I read a newspaper article this week which really annoyed me. It was by one of those well-publicised Anglican priests who really should have gone into politics because he spends most of his time talking about politics and very little of his time talking about God. On this occasion he did choose to talk about God but what he wrote was nonsense.
He started from this story of Jesus and the woman from Syrophoenicia. Here, he said, was an example of Jesus changing his mind. He wasn’t going to help her, because the blessings of the gospel were only intended for the Jews and not for Gentiles, non-Jews. But, or so this writer said, the woman made such an excellent argument and was such a deserving case that Jesus changed his mind and performed the miracle of deliverance which set her daughter free. The implication was that if Jesus changed his mind about something so fundamental as who could and who could not be saved, then God could change his mind about other things as well. Like whether homosexual practice is right or wrong. Or whether Jesus is the only way to God or whether Muslims are all saved as well. Or whether hell really exists. Or indeed whether heaven exists. If God can change his mind, so the writer says, then we should be ready to change our minds as well.
There were too many things wrong with that article for me to correct them all in just one sermon. I was appalled at the writer for writing such nonsense and I was annoyed with the newspaper for printing it – although they probably didn’t know any better. But this morning I want to put the record straight and explain what this story from Mark chapter 7 does NOT say to us, and then what it DOES say to us today.
And the first thing to be very clear about is that this is not an example of Jesus changing his mind. It is complete misunderstanding to say that Jesus did not initially intend to help the woman, but that she persuaded him to do so.
25 …, as soon as she heard about him, a woman whose little daughter was possessed by an evil spirit came and fell at his feet. 26 The woman was a Greek, born in Syrian Phoenicia. She begged Jesus to drive the demon out of her daughter.
27 “First let the children eat all they want,” he told her, “for it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs.”

At first sight it may seem as if Jesus is rejecting the woman’s request. In fact it appears that he even insults her, referring to Jews as God’s children and non-Jews as “dogs”. But let’s remember a few things. Jesus never refused to help anybody who came to him. Never. Jesus never turned anybody away. Not once. There were the kinds of people who respectable Jews would call “sinners” and refuse to have anything to do with. Tax collectors were professional thieves collaborating with the occupying Roman army, but Jesus ate with Zacchaeus and called Matthew to be an apostle. Prostitutes were outcasts, but Jesus welcomed Mary Magdalene a one of his disciples. The Pharisees accused Jesus of being a friend of gluttons and drunkards and tax collectors and sinners and that didn’t bother Jesus at all. Jesus never turned anybody away. Jesus never refused to help anybody!
We have seen in our evening sermons on the Book of Romans that it was always God’s plan that the gospel would bring salvation to non-Jews as well as to Jews. Isaiah had foretold this.
Isaiah 49 6 God says:
“It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept.
I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring my salvation to the ends of the earth.”

Some words spoken by the prophet Simeon when Mary and Joseph presented Jesus in the Temple are used every week in the worship of some churches. They are called the Nunc Dimittis or the Song of Simeon.
Luke 2 29 “Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace. 30 For my eyes have seen your salvation, 31 which you have prepared in the sight of all people, 32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for glory to your people Israel.”
God always intended and Jesus always knew that the gospel was for non-Jews as well as for Jews. After Jesus’s first recorded sermon in Nazareth, He went on to teach that his ministry would be to non-Jews as well as to Jews by reminding them of two people who had been blessed by the ministry of the prophet Elijah.
Luke 4 25 I assure you that there were many widows in Israel in Elijah’s time, when the sky was shut for three and a half years and there was a severe famine throughout the land. 26 Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow in Zarephath in the region of Sidon. 27 And there were many in Israel with leprosy in the time of Elisha the prophet, yet not one of them was cleansed—only Naaman the Syrian.”
So God always planned that the blessings of the gospel were for non-Jews as well as for Jews. Jesus never turned anybody away, not Jews, not Gentiles. But yet he says this.
27 “First let the children eat all they want,” he told her, “for it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to their dogs.”

And the woman says, 28 “Yes, Lord, … “but even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.”

What a good answer! The woman sidesteps the apparent insult. She even seems to accept that non-Jews were inferior to Jews. She recognises that she has no right to God’s help – but begs for the crumbs of blessing which are left over. So Jesus says,
29 …. “For such a reply, you may go; the demon has left your daughter.”

I think it is completely obvious what is going on here. Jesus makes a controversial statement in order to find out where the woman stands and what her attitude is. He is seeking to draw out her faith. And the woman’s response combines appropriate humility with also deep faith in the grace of God. Even though she knew she wasn’t entitled to anything, the woman reached out in faith. And that faith was not disappointed!

30 She went home and found her child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

It is ridiculous to suggest that Jesus changes his mind in this story. He was always going to help the woman and her daughter, even though they were not Jews. She didn’t need to persuade him – nobody ever needs to persuade Jesus that they deserve his help, because none of us ever could deserve God’s help. Miracles don’t depend on us giving clever answers to tricky questions. God’s help comes out of His love for us all. This story is all about God’s grace bringing blessing to undeserving human beings and not in the least about Jesus changing His mind.

It is just as ridiculous to suggest from this passage that God changes his mind about other things either. There are lots of issues where liberal minded people wish God had changed his mind since the Bible was written. Despite all sorts of clever arguments about freedom of choice God has not changed his mind over abortion or euthanasia. God has not changed his mind over the way of salvation. God has not changed his mind and suddenly decided that all religions are the same or that everybody is going to get into heaven. Faith in Christ and believing the gospel are still the only hope for human beings. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me.” Jesus hasn’t changed his mind on that!! And no amount of clever argument from human beings is going to make God change His mind on anything!!

So if this passage is not about Jesus changing His mind, what DOES it show us? Alongside many other passages, this story teaches us that the gospel is for everybody. It makes very clear that the gospel is not just for the kinds of people we might expect God to save. The gospel is for everybody.
The Jews had their ideas about who God would save. Just them! And we might have ideas about who God might save. People like us! Educated. Middle Class. Respectable. But the gospel is not just for the people we think God will save. The gospel is for everybody! People we might think God wouldn’t be interested in. We thought a few weeks ago about some groups of people God really cares about. People God cares about who we might overlook or even ignore. Children. The disadvantaged and marginalised. Widows and orphans. Aliens and strangers and refugees. The poor and needy. People with disabilities. These groups of people are very important in God’s eyes.
Jesus spent his time helping people in need! People who were sick. People who were distressed. The gospel is for everybody!! The daughter of this Syrophoenecian woman who was controlled by a demon. Jesus set that girl free. So he can certainly set free people trapped by alcohol or drugs or debt. Jesus can help anybody! The next story is also one of miraculous healing.
Mark 731 Then Jesus left the vicinity of Tyre and went through Sidon, down to the Sea of Galilee and into the region of the Decapolis. 32 There some people brought to him a man who was deaf and could hardly talk, and they begged him to place his hand on the man.
33 After he took him aside, away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into the man’s ears. Then he spit and touched the man’s tongue. 34 He looked up to heaven and with a deep sigh said to him, “Ephphatha!” (which means, “Be opened!”). 35 At this, the man’s ears were opened, his tongue was loosened and he began to speak plainly.
36 Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone. But the more he did so, the more they kept talking about it. 37 People were overwhelmed with amazement. “He has done everything well,” they said. “He even makes the deaf hear and the mute speak.”
Jesus didn’t come to bless those who were well but to heal the sick. The gospel is for everybody. Even for the hopeless cases! And there couldn’t have been a more hopeless case than Lazarus! Dead and buried for four days. Yet Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead! We may know a person who we think is beyond the reach of God’s love. We may think of them as a lost cause – a hopeless case. But nothing is impossible for God. Jesus can save ANYBODY! The gospel is not just for the kind of people we think God should save. Who is the gospel for? The gospel is for everybody!