And a Canaanite woman from that region came to Him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is miserably possessed by a demon.”Behold, a Canaanite woman came out from those borders and cried, saying, “Have mercy on me, Lord, you son of David! My daughter is severely possessed by a demon!”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.And behold, a Canaanitish woman came out from those borders, and cried, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a demon.
3 sermons cite this verse
You may be seated. the shadows are lengthening the clouds are thickening as Jesus moves to Calvary four times in the gospels Jesus is looking for a place a respite. He's trying to retire away from his friends and foes. He's trying to seek asylum from his adversaries and advocates. Jesus is trying to steal a way to be alone somewhere away from the political and the religious figures. As the ecclesiastical leaders who are coming after him, Jesus is trying to find someplace where he can retire and be alone to enter into silence and solitude. My spiritual mentor of over 40 years now, Father Henry J.M. Nowen, defines solitude as a furnace of transformation. It's a cell that you enter into and lock yourself in, not to be distracted from any of the busyness that knocks at our doors. All of us know something about that. Of all of the disciplines spiritually to master, probably the most challenging one is silence and solitude. We're just a noisy group of people. …
Ah, cold prayers will never open the gates of Heaven—you must go and knock, and knock, and knock, and knock again if you would make swing open the celestial portals! You must use the golden knocker not with a languid tap, but with the loud stroke of one who must get entrance, for the cold street of the everlasting storm is already falling and if shut out, there will be "weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth." Remember how powerfully the Savior, Himself, exhorted to this in His parable of the importunate friend who needed bread for his friend who came to him after a journey, and who never rested until he secured it from his neighbor, though he roused him out of bed at midnight to obtain it! Homely is the picture, but notable is the meaning and lesson of it. You must knock, and knock, and knock, and redouble your blows—take Heaven by storm—for as our Lord declared, "The Kingdom of Heaven suffers violence," so be numbered with the violent who "take it by force." The longer you are made to wait, the more earnestly must you pray— and your prayers will yet prevail! But I want us particularly to notice that the longer she prayed, the shorter became the prayer You may generally measure the worth of prayer by this rule—the longer the worse, the shorter the better. She began, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, You Son of David. My daughter is grievously vexed with a devil." That is a good prayer, but the next is shorter. "Lord, help me!" It is just those prayers that win the day! It would be well if we remembered to let our words be few when we come before the Most High. When we get intensely and solemnly earnest before God, we generally have more thoughts than words, more intensity than sentences. Some may say, "I cannot pray at all," but if God has given you desire for His mercy, you can surely pray, "Lord, help me!" That is not too long for memory or for time. "Lord, help me!" You can pray that before going to work in the morning, pray it at night, however late you may return. Some say the Lord's prayer, but I beg you not to do so if unconverted. How can you say, "Our Father," unless you are saved and belong to the family of God? What right have you to call Him, "Father," unless you have passed from death unto life? Use it when the Spirit of adoption is yours, but not until then! This is an infinitely better prayer for you, "Lord, help me!" It makes no profession but of helplessness. It confesses, "I cannot help myself. I am most unworthy and most needy. Lord, help me to repent! Break my heart for me. Help me to believe! To keep me from sin. To serve You and to be like Jesus Christ Himself." I cannot suggest a prayer shorter or more full of meaning. …
There are many benefits that we ask of God in our prayers, which are every whit of as great importance to us as those benefits which Christ asked of God in his agony were to him. It is of as great importance to us that we should be enabled to do the will of God, and perform a sincere, universal, and persevering obedience to his commands, as it was to Christ that he should not fail of doing God’s will in his great work. It is of as great importance to us to be saved from death, as it was to Christ that he should get the victory over death, and so be saved from it. It is of as great, and infinitely greater, importance to us, that Christ’s redemption should be successful in us, as it was to him that God’s will should be done, in the fruits and success of his redemption. Christ recommended earnest watchfulness and prayer-fulness to his disciples, by prayer and example, both at the same time. When Christ was in his agony, and came and found his disciples asleep, he bid them watch and pray, Matt. xxvi. 41. “Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. At the same time he set them an example of that which he commanded them, for though they slept he watched, and poured out his soul in those earnest prayers that you have heard of; and Christ has elsewhere taught us to ask those blessings of God that are of infinite importance, as those that will take no denial. We have another example of the great conflicts and engagedness of Christ’s spirit in this duty. Luke vi. 12. “And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.” And he was often recommending earnestness in crying to God in prayers. In the parable of the unjust judge, Luke xviii. at the beginning; “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint; saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man; and there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. And he would not for a while: but afterwards he saith within himself, Though I fear not God nor regard man, yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me. And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith.” Luke 5, &c. “And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him 1. And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, though he will not rise and give him because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity, he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.” He taught it in his own way of answering prayer, as in answering the woman of Canaan, Matt. xv. 22, &c.“And behold a woman of Canaan came out of the 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. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children’s bread and cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord; yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their master’s table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith; be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour.” And as Christ prayed in his agony, so I have already mentioned several texts of Scripture wherein we are directed to agonize in our prayers to God. …