Nothing but Crumbs

September 9^th, 2018        “Nothing but Crumbs”     Rev. Heather Jepsen

Mark 7:24-37

         When I was first encountering Jesus and getting to know him as presented in the Scriptures I loved the Jesus of the Gospel of John.  In John’s Gospel Jesus is cosmic, he is powerful, he has secret knowledge, and he seems to glow with holiness.  The Jesus in the Gospel of John is like a super hero Jesus. 

         The longer I live in the world and the more time I spend working in ministry, the more I have fallen in love with the Jesus of the Gospel of Mark.  The Jesus in Mark’s Gospel is not a super hero, he is a real person.  The Jesus in the Gospel of Mark is someone I can relate to and someone I can believe in.

         Our reading picks up right where we left off last week.  Jesus has fed some people, and he has healed some people, and he has taught some people.  In last week’s reading, Jesus was mixing it up with the Pharisees and the disciples over issues of following the rules.  He made it clear that it doesn’t matter how many rules you follow, if you don’t have love in your heart then your religion is worth nothing.

         Now, Jesus is tired, and Mark tells us that he has gone away to hide.  He travels outside of Jewish territory into a predominantly Gentile region.  He enters a house and Mark makes it clear that Jesus did not want anybody to know he was there.  He is trying to hide, he is trying to rest, and he is trying to take a well-deserved break. 

         But, Jesus can’t get a break.  Just like last week when the Pharisees interrupted his snack with the disciples, this week he can’t get a moment alone.  A woman enters the house, asking him to do something.  One more person, with one more need, and she is a foreigner to boot. 

This woman throws herself at the feet of an overly tired Jesus and begs for the life of her daughter who seems to be possessed by a demon.  In a most un-Jesus-like fashion, he snaps at her saying “Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”  Whoa, sounds like Jesus could use a WWJD bracelet to remind him how to behave! 

         So what is happening here?  It should come as no surprise that throughout the centuries commentators have attempted to soften this image of Jesus.  Some scholars have said that Jesus was faking it.  He was just being inhospitable to try to throw the woman off and test her faith.  Others have said that Jesus was just joking.  Personally, I think there is no way around this one. Jesus was tired and cranky and he used a racial slur.  Dog was a common derogatory term used for those of Syrophoenician decent, and Jesus’ use of the word is no different than Trump’s when referring to Omarosa a few weeks ago.

         Jesus is caught here, and he shouldn’t have said what he said.  I think Jesus was suffering from physical and mental exhaustion, and he was just tired of seeing people.  I think he had had enough.  He was trying to get away, he was trying to take a break, he was trying to hide, and in comes one more person asking for one more thing.  Plus, this woman wasn’t even a Jew, Jesus had reached his limit and it shows in the things he said.  We talk about Jesus being fully human and fully divine, but as soon as his humanity shows we want to explain it away.  I think we need to embrace Jesus’ humanity, even when it was ugly.  Jesus was human and he was annoyed and he told her so.

         Surprisingly the woman is not fazed.  She snaps right back at him.  “Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”  Now I imagine Jesus sees her.  I think before, when she came in begging, she was just one more person asking for one more miracle, and he was too tired to deal with it.  But now, he looks up, and he really sees her.  He sees her wit, her faith, her determination, and her desire to have her daughter healed.  “For saying that, you may go – the demon has left your daughter” he says, granting her the miracle she requests.

         This is one of my favorite stories in all of the Scriptures.  I love this woman.  I love her wit, and her strength.  I love her determination, and her unwillingness to take “no” for an answer.  I love that she accepts this insult and turns it around.  I love that she talks back to Jesus.  And I love that she gets what she wants.  Jesus doesn’t say her faith is the cause of the healing, he says her wit is!  Here is an outspoken woman, being praised, and getting what she wants.  It may not be the world, it may not be the glories that God has reserved for the Jews, but it is enough for her.  She is happy to get nothing but crumbs, if that is all she is going to get.  Nothing but crumbs is a lot more than nothing at all.

         I also love Jesus in this story.  I love that he is real and human.  I love that he is in a place where I sometimes find myself; tired and worn, hoping that the phone won’t ring or the text won’t ping.  I find myself hoping for a quiet night at home, hoping for a chance to rest and recharge, hoping for some time with my family where I am not thinking about church, or thinking about the next big negative story in the news and how I am going to frame it in a sermon.  I love that Jesus says something he shouldn’t, because we all do that when we are tired and have had a long day.  I love a human Jesus because a human Jesus I can believe in.  Give me someone who is real and gets tired and I will follow them to the ends of the Earth.  I need a Jesus I can relate to, not one who is so holy he is beyond my imagination. 

         Just like the woman, at this point I think Jesus himself has nothing but crumbs.  There has been no break, there has been no chance of rest, there has been nothing for days but the throng of needy people, the scorn of the Pharisees, and the foolishness of the disciples.  I think he is suffering from compassion fatigue, a condition common among individuals who work with those who have suffered trauma conditions.  Compassion fatigue often manifests as a lessening of compassion over time.  I don’t think that is a stretch for the fully human Son of God, for surely being among humanity is to witness trauma a hundred fold.  Jesus is exhausted, he is running on empty, he has nothing crumbs.

         But his encounter with this woman opens Jesus back up again.  In his fatigue he had closed in on himself, he had pushed others away.  This woman’s interaction with Jesus has opened him anew to the possibilities of God’s power and grace in the world.  It is from this experience that Jesus will go on to open the ears of a man born deaf.  Jesus is more open and now he is more able to open others, though he continues to ask folks not to share the news about him.  People don’t seem to be able to help themselves though and word about him continues to spread.  No wonder the guy can’t get a break!

         I love this story of Jesus because we find ourselves here so often in our lives.  Sometimes we are the woman and we are so desperately in need.  Our hearts are broken by the suffering of a loved one and we ask for anything from God.  We will gladly take crumbs if crumbs are what are available.  In the midst of crisis, we know how to survive on nothing but crumbs.

         And sometimes we are like Jesus in this story.  We are so tired of giving and doing and sharing.  We just want to be left alone for one minute and then the nominating committee calls and asks us to be on a committee again.  Or it’s that one family member or friend that always needs help and always calls at the most inconvenient time and it is all we can do not to snap at them and tell them to go away.  Go away, we want to say, leave me alone.  All I have right now are crumbs.

         This is the point where God intervenes, and God challenges us to share our crumbs.  I think there is an abundance available to us if we are willing to share what little time and energy we have.  A few days before this story, Jesus was standing around with a crowd and the people were hungry.  5 loaves were broken and shared among thousands of people and 12 baskets of pieces were left over.  That’s 12 baskets of crumbs!  If another crowd had come upon them that day I am certain there would have been enough bread.  They could have survived easily, even though there was nothing but crumbs.

         God challenges us to dig even deeper than we thought possible and to share with others even when we feel like we hardly have anything to share.  When all it seems that we have is nothing but crumbs, if we are willing to share, then miraculously there will be enough.  Like Jesus, we have to be awakened to our capacity to keep going, keep giving, and keep sharing in the community of faith.  We have to let others open us up to God’s possibilities and then we can share that miracle of openness again with others.  We have to be vulnerable to receive, and Jesus was certainly vulnerable in this story. 

Don’t get me wrong, you need to rest and take care of yourself.  You can’t pour from an empty cup.  But sometimes, we find that even in the dregs there is a little bit left to share.  In this story Jesus is modeling self-care, as he takes a break from the crowds.  But he also models generosity as he gives a gift of healing even in the midst of his own fatigue.  Jesus shares his crumbs.

         Today we come to the communion table and this is a place where we embrace the crumbs.   Like the Syrophenician woman, we are outsiders to the love story that God was telling about the Jewish people.  We are not the ones that Jesus in the Gospel of Mark thought he was coming to minister to.  We are not the children who get the bread; rather we are those who wait for the crumbs to fall.  And fall they did, as through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the love story between God and the Jewish people became a love story between God and all of humanity.  We who were once outsiders, we who were once Gentiles, have now been grafted into this family tree.  And so we can gather at this table and celebrate with the bread of life.  Even if we only get a crumb, this meal is enough to sustain our faith.

         And so today we ask that God bless us this morning with the things that we need.  May we have the energy and faith to get through difficult and scary times.  And may we have the willingness to share what we have, even if we only have crumbs, with those around us.  May we experience abundance and generosity together, even if we have nothing but crumbs, being open to God’s miraculous and generous grace wherever we may find it.  Amen.