When my youngest son was five years old, his mother and I became concerned about his physical development. We took him to a GP, who dismissed our concerns. Many doctors excel in their practice of medicine, but there are a small number whose professional advice is not worth the plastic plate on their door.
We took Zachary to a second GP. As soon as she saw him, she knew what was wrong. She said to us, “He may have coeliac disease.” She was right. A biopsy confirmed that gluten in his diet had so damaged the villi in his small intestine that he was no longer absorbing nutrients from his food. The doctor had noticed what we had not: a rounded abdomen indicating malnutrition. With a restricted diet, Zac’s height and weight were back within the safe range for his age within six months.
A Canaanite woman calls for mercy
As I read and reflected on our lectionary text for today, I recalled that parental experience of a child suffering illness and the hope for a cure. In the extraordinary narrative of Matthew 15:21-28, we encounter three characters: Jesus, a Canaanite woman from Phoenicia in the far north of Israel, and there is her daughter who is said to be “severely tormented by a demon” (v. 22).
Imagine the mother’s distress. Imagine her desperation, her hopes for her daughter, the sense of powerlessness and lack of control. She had probably sought help for her daughter from many sources. Perhaps as a last resort, she seeks out the Jewish holy man she has heard of, and humbly asks him for help.
She is an “outsider.” She enters the story without a narrated past. We don’t know her back story, but her persistence in seeking help for her daughter suggests that she has a measure of resilience forged through adversity.
The power of resilience
Psychologically, resilience is not an invulnerability to hardship or suffering, nor is it a fixed personality trait expressed by a select few. Resilience is a dynamic process of adaptation to a challenge, drawing on personal strengths, relationships and available resources. The Canaanite woman’s resilience does not eliminate her daughter’s suffering, but it enables her to act with integrity in the situation, making the most of her opportunity to bring about wellness.
Jesus’s initial response is quite disturbing. He listens to her plea, and is initially silent. Then he declares that he was sent “only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (24). We might call it playing the race card.
But the woman is not done yet. She kneels before him, and implores him to help her (v. 25). Jesus replies with a soliloquy. He says, “It isn’t right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs” (v. 26). This is a reminder to Matthew’s readers that the primary mission of Jesus was to rescue the people of Israel from evil, and Phoenicia is at the very edge of his circle of influence as a teacher and a healer. In the story, Jesus is also testing the woman’s faith and resilience.
But this is one strong woman! She faces her daughter’s chronic suffering, her own status as an outsider, the disciples’ desire to send her away (v. 23), and Jesus’ apparent refusal to show mercy to her. She remains focused; she remains resilient. She stands her ground and says, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table” (v. 27). She hears Jesus’s soliloquy, and gently turns it to her advantage with a witty and cogent metaphor. She first addressed him as “Lord” and “Son of David” to honour him (v. 22), but now she has the audacity to humour him. What a woman!
And Jesus, knowing her heart and mind, and her desperate need, says to this courageous foreigner, this persistent parent, “Your faith is great. Let it be done for you as you want” (v. 28a). And Matthew adds, “And from that moment her daughter was healed” (v. 28b). Jesus’s power to heal, his power over demonic spirits, is demonstrated, and the little girl is no longer oppressed.
There is so much that could be said in reflection on this text. Today, I want to focus on the theme of resilience amid suffering and hardship, and apply the narrative to our lives today. I have seven points. When faced with suffering or hardship, where possible, we should seek to:
1. Practise attentive presence
Serious illness or injury can pull our mind backward into regret or forward into fear. The Canaanite woman remains focused on what is before her, on her most pressing need. Attentive presence means acknowledging uncertainty while attending to what we can do here and now. Resilience begins by asking what needs attention today rather than being swamped by possible futures.
2. Regulate emotions without suppressing them
The woman cries out in distress, but also engages in purposeful action. To employ emotional regulation is to acknowledge our fear, grief, anger or exhaustion without allowing these legitimate and often strong feelings to write our script and control every outcome. Resilience is not the same as stoicism or toxic positivity. Biblical lament makes room for honesty, allowing people to express grief, to question and protest, while continuing to cry out to God for help.
3. Persist without pretending to control the outcome
Serious illness may involve uncertain diagnoses, unsuccessful treatments, perseverance without the illusion of control, accepting assistance when we cherish independence, continuing one step at a time, a difficult and perhaps lonely journey in the dark. If you are in that place today, recall the promise that Jesus gave to Paul: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is perfected in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9). There is a beautiful mystery here.
4. Remain cognitively flexible
When Jesus speaks about children and dogs, the woman engages with his words and suggests another possibility (v. 27).She accepts the soliloquy without conceding that mercy is out of reach on ethnic grounds. She demonstrates cognitive flexibility rather than rage or despair. For us, serious illness may compel us to reconsider our assumptions about the hope of recovery, or independence, or identity. Suffering may compel us to reconsider what we think makes life worthwhile, while acknowledging the genuine loss we experience.
5. Speak purposefully
The woman’s voice in this narrative is crucial: she acknowledges suffering, asks for mercy, responds intelligently and persists when her request appears to be ignored or refused. Illness can generate an overwhelming volume of explanations, questions and advice, but purposeful speech may be as simple as saying, “I need help,” “I feel afraid,” or the prayer, “Lord, help me.” Resilience includes finding words to communicate honestly, to advocate appropriately, and to express what matters most, including words of heart-felt lament when solutions are over the horizon.
6. Accept reality without surrendering agency
The woman’s response, “Yes, Lord, yet…” (v. 27) acknowledges what has been said without conceding that nothing new can occur. She cannot heal her troubled daughter. She cannot compel Jesus to act. But she can remain present, she can speak, she can respond creatively, she can advocate on behalf of her daughter, and she can live with hope. Resilience recognises what we can’t control while preserving meaningful agency. Acceptance is not resignation to fate but honest recognition of reality combined with openness to the mercy of God.
7. Practise altruistic concern
The woman’s resilience is directed toward another person. She persists in her engagement with Jesus on behalf of her suffering daughter, allowing a mother’s love to guide her actions. Illness and injury often narrow our attention toward meeting our own personal needs, but maintaining a deep parallel concern for others reminds us that life is bigger than our own suffering, that there are other needs that also need to be addressed. We sustain resilience through relationships of giving and receiving care. Altruism, the practice of acting for the welfare of others, keeps us open to compassion, generosity, and loving action amid difficulty.
Further reflections
Notice also that Matthew does not explain why the daughter suffers. As I said, we are not told the back story. We too should resist the suggestion that God sends illness, injury or disaster to punish us, to teach us lessons, or to strengthen our character.
We should also be cautious about psychological ideas such as post-traumatic growth. Many of us do grow in response to trauma, but we don’t seek trauma in order to experience personal growth. No one should be made to feel that they have failed simply because suffering has exhausted their capacity for resilience, or they can identify no compensating benefit.
The Canaanite woman’s story has a happy ending with her daughter’s healing, but we know that many stories of suffering don’t end like that. Many Christians live faithfully for years, day by day, with chronic illness, disability, permanent injury, or terminal disease. We reach beyond suffering and healing to the Christian hope of resurrection and new creation, the glorious future for which Jesus died and into which Jesus is leading us at this very moment.
Christian resilience is much more than psychological endurance, positive self-talk, or finding the confidence to seem as though we are coping with the struggles of life. Attentive presence, emotional regulation, persistence, cognitive flexibility, purposeful speech, responsible agency, and altruistic concern may deepen our awareness of the mercy of God in our lives, but divine grace always precedes resilience.
The mercy of God is not a reward for coping, and resilience is not just another mountain to climb or another badge to collect. Christian resilience is the capacity, sometimes strong and sometimes painfully fragile, to remain open to grace within circumstances we did not choose and cannot control.
And so we pray, “Lord, help me.”
Sermon 866 copyright © 2026 Rod Benson. Preached at North Rocks Community Church, Sydney, Australia, on Sunday 16 August 2026. Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from The Christian Standard Bible (Nashville: Holman Bible Publishers, 2020).
Rev Dr Rod Benson is General Secretary of the NSW Ecumenical Council and a minister of the Uniting Church in Australia serving at North Rocks Community Church in Sydney.
Image source: Michael Cook, Crumbs of Love (2008).
Taking it further…
Reflection questions
- What particular obstacles does the Canaanite woman face in Matthew 15:21–28, and how does her response illustrate resilience as active engagement with adversity rather than simple endurance?
- Why does the sermon insist that “divine grace always precedes resilience” and that God’s mercy is not a reward for coping well?
- How does the Christian hope of resurrection and new creation broaden our understanding of resilience when healing does not occur?
Application questions
- Who helps sustain you when your own resilience is depleted? Conversely, who might presently need your attentive presence, advocacy or practical care? What would reciprocal “giving and receiving care” look like in your family, congregation or community this week?
- When you experience fear, grief, anger or exhaustion, do you tend to suppress these feelings, become controlled by them, or acknowledge them honestly? What practices of prayer, lament, conversation or reflection might help you respond more constructively?
- Where in your life are you being called to persevere even though you cannot guarantee the outcome? What would it mean to continue faithfully while relinquishing the illusion that you can control what happens?
All Told 