesus a patsy, but worse, it makes him a thief. Am I helping somebody by making him a thief, by letting him steal from God?

Jesus made his rebuffing arguments, first by silence, then by pointing out that He was only called to the children of Israel. Finally, He tested her by calling the woman a dog, and asking if He would be right to take the children's bread a throw it to dogs? The Apostles must have figured that would do it. The stinging remark would hang in the air and she would be stunned, and offended, and effectively eliminated from their mission. Not so. She came through with faith and a brilliant answer. “Truth, Master, and yet don't the dogs eat the crumbs when they fall to the floor from the children's table?” She was saying, “Yes, I will even be your dog. Dogs do have a place at an Israelite's home, if only to clean the floor by licking it clean of spilled food. I will take that role for you and eat only what the Israelites fail to eat, if only you will deliver my daughter from this devil.”

The warmth of Jesus' final statement melted the chill from all his earlier words as He says, “O woman, great is your faith. Your daughter is healed just as you ask.” Jesus loved her. He made her understand her position, and where the healing was coming from, and the Name of the God she must follow. In a proper and humble position, she received the best Christ could offer.

Her humble statement makes its way into our own Anglican Communion liturgy, as the priest kneels at the altar, just before receiving the Lord's Body and Blood, and says, “We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table.” It is the prayer of humble access . We don't come to the rail confident of our worthiness. We are not worthy even to take the role of dogs and lick crumbs from beneath the Lord's Table. But it is God's mercy that urges us forward, and the Lord's command that makes us so bold.

If we come to Christ, as the rich young ruler did, full of self-righteousness and self-esteem, He will test us until we fail. It must be so. For that man it was, “One thing is lacking: sell all you possess, give it to the poor, and come follow me in abject poverty.” We don't often think of Jesus putting obstacles in front of people so they have to do a hard thing before they can come join Him. But He does. To the priests and Pharisees, He challenges the order of their laws and the Sabbath restrictions. To fishermen, he says they must leave a huge mound of fresh fish. To the tax man, he must lay aside his table laden with coins. To the sellers in the Temple, He breaks their cages and sets the animals free, overturning tables of coins and driving them out. This is the Jesus we seldom see, but He sets a price for us to come to Him. The price He sets isn't money. It's our lives. When we would keep our lives and get goodies from Jesus, He isn't able to help us because it would keep us successfully lost.

A Persian proverb my father-in-law told me yesterday wonderfully says it: The state of the world, it's too painful to tell /For, though heaven is free, you must pay to see hell . God isn't asking admission to come to Him. But we can't take our old lives into His kingdom. They won't fit. We have to see ourselves as we are. If we are dogs , we must accept a collar and a leash. If we have sinned , our sins must be confessed and set aside . What is sad is that the road to hell is so well traveled, so much more popular, that the devil can charge a toll on that highway, and people are willing to pay it. Heaven is free, but few are those who will go there. Those on the road to hell are dogs, but they want to be treated as kings. Jesus has shown us who we are. If we will get down and show Him we understand, kneeling at the rail and admitting to being less than dogs under His Table, He doesn't leave us there. We will turn from being dogs and He will make us His daughters. We will be healed. We will be forgiven. We will be made new. We will become daughters.

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