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Why Did Jesus Call Her a Dog? · Pastor John Piper's answers

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  Speaker 1: Well, there's a story in Matthew's Gospel that stops readers cold.
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  Speaker 1: You read it and then you pause and you ask
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  Speaker 1: and you're like, wait a minute, did I just read
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  Speaker 1: what I think I thought I read? And you go
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  Speaker 1: back and reread it. It's a story about a Canaanite woman,
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  Speaker 1: a Canaanite woman, a mother, a very desperate mother, a
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  Speaker 1: desperate mother who begs Jesus to save the life of
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  Speaker 1: her demon-possessed daughter, a daughter that is sick beyond the
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  Speaker 1: reach of all other help. She has one hope. It's Jesus.
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  Speaker 1: And Jesus, the emblem of love, ignores her first. So
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  Speaker 1: it seems. And then later when he does approach her,
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  Speaker 1: he seems to insinuate that she is in the category
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  Speaker 1: of a dog. An unclean, dirty animal. Today on Ask
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  Speaker 1: Pastor John, why did Jesus call her a dog? Yolisa
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  Speaker 1: is asking the question. Hi, Pastor John. My name is Yolisa,
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  Speaker 1: writing from South Africa. I've been reading Matthew 15, 21
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  Speaker 1: to 28. Over and over again, kind of stuck there
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  Speaker 1: because of how troubled I am by Jesus referring to
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  Speaker 1: this poor Canaanite woman as a dog. What did he
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  Speaker 1: mean by this? Surely we are not to speak of
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  Speaker 1: other people from other nations and cultures like animals. So
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  Speaker 1: how should we understand his words in light of his
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  Speaker 1: love and his compassion for so many?
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  Speaker 2: Let's read the story. It's not very long. I think
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  Speaker 2: everybody would benefit from just having it real fresh. Jesus
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  Speaker 2: went away from there and withdrew to the district of
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  Speaker 2: Tyre and Sidon. And behold, a Canaanite woman, in other words,
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  Speaker 2: not a Jew, a Gentile, from that region came out
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  Speaker 2: and was crying, have mercy on me, O Lord, son
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  Speaker 2: of David. My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.
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  Speaker 2: But he did not answer her a word. And his
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  Speaker 2: disciples came and begged him, saying, Send her away, for
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  Speaker 2: she is crying out after us. He answered, I was
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  Speaker 2: sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
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  Speaker 2: In other words, Jews, not her. But she came and
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  Speaker 2: knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me. And he answered,
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  Speaker 2: It is not right to take the children's bread and
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  Speaker 2: throw it to dogs. She said, Yes, Lord, yet even
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  Speaker 2: the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master's table.
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  Speaker 2: Then Jesus answered her, O woman, great is your faith.
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  Speaker 2: Let it be done as you desire. And her daughter
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  Speaker 2: was healed instantly. Now there are four things, at least,
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  Speaker 2: that Matthew wants us to know from this story. I'll
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  Speaker 2: mention all four, and then I'll come back to the
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  Speaker 2: main one that Yolisa is concerned about. First, when Jesus
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  Speaker 2: came as a Jewish Messiah into the world, his first
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  Speaker 2: focus was on Israel, not the nations. He came to
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  Speaker 2: call Israel to repentance. Verse 24, I was sent only
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  Speaker 2: to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. In
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  Speaker 2: Matthew 10, 5, he says, these 12 Jesus sent out,
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  Speaker 2: instructing them, go nowhere among the Gentiles. Only when there
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  Speaker 2: was a decisive rejection of Jesus by his own people
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  Speaker 2: did he turn to the nations and say, go make
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  Speaker 2: disciples of all the nations.
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  Speaker 1: In the world.
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  Speaker 2: And when he healed the Gentile centurion, just like he's
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  Speaker 2: going to heal this Canaanite woman, he foretells this change
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  Speaker 2: in focus, amazing world-changing change in focus. He says, I
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  Speaker 2: tell you, this is Matthew 8, 11. I tell you,
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  Speaker 2: many will come from east and west and recline at
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  Speaker 2: table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven,
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  Speaker 2: while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out
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  Speaker 2: into outer darkness. So that's the first thing Matthew wants
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  Speaker 2: us to see. Jesus' ministry was focused at the beginning
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  Speaker 2: almost entirely upon the Jewish people. Second, He puts this
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  Speaker 2: woman in the category of Gentile dogs. It's not right
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  Speaker 2: to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.
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  Speaker 2: Leviticus 11.27 had declared dogs unclean, is what it says.
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  Speaker 2: All that walk on their paws among the animals that
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  Speaker 2: go on all fours are unclean for you. That's how
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  Speaker 2: the Jews looked on the Gentiles, unclean. We see that
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  Speaker 2: in Acts 10, 28, where Peter said, you yourselves know
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  Speaker 2: how unlawful it is for a Jew to associate or
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  Speaker 2: to visit anyone of another nation. In other words, Jews
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  Speaker 2: kept their distance from those who do not believe or
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  Speaker 2: keep the laws of unclean and clean, so it was
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  Speaker 2: not uncommon for Gentiles to be called dogs and Paul
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  Speaker 2: was playing off this custom when he himself called the
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  Speaker 2: Jewish Judaizers in Philippi dogs in order to say, they're
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  Speaker 2: the ones, the Jews are the ones who are unclean,
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  Speaker 2: not the Gentile Christians. So Paul was building off that
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  Speaker 2: same common use of language. We'll come back to this. Third,
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  Speaker 2: Matthew makes much of in this story, he makes much
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  Speaker 2: of the amazing faith of this woman. Oh, woman, great
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  Speaker 2: is your faith. Let it be done for you as
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  Speaker 2: you desire. And what made her faith great? I see
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  Speaker 2: at least three things. She calls him Lord and son
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  Speaker 2: of David. In other words, she submits herself to his authority,
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  Speaker 2: and she puts herself as a Gentile under his Jewish kingship,
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  Speaker 2: son of David. Second, she perseveres through three rebuffs. At
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  Speaker 2: the beginning, he didn't say a word to her. Second,
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  Speaker 2: the disciples say, send her away. And third, the Lord
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  Speaker 2: himself says, it's not right to take the children's bread
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  Speaker 2: and throw it to dogs. And nothing would stop her.
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  Speaker 2: She believed he would do this. She kept after him.
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  Speaker 2: And the third thing, that made her faith great was
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  Speaker 2: her humility. This is probably the most outstanding thing, and
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  Speaker 2: I think it's what Jesus focuses on. She was totally
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  Speaker 2: free from a spirit of entitlement. I think it's one
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  Speaker 2: of the greatest marks of humble faith. Even when he
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  Speaker 2: put her off as one of the Gentile dogs, she said, yes, Lord.
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  Speaker 2: She said, yes. I think that's the high point of
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  Speaker 2: the story for Jesus. Blessed are the poor in spirit,
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  Speaker 2: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. She had nothing
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  Speaker 2: in herself to defend. She was totally submitted to the
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  Speaker 2: word of Jesus. If you say so, I am a
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  Speaker 2: Gentile dog. Let's go from there. And then she essentially says,
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  Speaker 2: I'm not asking to be treated like one of the children.
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  Speaker 2: I only want what dogs get, a crumb, just a crumb.
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  Speaker 2: because a crumb from you is better than a banquet elsewhere.
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  Speaker 2: This is great faith. It was irresistible to Jesus. Then fourth,
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  Speaker 2: Matthew wants us to see that faith in Jesus, not Jewishness,
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  Speaker 2: makes a person a child of God instead of an
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  Speaker 2: unclean outsider. Because of her faith, Jesus can see that
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  Speaker 2: she's not an unclean dog She is a child of God.
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  Speaker 2: Faith in Jesus makes a person a true Jew, as
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  Speaker 2: Zoe Paul put it, an heir of the promises. So,
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  Speaker 2: let's go back now to the second point that Yolisa
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  Speaker 2: is concerned about. How are we supposed to think about
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  Speaker 2: Jesus putting her in the category of unclean Gentile dogs?
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  Speaker 2: I think Yolisa's Biblical instincts are right. Jesus does warn
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  Speaker 2: against calling anyone, for example, a fool in Matthew 5.22.
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  Speaker 2: Calling someone a fool puts you in danger of hell fire,
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  Speaker 2: he says, let alone a dog. Paul warns us against
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  Speaker 2: filthiness of language or foolish talk or crude joking, and
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  Speaker 2: he sets a very high standard for our mouths. In
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  Speaker 2: Ephesians 4, 29, when he says, let no corrupting talk
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  Speaker 2: come out of your mouths, but only such as is
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  Speaker 2: good for upbuilding, as fits the occasion, that it may
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  Speaker 2: give grace to those who hear. That was my wife's
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  Speaker 2: favorite verse. We had four sons at home. We didn't
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  Speaker 2: always talk that way to each other. What a great
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  Speaker 2: standard for us. Jesus gave grace to this woman. He
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  Speaker 2: knew where she was going. So we should be very slow,
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  Speaker 2: I think, to take Jesus' word here, dogs, as a
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  Speaker 2: permission for us to use dehumanizing language toward others. We
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  Speaker 2: don't know the way Jesus was thinking here. We can't
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  Speaker 2: get inside his head. My guess is that Jesus could
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  Speaker 2: see faith in this woman from the beginning, and he
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  Speaker 2: was simply testing her. to give her an opportunity to
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  Speaker 2: show her amazing faith. The fact that she was still
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  Speaker 2: a Canaanite when she became a child of God, she
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  Speaker 2: didn't cease to be a Canaanite. Her ethnicity remained the same,
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  Speaker 2: and the fact that it remained the same shows he
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  Speaker 2: was not using an ethnic slur. Otherwise, she'd still be
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  Speaker 2: a dog. He was positioning her outside the family of
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  Speaker 2: God first and then welcoming her. inside, because of her
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  Speaker 2: great faith.
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  Speaker 1: Jesus was giving the sister a chance to voice her
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  Speaker 1: faith in a way that could be recorded for all
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  Speaker 1: of us, all Gentiles, all of us, who would later
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  Speaker 1: read the story and be encouraged by it. It's not
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  Speaker 1: a racial slur, and this is not just a power
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  Speaker 1: encounter with a demon. This was a test. Jesus was
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  Speaker 1: first positioning her outside the family of God first, and
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  Speaker 1: then welcoming her inside because of her great faith. What
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  Speaker 1: a great plot twist to shine the spotlight on the
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  Speaker 1: faith of this woman where outsiders become children of God.
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  Speaker 1: That is beautiful. Thank you, Pastor John. Thanks for joining
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  Speaker 1: us today. If you have an interesting Bible question to
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  Speaker 1: ask Pastor John, find a link to email us and
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: find our complete episode archive at the same place, askpastorjohn.com.
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  Speaker 1: Next up, daily vigilance for lifelong productivity. Daily vigilance for
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• 11:19
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