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The Desire of Ages
exclusiveness to be interested in working for others besides their own
people.
Jesus longed to unfold the deep mysteries of the truth which had
been hid for ages, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs with the
Jews, and “partakers of His promise in Christ by the gospel.”
Ephesians
3:6
. This truth the disciples were slow to learn, and the divine Teacher
gave them lesson upon lesson. In rewarding the faith of the centurion
at Capernaum, and preaching the gospel to the inhabitants of Sychar,
He had already given evidence that He did not share the intolerance
of the Jews. But the Samaritans had some knowledge of God; and
the centurion had shown kindness to Israel. Now Jesus brought the
disciples in contact with a heathen, whom they regarded as having no
reason above any of her people, to expect favor from Him. He would
give an example of how such a one should be treated. The disciples
had thought that He dispensed too freely the gifts of His grace. He
would show that His love was not to be circumscribed to race or nation.
When He said, “I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of
Israel,” He stated the truth, and in His work for the Canaanite woman
He was fulfilling His commission. This woman was one of the lost
sheep that Israel should have rescued. It was their appointed work, the
work which they had neglected, that Christ was doing.
This act opened the minds of the disciples more fully to the labor
that lay before them among the Gentiles. They saw a wide field of
usefulness outside of Judea. They saw souls bearing sorrows unknown
to those more highly favored. Among those whom they had been
taught to despise were souls longing for help from the mighty Healer,
hungering for the light of truth, which had been so abundantly given
to the Jews.
Afterward, when the Jews turned still more persistently from the
disciples, because they declared Jesus to be the Saviour of the world,
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and when the partition wall between Jew and Gentile was broken down
by the death of Christ, this lesson, and similar ones which pointed to
the gospel work unrestricted by custom or nationality, had a powerful
influence upon the representatives of Christ, in directing their labors.
The Saviour’s visit to Phoenicia and the miracle there performed
had a yet wider purpose. Not alone for the afflicted woman, nor even
for His disciples and those who received their labors, was the work
accomplished; but also “that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ,