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Bible Questions with Michael Pearl - Episode 035
[music]
Michael Pearl: All right. We are out here cleaning this 41 pounds
buffalo, caught out of the Tennessee River, with a bow and arrow,
by the way. That's a lot easier than catching them on a hook.
You ever seen a scale that big? You could use that for a paint
scraper. You're asking the questions. Jared's got them there and
going to read them to us.
I'm going to try to answer your Bible questions. I've not seen any
of these questions. So, it's a lot easier on me not have to prepare
for it. Just go fishing. Then, come in and answer your questions.
By the way, have you ever cleaned a big old buffalo? Cut out that
dark meat. I'm going right down the center here, where that joint
is. Same thing with a carp.
Turn it over and cut out that strip of dark meat that you see run
right down the center. Right there. It makes it a lot better.
What's your first question, there, Jared?
Jared: Is Jesus a racist, because he called a Canaanite woman a dog in
Matthew 15:26? Could you please explain the use of the word dog?
Michael: In the Bible, dogs represent unbelievers. To a Jew, a dog
is an unclean animal, obviously. So, when you call someone a dog,
like we would today, they're a dog.
So, Jesus was speaking appropriately, for his day and age, from the
perspective of a Jew, but he was also speaking from God's
perspective. You know what the Bible actually calls all of us? It
calls us worms.
He says the Jews were a generation of vipers. He said that
religious leaders were like dead mans tombs: white washed on the
outside but inside full of corruption.
Now, that's a pretty sick thing to call somebody. Like I said, he
called Jews "Son of Perdition". So, calling him a dog was a pretty
good term, relative to those others. Why?
Because we sing a song in church, concerning Christ died for such a
worm as I. "At the cross, at the cross, where I first saw the
light. For He died for such a worm as I".
In fact, when Jesus was hanging on the cross, as recorded in Psalm
22, He was praying to god, and He said of himself, "I am worm in no
man".
So, calling her a dog was a little matter. When you understand the
centralness of the human race, when you see the depravity, you
realize that there is no low name that we don't deserve.
Now, in terms of the ethnocentrism of that question, in other
words, was he preferring one race over another? Absolutely. The
Bible tells us there in Romans Chapter 9, 10, 11 that God chose the
Jewish race, that he loved them.
He gives an illustration, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I
hated. God has a right, he said, as a potter to prefer one pot over
another one. He said he makes them both.
He makes one to glory and honor. He makes one to fitted for
destruction. So, when God sees the gentiles worshiping, as the
Samaritans did, false gods, sees them engaged in idolatry, to call
them a dog is not at all degrading, because that is the way they
conducted themselves.
You remember the time, in Genesis Chapter six, when God came down
to view the human race? He said, "All flesh had corrupted his way
upon the earth, and I'll destroy whom I created from off the face
of the earth".
God destroyed every soul, except the eight that were on the boat
with Noah, because he said that Noah was perfect in his generations
and the others were not.
Ethnocentrism for the sake of the ethnic group would be central. It
would be pride on the person who relegates another race or ethnic
group to some lower status, but, when God views the Jewish people,
as his preferred people for the sake of bringing the Messiah into
the world, he has a right to do that.
Now, he told them, at another place. He said, "I didn't choose you,
because you are greater in number or more mighty", not because they
are more worthy. He said, "Because you're not".
He said, "I chose you that I might make my name known among you".
So, God has a right to choose. He has a right to...
That's a nice piece of fish, there. Isn't it? That's just a part of
that. I'm going to get four or five meals out of that. God has a
right to choose whom he will and love whom he chooses to love.
So, I would never second guess him, and say, "Hey, you have no
right to prefer the Jewish people over the gentiles". But, we found
an interesting thing in chapter nine and chapter eleven of Romans
is that 'God, after that date set aside the Jews' and chose the
gentiles.
Today, we live in a dispensation, when God is giving preferential
grace to the gentiles, but he said, "Watch out, one day, he will
set aside the gentiles, and he'll, once again, choose the Jewish
people and do his work through them".
[music]
Announcer: If you would like to ask a Bible question, email us at
BibleQuestions@NoGreaterJoy.org, or call at 931-805-4820.
Transcription by CastingWords