Lent 2
Mt
15:21-28
3/1/15
Clearly, I did not know what I was
getting myself into. When I received the
call to Good Shepherd more than eight and a half years ago, I didn’t know anything
about Marion. I knew there was a federal
supermax prison there. In fact that was
a comment that was made on multiple occasions by members at Zion, Lyons: “You
know there is a prison there, right?” – as if the prison sat right in the
middle of the town. As it turns out, it
took me seven years before I ever saw the thing.
I also didn’t know anything about
southern Illinois. I knew that Southern
Illinois University was in Carbondale; that they were named after some weird
Egyptian dog; and that their basketball team was good and played tough defense
– well they used to be.
What I didn’t know was that this is
rabid St. Louis Cardinals country. And
even if I had of realized it, I still would not have known what that really
meant. Growing up as a Cubs fan I
certainly didn’t like the Cardinals. I
knew they were the Cubs’ rivals. I was
happy to see them lose – I certainly had a case of schadenfreude when a blown
call helped the Kansas City Royals beat them in the World Series. But beyond that I didn’t really give them
another thought. I certainly didn’t
think much of it when I learned that someone was a Cardinals fan. It was just
no big deal.
The very puzzling thing I have
discovered during my time in southern Illinois is that this is clearly not the
way it is for Cardinals fans. Rather
they seem to be fixated on the Cubs. Let
someone know that you root for the Cubs, and you’ll never hear the end of it as
people say things like, “Oh, he’s a Cubs fan.” The very word “Cubs” comes off the lips with
disdain. Given the disparity between the
success of the two teams, I have never understood this. I can only explain it as a case of Wrigley
Field envy.
In our Gospel lesson today Matthew
tells us, “And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out.” To give you a sense of how those words would
have struck a Jew, try out this substitute: “And behold, a Cubs fan from the
region came out.” It will give you a sense of the disdain a Jew would have felt
for someone described as a Canaanite, and also for the surprise experienced due
to Jesus’ praise of her at the end of our text.
Our text this morning begins by
saying, “And Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre
and Sidon.”
Our Lord had just had
a confrontation with the Pharisees and scribes about what was religiously
unclean and defiled a person. Several
times in Matthew’s Gospel, after this kind of confrontation, Jesus withdraws. Our Lord has a timetable and a location for
his passion and will not let anyone disrupt this.
Jesus withdraws north of Israel into
the area of Tyre and Sidon. This was
pagan territory – Tyre had been the home of that Baal promoter Jezebel during
the days of the prophet Elijah. It is
unexpected to find someone seeking out Jesus here. Matthew notes this by saying
“behold!” and then heightens the surprise by using an “old school” for the
woman as he calls her a “Canaanite.”
The woman was crying out, “Have
mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a
demon.” “Have mercy on me!” was a call
for help – just as it is in the liturgy. But soon there are two surprises.
First the woman calls Jesus “Lord,” and in Matthew’s Gospel only those who approach
Jesus in faith call him this. And then
the woman addresses Jesus as “son of David.”
This phrase identifies Jesus as Israel’s Messiah. It is an insightful and profound statement on
the lips … of a Canaanite woman.
In Matthew’s Gospel you could hardly
ask for a more perfect form of address directed toward Jesus: “Have mercy on
me, O Lord, Son of David.” But Jesus
didn’t even respond to her. He didn’t
say one word. The woman kept crying out
to Jesus and the disciples became annoyed.
They said, “Send her away, for she is crying out after us.” Apparently they wanted Jesus to heal the girl
so that the woman would be quiet and just go away. However, Jesus didn’t do this. Instead, he answered, “I was sent only to the
lost sheep of the house of Israel.” He said
the Canaanite woman wasn’t his problem.
However the Canaanite woman wasn’t
done. Instead, she intensified her request.
She came and kneeled, or even prostrated herself, before Jesus. She again called him “Lord” as she begged, “Lord,
help me.” And in response Jesus said, “It
is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” He said it wouldn’t be right to bother with
her. He called her a dog.
You will be hard pressed to find
someone in the Bible who is more brusquely dismissed and rejected by God, than
the Canaanite woman in this text. She
approaches Jesus with words that say all of the right things … and she gets
nothing. In fact she gets less than
nothing because he calls her a dog.
At this point, it’s helpful to stop
and take stock of the Canaanite woman’s options. She certainly could have become discouraged
and given up. After all, two entreaties had gotten her nowhere and Jesus’
response to her was going from bad to worse.
She also could have become angry at Jesus and left. After all, not only was Jesus ignoring her
request but his responses were getting more and more offensive. First he completely ignored her. Then he
insulted her by calling her a dog.
This experience is not unique to the
Canaanite woman. You know it too. It happens when there is a diagnosis of
cancer or depression or diabetes. It
happens when you get demoted, or lose a job, or decide that you can’t stay
there anymore and need to find a new job.
It happens when there are strife and problems in your family.
Our first reaction is that God is
being silent – that God is ignoring us. After all, why would he allow this to
happen? And then if things don’t get
better soon – or if they even get worse – we feel like God is just piling
on. We feel like he is calling us a
dog. This breeds anger and resentment at
God. Perhaps it even makes us doubt why
we bother with God at all.
The Canaanite woman did not react in
any of these ways. We hear in our text
that she said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from
their masters' table.” The Canaanite
woman did not try to make assertions about “her rights.” She didn’t get angry and offended with
Jesus. She didn’t get upset and walk
away.
Instead in faith she clung to the
fact that the gracious abundance of Jesus was more than sufficient to meet her
needs. In faith she believed and trusted
in Jesus Christ. In faith she trusted
that through his power the crumbs would provide all that she needed.
We learn in our text that Jesus then
answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.”
And her daughter was then healed instantly.
In an emphatic way Jesus praised the great faith of the woman. He praised her for clinging to him in the
midst of silence and apparent rejection.
The mystery of our text is how a
woman living in the pagan territory of Tyre and Sidon had heard about Jesus in
a way that led her to approach him with the words, “Have mercy on me, O Lord,
Son of David.” The text doesn’t say, and
so we will never know. But we do know
that you have all the more reason to approach Jesus in faith than she did.
You know the whole story – the story
that we are following during this portion of the church year. You know the whole story about the incarnation
– that Jesus Christ is true God and true man.
You know about his death on the cross that we are preparing during Lent
to remember. And then you also know
about his resurrection from the dead.
You know that Christ died on the cross to redeem you from sin, and then
on the third day he defeated death as he rose from the dead. Christ has
died, and Christ has risen from the dead!
You know that in faith you approach the Lord, crucified and risen for you.
The example of the Canaanite woman
has been included in Scripture by the Spirit in order to provide a model and
encouragement to us. It calls us to a
firm faith that trusts Jesus and keeps coming back to him. We may have specific concerns we want him to
address. We may have our own ideas about
how we think things should work out. It
may in fact be that the Lord answers in this way. But more than this we approach Jesus in faith
knowing that because of his death and resurrection for he will not fail to
provide us with forgiveness and life. He
will not fail to keep us as a child of God. He will not fail to support us in
that faith through his Spirit as he brings us through the challenges that we
face.
In our text the Canaanite women
makes a bold statement when she responds to Jesus: “Yes, Lord, yet even the
dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.” She is so confident in Jesus’ grace and power
that she believes even that which seems to be nothing will meet her needs.
In a few moments, we are invited to
approach the Lord’s altar with the same faith.
We go to receive a sip of wine and a crumb – a bite of dry bread. Yet we go because of who Jesus is and what he
has promised about it. We go in faith
because we know that there we receive the true body and blood of the risen
Lord. And through this body and blood
given and shed for you, Jesus Christ gives you forgiveness and strength to
continue in faith. Through this divine food the Holy Spirit feeds and nourishes
the new man within you so that you can walk in faith. Crumbs from the table? It
may not look like all that much. But the
Canaanite woman in our text is right.
Because they are crumbs from this Lord they provide everything
that we need.
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