Sermon

Heal Your Fear, Unleash Your Power: 
Talkin' Back

March 30, 2003

By Rev. Dr. G. Penny Nixon

Who would you be without your fear?

Who would you be without your fear?

This is the question we've been asking of ourselves during Lent. In the gospel lesson from Mark this morning we see a woman who finds out just who she can be without her fear. It's revealed in this brief conversation, this short exchange, between this one called Jesus and this unnamed Syro-Phoenician woman. In fact, at the very end of the story a miracle takes place, a healing, but we're so caught up in the conversation going on between these two that the healing is actually in the background. It takes second place to this somewhat disturbing conversation.

The thing that I love about the woman in this story is that she walks without fear. She doesn't have any excuses. Have you ever noticed that when you start to feel afraid about something you're going to do you can make all sorts of excuses not to do it? I suppose that's called procrastination; but I'll put that off until a later time. First of all, she makes no excuses; we all know timing is everything in life, right? And her timing was terrible. Jesus was trying to get some time away. He was actually on retreat in some secluded place. He didn't want anyone to know where he was. In fact, when Matthew tells the same story, Matthew makes it even more obvious that Jesus was “done”. He'd had enough of people. His last and final nerve had been worked. It was time for him to go away.

Secondly, women in that day were not supposed to take the initiative about anything, be aggressive or assertive or angry or whiny. (So much has changed....)

Thirdly, she was a Gentile among Jews. Jews and Syro-Phoenicians had had two centuries of bad blood between them. She was really the most unlikely intruder at the door. The one she wanted to be healed, her daughter, wasn't even with her. She wanted a miracle to take place somewhere in the distance.

Then there's this one called Jesus. Jesus himself appears uncharacteristically rude in this story. The woman says, "I want you to heal my daughter" and Jesus says, "You think I should take food that's meant for the children and throw it to the dogs?" Now, in Matthew's account, Jesus is even ruder. In Matthew's account, she falls at his feet and Matthew says, "And he said nothing."

Have you ever been shopping, and you ask clerk a question and they don't respond at all? Or do telemarketers call your home as often as they do mine? When I hear "Good evening, is Mrs. Nixon there?" I know they want something that I don't have or I don't need. And so I am, I admit, uncharacteristically rude, and often just hang up the phone. In Matthew as well, Jesus’ disciples go to him and say "Jesus, would you send this person away?" They're always doing that. If you read the gospels, you see that the disciples are always saying to Jesus "C'mon, not one more. Send them away. Haven't we done enough already?"

He then dismisses her in a very diminutive way saying "I'm not going to take the bread that's meant for the children and throw it to dogs. Who would do that?" It's really quite harsh. Something that we perhaps miss in the English translation is that the word "dog" at that time was also a word used for Gentiles. Some commentators try to say it's actually a softer word and it really means "puppies." Is there a grand difference to say to someone "You dog" or "You puppy." It's very different. But whatever Jesus said, his meaning was clear: "I'm not going to help you today."

He might have felt, though I'm not trying to sanitize the story at all, that it was unjust to help her when his own people needed so much help. And out of fatigue and extreme exhaustion he might have slipped back into that "scarcity" mentality that all of us can have at one time or another. Or perhaps he was just off-center enough that he actually, for a moment, put a fence around his ministry. (Not that any religious institution or religious leader would ever do that....) Or he might have been so off-center that he actually slipped back into the cultural messages of "You don't help a Syro- Phoenician" instead of coming from that place of unconditional and inclusive love of this Divine One who lived so brilliantly and brightly in him.

But the beauty of the story is that the woman retorts to him, she says,"Even dogs get crumbs." Now, if timing is everything, tone is everything as well. You know, it's not always what you say; it's how you say it. (I'm sure none of you have ever had any of your beloveds tell you that) So it could have been that she said this very humbly with great humility and with eyes downcast. Or it could have been that she was flattering him, even being a bit flirtatious. Or she could have just been downright sassy. The point is her "sassiness" snapped him right back into the reality that God's inclusive love is for everybody. And let me tell you something, after being around this place for awhile, I've had enough sassy queens snapping me back into reality....I'm a different woman because of it and Jesus was a changed man because of it. His reply (probably after he took a step or two back) was to say, “Okay, you're daughter's healed.” In fact, in Matthew, the words he says to her are "Your faith has brought you to this place." Because in the gospels, it is not doubt that is the opposite of faith; it is fear that is the opposite of faith.

She moved right through her fear and stood up for herself. When you have no fear (and you've seen those bumper stickers and logos on clothing: No Fear) you have great clarity about your purpose. She was really clear. She didn't want to become part of the Jewish story; that wasn't what she was looking for. She was desperate for a cure by any means necessary. She was coming to have her deepest sorrow healed. For those of you that are parents in the room, I imagine that some of your deepest sorrows, as well as joys, are around children, and you will do anything to help them. Her faith was that God, however she named God at that time, was not limited by any expression of gender or of race or of class or of timing. You see, when someone is really important to us, we will go to great lengths, often without fear, to protect them. Have you ever experienced that? Whether it's a child, or a parent or a beloved, have you ever had that an experience where you, almost without thinking about it, had such a rush of courage that you just stood up for that person? That kind of courage, and ability to act, is available to us all the time. It lives within us. It is called the power of the Spirit of God.

You know, there are so many great truths and great nuggets to take from this story. This woman really teaches us a lot. I think she had learned somewhere along her life not to take anything personally. I don't know how many of you have read the book The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz. It's Toltec wisdom. He talks about how living by four agreements that will change your life. The second agreement says, “don't take anything personally.” Try it, just for a day; it's a ride. Take nothing personally. He says, "Nothing people do is because of you. It is because of themselves. All people live in their own dream, in their own mind. They are in a completely different world from the one we live in. When we take something personally, we make the assumption that they know what is in our world. We, then, try to impose our world on their world." He says that each of us "… create an entire picture or movie in our mind. In that picture, that movie, you are the director, you are the producer, you are the main actor or actress. Everyone else is secondary; it's your movie." We don't like to admit that about ourselves, but in our minds, it's our own movie, and not to take anything personally is quite a task. After reading this book, I find that it sometimes helps me to say in my mind and sometimes out loud, "Not my movie." It will help you, to gain clarity of purpose and prevent taking in negative messages that stop us from doing the things we need to do.

Can you imagine what would have happened if that woman had taken in that negative message? She would have just limped away. Ruiz says "If you keep this agreement of not taking anything personally, then you won't need to place your trust in what other people do or say. If you keep this agreement, you can travel the world with your heart completely open and no one can hurt you. You can say "I love you" without being afraid of ridicule or rejection. You can ask for what you need. You can say "yes" or "no" and make your own choices without guilt or self-judgment. You can choose to follow your heart." And somehow, I think that this woman had learned not to take everything personally.

And I think, as well, that Jesus had really been challenged in that brief exchange to extend his mission. I think it's something that has happened to us, here in this place. We've known what it is to extend our mission. We are a queer organization that is for all people. We serve not just the gay community. We serve the entire community of those who have needs. Mainline churches have often put a fence around their ministries. Homosexuals have come knocking at their doors. The door is opened and they have said, "Homosexuals? We'll need to do a three year study on that." Can you imagine if someone who was hungry knocked at this door and we opened the door and put our head out and said "Hunger? Oh, we'll need to do a three year study on hunger." At MCCSF, we have experienced the inclusive love and power of God and often, it is those on the margins, like this woman, who have challenged the status quo of how things are done. We have learned from being excluded ourselves, to try, to the best of our human capabilities and capacities, to never exclude anyone.

What's also true for us to get where we are today, we had to do a lot of speakin’ up and talkin’ back. Talkin' back; it's a great practice. It is rewarded time after time in these encounters with Jesus. Her sassiness was rewarded. Think about people who have spoken up that have made changes. Steven Cozza, a young, straight boy, who stood up and said "Oh no, gays need to be invited into the boy scouts just like everybody else." Think about Rosa Parks who sat down in the front of the bus. When told to move, spoke up and said "I'm not movin'." It changed history. Think about Barbara Lee. When the whole Congress went one way, she said "I can't do it. I've got to speak up." Think about the whistle blowers in corporate America, who, at the risk of their job, their livelihood, their reputation, their resume, say "Oh no, I have to speak up. Something's fundamentally wrong with the amount of toxins we're dumping in the river or the pollutants we're putting into the air or the straw holding companies.” Think about the two men who were brought up on criminal charges of sodomy who said "Oh no, we're speakin' up." And they spoke up all the way to the Supreme Court. We are rewarded, I believe, for our sassiness.

And lastly, I believe that we are both of the characters in the story. Sometimes, we can be the rude ones saying "I can't accept one more thing." Sometimes, we're the woman saying "Look, I have a place." So, I invite you to go out in the world and be your sassy self. Speak up for yourself and on behalf of others. Let your faith move you right through your fears. As our second lesson said, “people, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed and redeemed.” Never throw anyone out. May it be so because of us, speakin' up and talkin' back, and being downright sassy.

Amen