“THE HEART THAT HEARS”
MARK 7:24-30

24 And from there he arose and went away to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And he entered a house and did not want anyone to know, yet he could not be hidden.
25 But immediately a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit heard of him and came and fell down at his feet.
26 Now the woman was a Gentile, a Syrophoenician by birth. And she begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter.
27 And he said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.”
28 But she answered him, “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs under the table eat the children's crumbs.”
29 And he said to her, “For this statement you may go your way; the demon has left your daughter.”
30 And she went home and found the child lying in bed and the demon gone.

I made a big decision this past week. I decided that the time has come for me to look into getting a hearing aid. I say that because I suffer from tinnitus. That’s a medical condition where you experience a ringing sensation in your ears. My ears ring all the time, twenty four hours a day, seven days a week. Because of that I don’t always I don’t always hear what people are saying. There are times when I feel like I’m having a conversation with the guy in those Verizon television commercials. “Can you hear me now?”

My problem is that I don’t always hear what people are saying. For some people the problem isn’t that they don’t hear. The problem is that they just don’t listen. Unfortunately, listening skills aren’t as good as they used to be. You can see that when it comes to preaching. It used to be that a good sermon lasted 20 to 30 minutes or more. Today it’s more like 12 to 15 minutes and that may be pushing it a little. When I told my dad that I was going to go to seminary he had one bit of advice for me. I believe his exact words were “Just remember to keep your sermons short. If you have to go more than 15 minutes save it for another sermon.”

Of course I always tell my congregation that there’s no such thing as a bad sermon. Either you walk away from it renewed or you wake up from it refreshed.

There are lots of reasons why people don’t listen. Sometimes it’s because they’re too busy. Sometimes it’s because they don’t want to hear what’s being said. Sometimes it’s because they’re nervous.

That’s what happened many years ago during a formal dinner at the White House. Franklin Roosevelt was standing in the receiving line when he decided to play a little game. While shaking each person’s hand he said very calming, “I murdered my grandmother this morning.” Instead of being shocked people just smiled and said, “That’s great” or “Keep up the good work.” No one really listened to what he was saying except for one foreign diplomat. When Roosevelt told him that he murdered his grandmother he replied, “Well, I’m sure she had it coming to her.”

When it comes to listening it seems as though the words to that old Simon and Garfunkel song are true. “In the naked light I saw, ten thousand people maybe more.
People talking with out speaking. People hearing without listening.”
If you want to see people who aren’t listening, just look at the debate that’s raging right now over health care reform. I don’t know about you but I’m tired of watching people scream at each other and insult each other. I’ve heard people against health care reform say that Obama wants to guillotine white Christians. I’ve also heard people in favor of health care reform attack Rush Limbaugh with equal vehemence. It’s been said that he’s against health care reform because he won’t be able to get the oxycontin he needs to feed his drug habit.

It’s enough to make you sick which is why I think we’d all be a lot better off it we did what Jesus did that day when he met that Syrophoenician woman. What you see in that story is a Jesus who listened to what the woman had to say. Of course, it didn’t start out that way. When the woman first asked Jesus to heal her daughter he refused. Some people believe that Jesus did more than that. Some people believe that Jesus actually insulted the woman.

Jesus said to her, “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” Does that sound like Jesus to you? “Let the children be fed first, for it is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Those words offend our politically correct ears. What Jesus was basically saying though was that he couldn’t help the woman because he was a Jewish messiah and she and her daughter weren’t Jews.

Now at this point the woman could have cursed Jesus or she could have begun to cry. Instead of doing that she stayed calm and said, “Yes, Lord, but even the dogs under the table (get to) eat the children's crumbs.”

With those words the woman reminds Jesus that even though she and her daughter aren’t Jewish they were still God’s children. It’s almost as if the woman is saying to Jesus, “I’ve heard about your God and I’ve heard about you. You’re God is great and because you’re God’s only begotten Son I know that you are a man of great compassion. So, I know that there’s enough love in your heart to heal my daughter.”

“Yes, Lord…even the dogs under the table (get to) eat the children’s crumbs.”
When Jesus hears that he praises the woman for her faith and he heals the little girl.

Jesus listened to what the woman said and it changed the way he looked at her. She went from being a lowly woman to being a woman of great faith. She went from being a strange foreigner to being a woman with who deserved God’s grace and a daughter who deserved to be healed.

Jesus will tell you that when you listen it leads to understanding which leads to compassion which leads to reconciliation which in turn leads to a better tomorrow. Can you image how much better this world would be if Democrats and Republicans listened to each other instead of shouting at each other? Can you image how much better this world would be if Palestinians and Jews listened to each other instead of shooting guns at each other? Maybe your life would be better if you took the time to sit down and listen to what someone has to say to you.

Jesus wants you to know that when you take the time to really listen you may have to change your mind about someone or something. So, sometimes it takes courage to listen. Do you have the courage to listen?

If you do you might end up experiencing a grace filled moment similar to the one that Jesus and the Syrophoenician woman shared. You may end up experiencing a grace filled moment similar to the one a man experienced many years ago. It all started when the young man made a phone call. Unfortunately, when an old answered the phone he grumbled “Wrong number” and hung up. That surprised the man. So he dialed the number again the same thing happened. Instead of getting angry the young man was now curious. He wondered how the old man could be so sure it was a wrong number before he even heard his voice. You see this was before the days of Caller ID. So, he dialed the number a couple more times and finally managed to ask the old man his question before he hung up. The old man grumbled, “You figure it out,” and then he hung up again. A few minutes later the phone rang again. “Did you figure it out?” the old man grumbled. “Well,” the man replied, “the only thing I can think of is that nobody ever calls you.” “You got it,” the old man grumbled and then he hung up again. A few minutes later the phone rang again. “What do you want now?” the old man grumbled. The man replied, “I just thought I’d call to say hello.” When the old man asked why he would do a stupid thing like that, the man replied, “If nobody ever calls you, I figured maybe I should.” Those simple caring words broke the ice and led to a telephone friendship that lasted several months. In the weeks and months that followed the man learned that his new friend was 88-years-old and was all alone in the world. All his family and friends had died. He also found out that the two of them shared something in common. At different times they both worked for the New York City police department. In their telephone conversations the old man shared his memories of both World Wars and other historic events like the Hindenburg disaster. During one of their conversations the man learned that his friend’s 89th birthday was coming up in a couple of weeks. So, when the big day arrived he got a cake and had everyone at the police station sign a big card. When he got to the apartment though he discovered that the old man had died a couple of days before his birthday. The man’s heart was heavy as he walked away from the apartment. In his heart though he knew that he didn’t get a wrong number the first time he called the old man. Because he took the time to listen the two of them had been blessed with a short but wonderful grace filled relationship.

Things like that happen when you take the time to listen, really listen. So with that in mind I have just one question for you this morning. Can you hear me now? Amen.

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes
September 6, 2009