Jesus addresses bad traditions that the Jews were very careful about following and then proceeds to give a case study in how to show mercy at the expense of tradition by travelling between 30 and 50 miles to the region of Tyre and Sidon where he is met by a woman with a request to heal her daughter who is possessed by a demon. Jesus leads her along to demonstrate to the disciples their thinking. The woman sees through the game and persists to plead her case and finally Jesus heals her daughter and sends her on her way. Again Matthew includes the statement (one of ten such statements) where Jesus heals all who came to him. Then he includes the feeding of 4000 who were no doubt gentiles. Again breaking from tradition to give mercy to people in need. The pdf for this episode is available at www.rediscoveringgod.ca.
