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Proper 15 20 Ord BFC 2017
Matthew 15:21-28
August 20, 2017
“Maybe you can accept it, but I can’t,” Zdenka
screamed. “This is not God’s will to
have our daughter suffer so. You go off
in the fields . . . and you work hard, Melkart, but you are not here all
day. I am. I look into her eyes and see that this is not
what God wants.
Melkart sighed. “But Zdenka, but Zdenka . . . how much energy
do we give to this false hope that anything can be different?”
“What you call false hope, when all
around us is blind acceptance. We
blindly accept being stripped of our farm.
We blindly accept losing all honor.
We blindly accept when the landlord refers to our daughter as a dog.”
“What am I to do?” Melkart screamed back. “You want me to fight the Romans myself?!”
“No, Melkart, that is certain death,
but aren’t we living death now?”
Melkart hung his head. He felt responsible.
“No, Melkart, you are a farmer, a good
farmer, and not a warrior, so I do not expect you to take on centurions. But we should not live as dead. Maybe I’m willing to change because I’m too
tired . . . or too hungry . . . or too cold to care.”
Melkart moved to the floor and
sat. “What then? What is possible?”
“I don’t know.” Zdenka said, as she
continued placing bread and other supplies in her pack. Zdenka shook her head all the while, like she
was trying to stop Melkart from any more agreeable comments about the life they
led.
“How long will you be gone?” Melkart asked.
“I hear he has gone to the coast—to
Tyre. I will try to see him there. Mother will be alright with Kashlan.”
“Kashlan needs you. You are the only one who knows who she
is. Do you think a Jewish prophet or a
Jewish God will know who she is?”
“This Jewish prophet tells Jewish
farmers they are the children of God. If
he knows them, then maybe the Jewish God knows Kashlan.”
“A Jewish God knows our Canaanite daughter?”
“I don’t know, Melkart. I have just heard this prophet is creating a
different place. He does not accept the
living death.”
“The Romans will still kill him.”
“Maybe so, but he is not dead
yet. Be good to my mother. She thinks Kashlan is a dog too. Show her a different way.”
Zdenka moved to the passage way.
“But what if I don’t, what if I can’t
. . .”
Zdenka stopped and leveled her eyes on
Melkart. “Show her a different way,
Melkart!” And with that, Zdenka left.
It took Zdenka more than two days to
arrive outside Tyre. The heat pressed
down on Zdenka during the day, and the cold had her bent over and clutching at
night. She had not thought her journey
would last so long, perhaps hoping it would not last so long, and she only had
bread for three days. This would make
things more difficult for Zdenka. She
had barely enough bread for her trip to Tyre and back. As the crowd became more thickly Jewish,
people who were not her own, she knew that begging might not even gain her
bread.
She went a day without bread so that
she would have some for the trip home.
When she finally reached the seacoast, her feet ached . . . but Zdenka
was convinced she knew something.
Along the seacoast of Tyre, she was
shameless in asking every Jew she saw where she might find the prophet. Some men, so startled that a foreign woman
would talk to them, pointed the way for her.
Most of the women scolded her.
Zdenka entered two or three private
homes, hoping to find the prophet. She
was shooed away.
Finally, Zdenka came upon a gathering
of men and women eating at a table together.
It was a strange table. Some of
the women seemed to be in a much more prominent position than the men.
Zdenka’s nails dug into her palms as
she thought, “He must know my daughter.
He must!” She quickly approached
the man who seemed to be enjoying himself at the table more than any other.
Zdenka knelt behind him. He looked back to see her and then turned
back to the group, ignoring her. She
moved closer to the table and knelt again.
Again, he turned and then ignored her.
“He must.” Zdenka thought.
When she heard the women around the
table freely speaking out of turn, she took a chance. “Prophet,” she paused, “prophet, my daughter
has demons which possess her. She is
oppressed by them, and needs . . .”
He interrupted. “This is no concern of mine, Canaanite,” he
said, without even looking at her, “we don’t give food to the dogs.”
The room erupted in laughter. Zdenka dug her nails deeper into her palms
and clenched her teeth. The laughter
kept coming and coming, pushing her from the room. She tried to speak again.
“But, prophet . . .” Nobody could hear
her over the laughter.
“But, prophet . . .” Still they
laughed.
“But, Lord . . . even the dogs get to
eat the crumbs from the master’s table.”
This time the prophet turned. He had been caught off-guard by just how shameless
this foreign woman was willing to be on behalf of her daughter, how persistent,
how unrelenting. And this time the prophet saw Zdenka, and his heart expanded,
and he didn’t know what she knew . . . but the prophet knew Zdenka.
“Go,” the prophet said, “Your faith
has healed her.” And it was so.
Now there are many people who need to
be known in the world. The day may come
when we begin to know them as Christ knew Zdenka, as Zedenka knew Kashlan, as
God knows Kashlan. For God’s home is
made among the living dead. Amen.
Now there are many people who need
to be known in the world. The day may
come when we begin to know them as Christ knew Zdenka, as Zedenka knew Kashlan,
as God knows Kashlan. For God’s home is
made among the living dead. Amen.
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