Praying Mother (Mother’s Day)

Text: Mark 7:24-30

A desperate mother has exhausted herself trying to help her daughter.  She hears about the Lord Jesus Christ and determines that she is going to find him.  She does. When she airs out her problem before the Lord and the disciples looking on she is turned down by them all.  But she persists. And the Lord explains His specific ministry is to the house of Israel and it’s not right to take bread off the table to give it to Gentile dogs.  She agrees that she is a Gentile dog, nevertheless even the dogs eat crumbs off the floor from the table. At that point Jesus is impressed and heals her daughter.

Persistence pays off

  • …and would have no man know it: but he could not be hid.  For a certain woman… (vss 24-25)
  • She hunts down the Lord in desperation.
  • Then gets turned down by the disciples.
  • Then gets turned down by the Lord.

Some people are too dignified to get a prayer answered

  • She came and aired out her dirty laundry.
  • She’s humble and humiliated and that doesn’t matter at this point.
  • Her daughter means more than her own dignity.
  • Some of you are too dignified to get an answer to prayer.
  • It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.  And she answered, Yes Lord…
  • There are so many reasons why God should not answer my prayers the first of which is because of who I am and because of who He is.
  • Prayer answered because I am exactly who He said I am and He is exactly who He said He is.

The Lord is willing to change His plans

  • None of what we’re reading was in the Lord’s plans.
  • He was trying to hide from the crowd.  He was not planning on dealing with anyone for a while.  He had no intentions of dealing with Gentiles at this point.
  • Change in plans is not a change in character.  In fact, it is the Lord who is very responsive to man.

The Lord responds to faith

  • For this saying go thy way… (vs 29)
  • Breaking through all the dispensational barriers and responds to faith in a Gentile when He is ministering to the Jews.
  • Accepting

A crumb goes a long way when the Lord is in it

  • And when she was come to her house, she found the devil gone out… (vs 30)
  • She went home and her daughter was sitting up and I imagine she said, Momma, you won’t believe what happened!  My headache went away and all the bad thoughts went away and I feel happy. And I imagine she grabbed her daughter and embraced her with tears streaming down her face.
  • That crumb went a long way.  It fed my daughter and it fed me.