Do You See Me? (1)
“O woman, your faith is great; be it done for you as you wish.” Matthew 15:28
Faith – If love is what we all want, rejection is what we all fear. There is nothing quite as damaging as being told that you don’t belong. “Don’t bother me. Can’t you see I’m busy?” “What are you doing here anyway?” “Who told you to come? You’re not welcome.” You can add your own variations to the theme from your life story. Somewhere along the way we have all felt the cold sting of dismissal. Sometime in our past we knew the flash of shame that comes when we weren’t welcome. If the world needs love, it has a very strange way of showing it.
Turned away! Worse than that! Not only turned back but rejected. “Not good enough for God’s care.” This is not what we expect from Yeshua. How could He turn away someone in need?
In what must be one of the strangest stories of the Gospels, Yeshua deals with rejection. But He seems to be on the wrong side of the equation. He seems to be handing out the dismissal, shunning someone in desperate need. Is Yeshua really this callous, this demeaning? The story compels us to look deeper, to find a way inside the window in order to feel the emotions released in this encounter. What does the heart of God have to say when we feel as though we have been pushed away, even by Him?
You are walking along the street with several friends. It is a pleasant day in the city and soon you will be enjoying good conversation over a great meal at the nearby restaurant. But as you and your friends pass by the alley, you see the pitiful sight of a homeless mother with her child. For one brief moment, your eyes lock. As though her eyes suddenly become yours, you see what she sees – the chosen ones, passing through life as though God’s favor belongs only to them, ignoring the plight of a mother who has known only sorrow. The flash of identity passes. But the woman in rags knows. She steps forward. “Please, please help me. My little girl is sick. I have nothing to feed her. Won’t you help us?”
The matted hair, the dirty face, the smell, the voice – an emotional assault that catches you off guard. You were thinking about a nice lunch and good company when your world confronted this outsider. You fight between panic and pity. You want to get away but her words tug at your heart. You did not come to minister to the homeless today. You aren’t dressed for it.
Your friends push you forward. “Oh, that’s disgusting. How can people allow themselves to live like that? There must be a shelter or somewhere she can go.” As they try to urge you along, you see the woman following. She is crying.
“You know, you just can’t be sure. If you give her something, how do you know she won’t just buy drugs? I hear that’s all they really want anyway.” But the woman cries out, “Please, lady, help me.” Now you realize that she is young. The time on the street has aged her. She could be your child. Children bearing children. You wonder about the tiny body clutched in her arms. Was it really a child, or just a doll? Your steps falter.
“Look, just send her away.” One of your friends touches you reassuringly on the arm. “We can’t have her following us like this. Everyone will stare! It’s embarrassing.”
Come with me to Cite Soleil in the port district of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. 300,000 people living on a two-square mile garbage dump. Water so polluted that it smells. Open sewers like the tentacles of a diseased monster. And children. Everywhere! Digging for scraps. Flies covering their faces. Bellies swollen from malnutrition. Slowly dying. By the thousands! Once noted as the poorest place in the Western hemisphere, Cite Soleil has a new badge. It is now the most dangerous place in the Western hemisphere. Rape, murder, robbery, beatings and every other kind of violence is an everyday way of life here. 245 miles from South Beach, 7 million people are starving to death in Haiti while the glittering crowds of south Florida drink $9 martinis and eat $100 dinners. These are the outcasts, rounded up and put into the concentration camp of the global economy. Surrounded by a prison of bright blue water, they have nothing to offer the world except the cry of their need. And the world does not respond to need unless there is something to gain. So, tip the valet parking attendant and drive away in your new Lexus. There is no reason at all to think about Cite Soleil.
The first step in understanding this encounter with Yeshua is acknowledging which role we play. Are we the socially annoyed or the clamoring needy? Are we the righteous or the refugees? This is a story about personal pride. It is a story about who matters. Unless we stand with the Canaanite woman, Yeshua will be nothing more than the leader of the acceptable. God’s grace falls on outcasts of the world because they know their need. To lead like Yeshua is to see our outcast faces in the mirror, accepted only because He cares.
Yeshua encountered a refugee on this trip to Tyre. This woman from nowhere begins to cry out, “Son of David, help my daughter.” The Greek word that describes her cry is onomatopoetic. It makes its own sound. Krauge. It is the sound of a cry. The crying of an old crow. Caw. Caw. The annoying sound designed for only one purpose – to get attention. Krauge, krauge. Yeshua does not respond.
How do you get God’s attention when you have nothing but your need? This woman teaches us a great lesson. Need is enough. She does not stand on protocol. She does not consider the consequences. She does not wait for the right setting, the right attitude or the right contact. She “caws” after God. She steps boldly forward and makes her need known. She has no other way. On every other basis, she is excluded. But need overcomes all other reasons.
Do you have needs worth “cawing”? Why are you waiting to cry out to Him?
Topical Index: krauge, cry, faith, Cite Soleil, Matthew 15:28
Oh…I enjoyed getting the Spanish version..although I don’t know the language, I was sure you were just keeping us on our toes. LoL thanks for the English version!
Thanks for the English addittion. My two years of High School Spanished failed me. Even though I have read this story countless times, I had never focused on the initial ignoring of the lady on the part of Jesus. Only focused on her faith that accomplished her mission. It is amazing how blind I can be. Thanks for taking off some of my scales, Skip.
Your lesson gave me the courage to pray in a way I felt selfish about at first. At this present moment, there are two workers in my basement and they have just discovered enough mold down there to make me very sick and cost me what I don’t have. They are fixing it and my father, my lover, my savior, my provider, my husband, my friend has just listened to my caw call and hears. He and I have come a long way. I am at peace. All I know is that He is faithful, has been faithful, will be faithful.
Skip, what is the solution for Cite Soleil? Surely there are numerous organizations trying to improve the situation in Haiti. How do we get there from here? Skip, I don’t really expect you to try to answer this. The task is monumental. I ask myself somewhat similar questions virtually every day as I pass by half dozen, or more, so called homeless with their cardboard signs, now so prevalent on our street corners across this land of plenty. Tom
Hi Tom,
It’s so nice to hear from you and I know you have a heart for these people and people like them. Cite Soleil is really a problem that cannot be solved. The squalor, death, disease and violence is so rampant that there is no “general” fix. All we can really do is try to save one person at a time. There are organizations that are trying to do this – mostly medical aid and missionary groups who work with the world’s worst situations. The rest of the nations have essentially abandoned Haiti. It has no political capital, no economic value, so they don’t really care. Outside Port-au-Prince there is still hope. Like the work in Ranquitte where our efforts have provided a road, solar electric, water, teachers and medical supplies. But in the depths of the worst slums, there is only death. It is a shocking reality. I wish I could tell you what to do other than help us in Ranquitte, but I have no answers. Sometimes people say to me, “Haiti’s problems are too big to solve. Why bother? There is nothing we can do. They are all going to die.” I answer, “Yes, you’re right. We can’t fix the problems of all the population, but we can save one family, can’t we?”
The two great cries of each of us at our points of crisis and greatest need are: 1. God, are you there? and 2. God, do you care? And to those two profound questions, God answers each of us at our times of greatest doubt and wavering faith, “I will never leave you” and “I will never forsake you.” Our family may abandon us and forsake us but our Lord will not…Our friends may abandon us and forsake us but our Lord will not…Our circumstances may cause us to feel abandoned and forsaken but our Lord will not. In other words, He assures us of His presence and He assures of His love….It is only when we encounter Christ in this way that we can be moved to be His presence and love to those around us who are or even feel abandoned and forsaken.
I am also mindful that only our Lord felt and experienced ultimate abandonment and forsakeness on the cross He bore for me. He knows and He knows infinitely and experientially just exactly what it means to be abandoned and forsaken.
I used to spend a lot of time in Haiti, with my husband, who was Haitian. He disappeared there the last time he went without the rest of the family about 30 years ago. I couldn’t go back or the same thing would likely happen to me. His family was part of the white ruling class of Haiti before Papa Doc took over. My father-in-law was put into the torture chamber under the National Palace because he refused the position of the “token white” in Duvalier’s cabinet. He had been Secretary of State and Commerce under the previous president. They released him after two years and we brought him to the US, but he didn’t live very long after that.
The country was still beautiful then — a place where Hollywood stars and heads of state had recently vacationed. I can remember how safe I felt there. I knew if I fell down in the street that the people would care for me. At that time, there was no violent crime in Haiti (except for the government, of course). Even those who robbed the houses at night, used ether on a sponge at the end of a pole, pushing it through the wrought iron grills at the tops of the walls, keeping the owners asleep so they would not have to harm them. And when they robbed the house, they stole socks and underwear and shirts and shoes — never touching the silver or valuables for which they had no earthly use. They were such a gentle people.
Once on the street in Port-au-Prince, we encountered a begging woman with twins. Both babies had 6 fingers and 6 toes, and she was begging for money to have them surgically removed. My husband laughed at me for giving her money. He said the babies belonged to another woman, who rented them out to different women so they could beg from the tourists. He said the mother was considered wealthy among the peasants. A cab driver once begged us to take his newborn baby boy and raise him in the US. It was his 9th child, and could not feed the 8 he already had. The colorful Tap-taps, with the names of all sorts of voodoo gods and Catholic saints painted all over them rode the rough roads, carrying people, goats, chickens, sometimes a skinny cow in the back that was once a truck bed, and now had a bench down each side for passengers and animals.
There were times when we were stopped at the airport and detained for several days claiming a seal was missing from my husband’s passport. They took us to a hotel in a limo, took good care of us for a few days, then let us go after outlying areas had time to report that we had stirred no trouble there.
I can remember the marchand weaving their way down the side of the mountain from Kenscoff, into Port-au-Prince at night, carrying their wares on their heads for Saturday market, torches in hand, and singing the most beautiful melodies. I also heard the Voodoo chants at night, and saw a yard boy “possessed.” The lady of the house threw “holy water” on him, and he screamed and jumped wildly, saying it burned, then fell to the ground as if asleep. I can also remember the ton ton macout (boogey men), the President’s personal body guards, with their guns bulging out from under their ragged shirts, and we cut a large circle around them, knowing they had no normal limits to their behavior.
It is so sad to see such a beautiful paradise turned into such horror, and to consider the lives of the children born into this nightmare. Given the current violence and crime, even the charities of other nations can’t get to them to help. God help the outcasts.
Donna, I had stopped at John Offutt’s reply, as I scrolled back up from the bottom where a person comes in. I had written a long reply on it, and stopped there. I came back later and just now read your reply on Haiti, and found it most interesting!
I must go to the sewing room while the sunshine is out, and I can see well enough to sew properly, but wanted to say, please let us hear more from your experiences of it. We, too lived in a poor Third World Country, West Pakistan ( at that time Pakistan was divided into two sections divided by India.– no real wealth in our family, just to the poor there it appeared that all Americans were wealthy. U.S. Educational Foundation was our source, and I taught in an English speaking School, mostly for Oil people’s children, a few nationals on scholarship. — I think this experience among many others, caused me to ” really start ” Seeking a real alive Jesus in the scriptures”, and to keep on seeking==literally keep -keeping on. Please let us hear more of your experiences, and how you see God’s hand in them. May the Lord richly reward you. Sincerely, La Vaye Billings (L.B.)
Our friend Teresa who is a very sincere believer has colon cancer. From talking with her, I found that God has revealed the basics of what Skip tries to teach us on the blog through her own Bible study. She is about 55 years old and divorced. She has raised her two children, owns a house, a car and HAD a business. Colon cancer struck suddenly and without warning. She had surgery and a poor prognosis for recovery. She took one series of chemo and felt like it was killing her, and she stopped. Her very kind Doctor that was in charge of her chemo told her it didn’t matter, because she was going to die anyway. Teresa has a house payment, a car payment, insurance, a past due income tax payment, utilities and other every day expenses with no income. For the first time in her life since she was 12 years old, she has no money, none. She exhausted all her financial reserve. But she has great faith in God to sustain her. When the reality of her situation became clear, she began to pray more than ever before and state her case to God. She had her first surgery 10 months ago, and since that time all her bills have been paid. Some by people she knows and some by people she has never heard of before. So far she has had exactly enough to pay all her bills untill last month when she lacked $50 having enough to survive. That same day, she went to the mail box and found a check from someone she barely knew for $50. With my wife’s emotional help and our financial help, Teresa has been able to go to Vanderbilt where Cancer specialist there determined with a PET scan that she had only 3 tumors remaining. They were very large and all on her liver. Last week those tumors were all successfully removed by very risky surgery, and I am not sure that the hospital or the surgeons were paid anything other than a minimal TN care payment if that. When you have great faith and cry out, God will answer and keep on answering. Anyone that would say one more prayer for Teresa, please do. She is very appreciative of all the prayers for her recovery.
We don’t always get the answer to our prayer that we want though. We get the answer that God determines is best. If we got what we wanted, my son would have survived his cancer last year. Now I cry out to God to heal the emotional discord that my sons death has caused the family.
John,
I’m sorry to hear about your son and your suffering. I will say a prayer for you.
Mike
John, and all others,
We lived in Houston for 26 years, where M.D. Anderson was/is known as one of the best Cancer Hospitals in the world. We lived only about a mile straight down from the huge medical center area ( 30,000 people estimated then to work in it.) The Lord gave us the opportunity to help many patients coming from the top of TX where we both had roots, to do what we could to bless them. Ed’s own sister, K.L., about 30 years ago, at age 41- “seemingly” lost her four year battle with cancer starting in the breast, and over the years of chemo, radiation, etc. etc. etc. in all other areas of her body.
She had three boys, two were twins age 7 when she died, the older one about 9 years old. She was somehow able to teach school for those years, and somewhat care for the family, until the final summer. She had a husband ,that the kindest thing you could say about him, was that he was an atheist, and a mentally deranged man, he drank hard liquor regularly. He was not illiterate, he was a degreed engineer. His father and brothers were medical doctors, outside of Houston.— She had really turned from the God of her youth, with this bad marriage, and their lifestyle. Because of it, we were not close to the family that lived about five miles from us.
NOW TO WHAT G-D DID FOR ALL OF US. Prior to K.L. becoming ill, God had begun to inundate Ed and Me with the power of His Holy Spirit, our entire “Christian” lives were turned upside down, all according to the scripture”, we were only able because of His Spirit living in us, able to walk out what He wanted us to do. I have written about some of this outpouring, a few times previously. It is necessary to remind everyone, that “when you began to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousnes, and keep on doing that, He will reward that effort in His own timing.
The horrors of those years would fill a book, BUT G-d made something beauiful out of them, K.L. too, began to seek the Lord with all her heart, soul, and mind—He gloriously filled her with such peace, joy, and hope each day, even after the trauma’s. Her husband literally threw her out of her home with the boys, she continued on in God’s Word, with the help others gave her. I have been in a large shopping mall store, where unkown people to me, were discussing this teacher (K.L.) at the school where she taught, and saying what a miracle it was. The last day of K.L.’s earthly life, I was in such pain for her going through so much suffering that I could not even pray. finally, I went outside to work in my plants. I am writing this ( I have spoken it only a few times in all those years since then, 1974, and just to those that were mature in the Lord.) Our youngest daughter about ten or eleven years went with me outside, and was using a flashlight to catch little frogs, and etc. I began to speak to her about her Aunt’s death, and asked her if she knew that she was going to die. She said, “No”, she did not. I began to explain some things to her. Ed stepped to the door, and spoke to me, that he had received a call that K.L., had left this world an hour ago. Then I began to praise the Lord for no more suffering, no more pain, no more death for her, but I also asked why did she have to suffer so much.
And during this time G-d released visions, dreams –( how does one write about Heavenly things, with English Words?) Those things definitly from the Lord– He showed me that if I could multiply what K.L. suffered by billions of people through out history of man on earth, that it would not even began to reach what Jesus took on Himself and carried- suffered for us when He left His Glory, and came to the earth and died on the cross. That it was necessary for people to suffer & die, and those walking with them on earth , to really get even a slight glimpse of what He provided for us. Then we would began to have some understanding of HIs great LOVE.
Without much more time to write, I will say that her suffering brought her into His Glory, and how many others, we do not know. — So much more after all these years. Only God can see the full picture.
John, for this lady your family is ministering to, and with the loss of your precious son, I will remember often all of you in prayer. I can honestly say that God is a rewarder of those who continue to diligently seek Him, and His righteousness. — Each situation will be what God ordains to bring glory for His name sake, no two alike, and you may not be even unaware of much it. But in due season you will be rewarded greatly, and others already are being blessed by your family! Praise His Many Holy Names, giving Thanks in all things. L.B. (LaVaye Billings)
LaVaye,
Thanks for your encouragement and the others who have written and prayed also. We were at M D Anderson in 2006. They were very kind, but told my son that because his pancreatic cancer was so advanced in the area it was, that there was no hope but chemo. He survived almost a year before the chemo caused kidney failure and added dialysis to our son’s torment. M D Anderson was not in charge of the chemo. The doctor who did his chemo was negligent as so many of them are these days. If you have a caring doctor, hang on to him at all cost.
John