Marilu Thomas, “The People Pleasers Guide to Jesus”

The Jesuit priest Anthony DeMello said that our first addiction is an addiction to approval, that as children we become “attuned to the reaction of others who have the power to make us happy or miserable and create fear and desire.” I can so relate to that—I crave approval and don’t want to disappoint anyone in my life. I have recognized this trait as people-pleasing. 

Here are a few lighter examples from The People Pleasers Guide to Pleasing People:

If someone asks you what you want to do, ask them what they want to do instead:

“What do you want to do?”

“No, what do you want to do?”

“I dunno- whatever you want to do.”

“I’m open to whatever.”

“Well- what are you in the mood for?”

“I don’t know, how about you?”

My sister and I perfected a sibling version of this dance called Ask Three Times. “Do you want to go?” “No, that’s ok.” “Are you sure? It will be fun.” “No, you go and have fun. I’ll be ok here alone.” “Come on, go.” “Oh, ok. If you insist.” 

Here’s another one. Say Yes to something you really don’t want to do. 

“Do you want to babysit our demonic triplets every Friday night?”

“Sure! That would be great!”

In fact, this is correlated to the next one, Don’t Ask for Anything Directly. Say you want to ask someone out, give them every opportunity to say ‘No,’— short disclaimer here, this is almost verbatim of my asking Bubba to a sorority dance in college.

“Hey- I’m sure you’re already doing something next Friday so don’t worry if you can’t go because I know you have a lot of stuff going on and you probably already have plans, and I don’t even know why I’m asking you because I’m sure you can’t, but if you could go, that would be great. But I’d understand if you can’t. Sorry. Sorry again.” I think he felt sorry for me because he said yes.

And last but not least, the perennial favorites: Never Be The First One to End a Phone Call and Always Say You’re Fine (especially when you’re not).

Because I grew up in a family affected by generations of alcoholism, I have an acute case of people pleasing. The pandemic has helped me see this in technicolor as we let go of things and must decide what to pick back up. The problem with people pleasing is that it doesn’t please anyone—least of all people. It is not loving ourselves or our neighbor. It is self-centered because it is abdicating responsibility for one’s emotions, like and dislikes-- and then feeling angry and resentful at others. People Pleasing is not pleasing to God because it is hiding yourself—the you God made-- behind a smoke screen. Jesus sees the real you and release you from this bondage of self with love.

As you can guess—Jesus is no people pleaser. The gospel today is my least favorite passage in the New Testament—seriously—because Jesus makes me uncomfortable. 

It’s one of those scripture passages that I used to wonder why it’s even included. The gospel of Mark is always toying with our expectations of Jesus, proving that we don’t truly know who He is or what He came here to do. We can make Jesus into a bobble-headed influencer, always saying yes, instead of facing the fact that he often makes us feel uncomfortable and disoriented.  In the gospel today, Jesus seems unjustly rude to the Syrophoenician woman who needs help, and then he pits two of the things I thought Jesus would unquestionably love against each other, children and puppies. It feels to me like those commercials for pharmaceuticals that showing puppies frolicking, while underneath it has all the dire side effects that could happen. I guess I want Jesus to be the smiling, people pleasing Savior when really there is a label that reads, “Warning—this Savior is an outlier who is so offensive that He will die a grisly death.”

C. Clifton Black reminds us that; “Jesus’ offensiveness [in this gospel story] is a fact we have to face…Jesus flummoxes everyone who boxes him into conventional expectations: the pious, his family, his disciples and even some petitioners. If we too are not gob smacked, it’s a safe bet that we have domesticated Jesus and have neutered the gospel.” 

Jesus has been blunt all through Mark about upending the Jewish traditions of purity and defilement, as we heard last week from DZ. From the first chapter, when the Holy Spirit rips open the sky to claim Jesus as the Beloved, he capsizes every expectation we have of him as ‘a nice Christian guy’ to break through boundaries to reach the unreachable. Jesus bypasses our dishonesty and manipulation to get to the heart of the matter—our salvation. The woman who comes to him in this story is a five-time loser in the purity games—she is the wrong gender, the wrong race, the wrong religion, with a daughter defiled by a demon and she has arrived at the wrong time, disturbing Jesus’ rest. She is at the farthest edge one could go from the Kingdom of God. What has she done to merit the healing of her daughter? Nothing. What does Jesus owe her? Nothing. Has she in some way proven that she deserves the healing power from the King of the Jews? No. There is a very close parallel here with the Samaritan Woman at the Well as Jesus seems to know who she is and what she needs. He is dead honest with her. We tell people what they want to hear—Jesus tells us what we need to hear, the truth about us and our inability make ourselves worth saving. 

What if Jesus refused to heal her daughter? Theologian Alyce McKenzie postulates, “Then he would be a Savior whose salvation is limited to those who are like him—in other words, no Savior at all.” In this difficult to hear passage, Jesus verbalizes the good news that salvation is for us, all of us. And there is always more than enough grace to go around—for the children, the dogs, the woman and us. Grace upon grace. The Syrophoenician woman’s little girl received that grace from miles away and she did nothing for it. This is God’s mercy come to us in Jesus Christ.

So, if you are wondering today if you are worth saving, if the things you have done knock you out of the purity games, if you are the wrong age, color, gender, social class or feeling not good enough—then this good news is for you. Jesus Christ goes to any lengths, breaks any boundary to get to you—not because of what you have done or haven’t done, but because of who He is and what He has done. You do not have to please him or other people to be loved and accepted. This is the very definition of grace. 

I want to close by repeating the Collect of the Day today as a reminder that it is not our intellect, strength, good works, good family, bank account, pedigree or pile of degrees that give us value but the Lord Jesus Christ who loves you far too much to leave you miserable and alone. 

Grant us, O Lord, to trust in you with all our hearts; for, as you always resist the proud who confide in their own strength, so you never forsake those who make their boast of your mercy; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, One God, now and forever. Amen.