‘BUT HE ANSWERED HER NOT A WORD’

“AND, behold, a woman of Canaan, came out of the same coasts, and cried unto him, saying , ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord , thou son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil’. But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying; ‘Send her away; for she crieth after us’,” Matthew 15:22-23.

Reader, whoever you are; wherever you are; and whatever you are going through; I humbly greet you at this time in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified and died on a wooden cross; not for His sins, but for the sins of all that have sinned. And I so greet you with the above text of scripture in the knowledge that you and I do often come to God with our burning desires, critical needs and urgent requests; and He sometimes answers us ‘not a word’. And I have prepared this short article praying that God may use it to give us a better understanding of His ways.

Reader, the lack of response from a person like Jesus must have sounded out of character to those who knew Him; it definitely looked unlike Jesus; and even His disciples must have felt that He could have done better than just keeping quiet when the poor woman was crying after Him and His followers; hence their request that He should rather send her away because of her crying.

But reader, this silence of Jesus Christ was not empty silence; it was neither senseless nor insensitive to the needs of this poor Canaanite woman. Jesus had a better way.

But to the listener, the following words of Jesus Christ must have sounded even more devastating to this desperate and persistent woman: “It is not meat to take the children’s bread, and cast it to dogs,” verse 26. Someone else in the position of that woman might have surrendered; may have been completely disheartened; may have lost all hope of a favourable answer from Jesus. First the significant silence; then these hard words; that would have been enough for some of us. We would have quit right there.

But it was not to be with the Canaanite woman. She was not about to be broken. Humble as a dove, she was as strong as a rock; she was not about to be counted out. She must have said to herself; “Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him,” Job 13:15; and she quickly collected herself and swung back like a pendulum, saying; “Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table,” verse 27. The Lord had played her a long shot of faith, but she comfortably returned the ball. And even He was sporting enough to concede, saying; “O woman, great is thy faith.”

Reader, when we go to God frustrated by endless pain and He answers us not a word, we should neither quit nor despair; for that silence is neither empty towards us, nor is it a denial by God. God has His ways dear reader.
At times our troubles get worse after we have reported them to Him. And it may be that He is still weighing our faith and finds it still wanting. For without faith it is impossible to please God. It is at such difficult times that we should take strides of faith towards God like that Canaanite woman.

Reader the greatness of our faith is not revealed when God is answering all our prayers; when our friends still surround us and when our bank accounts are still fat. No sir! We don’t need light when it is not dark. So when He is silent, and when he plays hard balls towards us, we should understand that His ways are higher than our ways; and never despair.

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