Day 7 - Go For It by Pastor Philip Olubakin: MP3 Download & Sermon Notes

Mark 7 — The Syrophoenician Woman

Mark 7:24-30

Jesus entered a house wanting no one to know his whereabouts, but he could not be hidden. If your life is changing other people's lives, you cannot hide. A city set upon a hill cannot be hidden.

A Greek woman — a Syrophoenician — came and fell at his feet, begging him to cast a demon out of her daughter. Jesus said to her: let the children first be filled, for it is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.

This has been misread as a racial insult. It was not. Jesus was sent to the lost house of Israel in this season — his death had not yet opened redemption to the Gentiles. The reference to dogs was an illustration of the unclean status of a Gentile as at that time.

But the deeper point is this: Jesus said healing and deliverance are the children's bread.

Healing belongs to you. Deliverance belongs to you. You do not have to beg for it, lobby for it, or perform for it.

In the book of Luke, when Jesus addressed the woman who was bent for eighteen years, he called her a daughter of Abraham and said: "Be loosed." It is your right to be healed. It is your right to be delivered. It is your right to be fruitful.

Persistent Faith Takes Everything in the Bread

The woman's response was extraordinary. She said: "Yes, Lord — but even the dogs under the table eat of the children's crumbs."

Jesus was moved. In other gospel accounts he marvelled and said: "Great is this faith." And he gave her what she came for.

Consider what she understood: if there is butter in the bread, there is butter in the crumbs. If there is an egg in the bread, there is an egg in the crumbs. If there is a miracle in the bread, there is a miracle in the crumbs. She was not settling for less — she understood that even the overflow of the children's blessing carries full kingdom substance.

Speak to It

Mark 7:32-35

When Jesus healed the deaf man, he did something unusual — he spoke to him. Why would Jesus speak to a deaf man? Because the spirit of deafness can hear. The deaf spirit is not deaf.

Jesus spoke and the deaf heard. Jesus spoke and the dead heard. He spoke to the wind, to the sea, to the fig tree, to Jairus's daughter.

He spoke words of faith to everything. Whatever in your life is not working, learn to speak to it the way Jesus did. Speak to your body. Speak to your finances. Speak to your relationships. The miracle follows the word.