Let us pray: Sharpen our ears, O God, that we may not just hear with our ears, but with our hearts. Sharpen my tongue O God, that it may not just speak with my words, but with the penetrating power of your divine message. Guide what I say and guide what we hear. Amen

The story we just heard from Mark is for me one of the defining stories in the whole gospel record. It’s not one of Jesus’ better moments, but in the telling of this story we learn about learning. We discover the critical importance of the action-reflection-action cycle which is part of a living faith.

Let’s parse the story just a bit. For whatever reason - perhaps because he feels like an outsider in a foreign land - for we’re told that he went into a house hoping to avoid notice, even though he was unsuccessful. Perhaps he wanted to consult his Tyre phrase book before setting out to speak with people in this new territory. Perhaps he was just girding his spirit for what might be a more difficult crowd. Jesus was used to making the point with his friends the disciples and all the others who were there to hear him speak that wisdom could very often, perhaps even most likely, be found from the outsider. Children, women, beggars, widows, people relegated to the fringes of society because of their occupation as tax collectors, or because they were diseased or disabled - all of them Jesus pointed out to the crowds around him were people who could point to the way of God by their faithfulness, their insight, the simplicity of their uncomplicated expressions of faith. But here was Jesus, an outsider himself. We know this because Mark makes a point that Jesus had travelled to a new territory.

Perhaps the unfamiliarity put him on edge. Perhaps he was just annoyed that his quiet time got interrupted. Whatever the reason, Jesus clearly shows an uncharacteristic edginess when the Syro-phoenician woman invades his space, asking for healing for her daughter. You can practically hear his frustration as he tells her to get in line and wait her turn, but with an added epithet that raises the tension. Not only must she get in line, but Jesus describes her place - children first then dogs. In other words, fat chance he’s going to be able to meet with her any time soon. She’s way down the pecking order. But the woman calls him on it. It’s probably the quickest and least described turn around of any place in the bible. In a flash, Jesus recognizes his own hardness of heart, his own variation from the message he’s been demonstrating and telling all along. This woman has taught him a lesson and he responds with graciousness and openness.

That’s part one of the story. The next part is a bit more typical. Jesus has travelled back into familiar territory, and a more familiar encounter takes place. A man who can neither speak nor hear is brought to Jesus. This is more like the stories with which we are familiar. Jesus doesn’t show any of the previous frustration. The edginess is gone. Is it because he was back where the surroundings, the customs, the situation were more familiar. Had he lost the sense of being a fish out of water that came when he ventured into the region of Tyre? It certainly seems possible. I’m sure we all know the discomfort that can come when we are in unfamiliar places, the heightened sense of awareness, the desire to not show ourselves up too obviously because we don’t know the customs and traditions. At any rate, here is a situation that sounds much more like the other ones we read about in all four of the gospel records. A person is in need of healing and Jesus is consulted to lay a healing hand upon him. Ephphatha - Jesus says. Open up and opened up indeed were the ears and the mouth of the man who had previously been unable to hear or speak.

Of course we all know there is more to this story than just the healing of the man. The words that Jesus speaks have much deeper meaning than just simple words of healing. They are words that speak of an attitude, a way of being, a positioning of our spirits so that they are ready to learn, to accept insight, to find new ways of seeing and hearing for ourselves. Much has been written about the “great secret” that occurs in the gospel of Mark - the frequent addendum to a story of healing in which Jesus tells his disciples not to tell anyone about what has just happened. The irony of course is pretty clear - for the directive to the disciples is being detailed in a story meant to proclaim the miracle even though it has Jesus telling the disciples to keep it quiet.

Well, as I say much has been written about the meaning of this “secret” in Mark’s gospel, but at least one explanation occurs to me in this particular case. We all know that the best sermons, the most influential learnings are the ones we preach and teach to ourselves. It occurs to me that given the events of the previous encounter with the Syro-phoenician woman that Jesus may indeed be preaching to himself. Open up - he’s telling himself. Listen to yourself - why did you react so strongly and with such a closed mind to the request from the Syro-phoenician woman. Haven’t you always pointed out that outsiders, unexpected people are of the source of great learning, are examples of great faith? And yet, here you were, perhaps guided by your own discomfort, frustration and feelings of being an outsider, reacting in a way that ran counter to your own teachings. The encounter with the syro-phoenician woman became for him an object lesson in his own theological principles.

“Open” describes for me the attitude we are called to take in our lives as guided by God. Open to wisdom in unexpected places, from unexpected people at unexpected times. There is a description of the way we are called by God to live our lives, that takes this pattern: reflection - action - reflection. Filling it out a bit more goes like this: We reflect on our lives and how we might better follow the way of God. We then follow that path in action, and having done so, we reflect again and let it inform our continued action. In other words, it is a theology which is continually growing, evolving, and learning from the wisdom not only of our past experience, but the wisdom that comes from others.

Does this not describe the progression we heard about in the gospel story from Mark this morning? Action called into question by the wisdom of the Syro-phoenician woman, resulting in different, more faithful action, and then further reflected upon by Jesus in his subsequent encounter with the man who could neither speak nor hear. 

 Open may we be. Amen.