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Matthew 15:22-23
Excerpted from: The Canaanite Woman's FaithWe have this one Gentile woman. She is specifically named, or identified as a daughter of Canaan, a descendant of Canaan. And just also put this in the back of your mind: what is being set up here by Matthew, who is writing particularly to Jewish people in his gospel, is that he is bringing up the image of the Israelites versus the Canaanites. This idea, when they came into the land as the children of Israel, the ones they had to kick out were the Canaanites. So you have this dichotomy here between the two of them, these two groups. And it is kind of just a passing suggestion—she is a Canaanite—but he wants that idea in your head as you read further.
But this Canaanite woman knew who He was, and believed. So we have this idea of a Canaanite as opposed to a Jew or an Israelite. Jesus had just come out of a Jewish-controlled area where He had been beset by contentious Jews who do not believe, and He leaves for a Gentile area and finds a Canaanite who believes. It is totally the opposite.
She not only believes, she calls Him Lord, which is master. And she also calls Him, surprisingly, Son of David. She knew who He was. She knew His lineage, and this may even mean she believed He was Messiah, because that is the term for Messiah, Son of David. It is all through the Old Testament.
Notice her attitude here. She asked for mercy with great humility. She is asking very deferentially, very differently from how the Jews treated Him. And she comes to Him as unworthy. She is not demanding. She has the correct attitude, the very opposite of what He had had to face just in the recent past.
Now she shouts out to Jesus here to heal her young and cruelly demon-possessed daughter. The sense is that she was very young, still an adolescent, and this demon was just making her and her mother's life miserable. And the idea here under severely is either cruel or wicked. She was cruelly demon-possessed or wickedly demon-possessed. So it was obviously something that was disturbing their home life, and this Canaanite woman seems like she was fearing that this would eventually kill her daughter. So she was in earnest.
But you have all of this going on—a deeply humble and earnest believer with a terribly mistreated demon-possessed daughter—and what does Jesus do? He answers her not a word. So you have to ask yourself why. Why did He not answer her? Why did not He say, Oh, poor woman, come on in? But He does not.
Bible StudiesThe Miracles of Jesus Christ: Exorcising a Syro-Phoenecian (Part One)
The Miracles of Jesus Christ: Exorcising a Syro-Phoenician (Part Two)
The Miracles of Jesus Christ: Healing a Centurion's Servant (Part Three)
SermonsThe Father's Promise of Power!
Remember the Christians
Matthew (Part Twenty)
The Doctrine of Israel (Part Six): New Testament Teaching
The Canaanite Woman's Faith
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