Sermon for the Second Sunday in Lent - Mt 15:21-28

 

Lent 2

                                                                                      Mt 15:21-28

                                                                                      2/25/24

 

          What is Jesus doing up here?  What is Jesus doing way north in the district of Tyre and Sidon?  This is an area along the Mediterranean coast that is north of Galilee.  It is outside the region that was ever part of Israel.  Instead, it had been the home of the evil Jezebel who worshipped Baal.

          This was pagan territory and it was not an area where Jesus conducted his ministry.  When Jesus denounced the cities where most of his miracles had been done because they did not repent he said, “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.”

          Jesus has left the land of Israel because he has just been in conflict with the Pharisees. The Pharisees and scribes had come from Jerusalem and said, “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.” They had travelled all the way to Galilee to confront this trouble maker.

          Jesus had disputed with them and said at the end, “You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said:

“‘This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’” 

The Pharisees were offended.  And so as Jesus does on several occasions like this when there is conflict, he withdraws.  Our Lord is on a divine schedule.  He will die, but he will not die until it is according to God’s timing.

Our text tells us that Jesus withdrew into the district of Tyre and Sidon.  Jesus was not there to do ministry.  However, his presence did not go unnoticed.  Matthew tells us, “And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.’” 

Whenever Matthew wants us to note that something is surprising or remarkable, he says, “And behold.”  What he describes is certainly surprising.  We learn that a woman of that region approached Jesus.  Matthew calls her a “Canaanite woman.”  This was an entirely anachronistic term.  Nobody in Matthew’s day called people of that area Canaanites. However, it was a term from the Old Testament that emphasized the pagan nature of the woman.

It was surprising that a pagan woman would approach Jesus.  Yet more surprising were the words that she spoke. First, the woman said, “Have mercy on me.”  The woman came to Jesus asking for help. She a pagan, appealed to Jesus – a Jew.

Then the woman called Jesus “Lord.”  In Matthew’s Gospel, this is the term that Jesus’ disciples use to address Christ.  We do not expect to find it on the lips of this pagan.

But most surprising is that she addresses Jesus as “Son of David.”  Matthew begins the Gospel by saying, “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.”  The term “Son of David” identified Jesus as Israel’s Messiah.  This pagan woman – this Gentile - calls out and addresses Jesus as the Messiah of Israel.  She called upon him and asked Jesus to help her demon possessed daughter.

The woman had said things exactly right: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David.”  She had pleaded with Jesus to help her daughter.  And how did Jesus respond?  He ignored her.  He did not answer her a word.

Jesus ignored her, but this did not stop the woman.  She kept crying out to Jesus.  It reached the point where the disciples were annoyed.  They came to the Lord and asked him, “Send her away, for she is crying out after us.”  Apparently, they wanted Jesus to give her what she wanted so that she would just be quiet and go away.

However, Jesus answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”  Jesus said bluntly that he wasn’t here for her.  He was Israel’s Messiah. We are probably surprised to hear this.  But it is not an isolated statement.  When Jesus sent out the twelve apostles in chapter ten he told them: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

Our text confronts us with the reality that Jesus Christ was the fulfillment of God’s promises to Israel.  He was the Messiah for those whom God had taken into the covenant at Mt. Sinai.  He was here, first and foremost, for Israel – for the Jews. As Paul told the Romans, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.”

It is a humbling reminder that we as Gentiles have been included in God’s salvation purely on the basis of his grace.  We had no claim to God’s saving work in Christ.  But God in his mercy has extended it to us as well.  He saving intention included us and he has worked through Israel and her Messiah to give us forgiveness and eternal life. 

Jesus had provided no answer to the woman.  But the woman did not give up.  We learn that she came and knelt before Jesus. She pleaded, “Lord, help me.”  With the woman directly before him, surely now Jesus would help her.

However, our Lord responded, “It is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” Not only did Jesus refuse to help the woman, but he called her a dog.  Now we are used to having dogs as pets that we treat like part of the family.  Perhaps the dog even gets to sleep on our bed.  But in that culture dogs did not hold any such privileged position.  It was deeply insulting to be called a dog.

Yet rather than being angered, the woman replied, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.”  She didn’t deny her status as a Gentile who was not part of Israel.  Instead, she asserted that the left overs of what Jesus had to offer were sufficient to help her.

Then Jesus answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.”  Our Lord praised her faith, and told her that her plea would be granted.  We learn that her daughter was healed from that hour.

In many ways, it is difficult to listen to this text.  This is not the Jesus that we expect.  We know our Lord to be the loving and compassionate One. And yet he does not seem to be so here.  Instead, he ignores the woman. He rebuffs her.  He even insults her.

Yet upon further reflection, we recognize that sometimes this is the experience we seem to have with God.  We trust and believe in him, and yet problem after problem seems to arise.  We experience continuing health difficulties that weigh us down and wear us out.  We face uncertainty about our career or school plans.  We see family members experience challenges and hardships and are pained by this.

We turn to God in the midst of these things.  We ask for help. And yet things don’t improve.  Perhaps they even get worse.  We call out to God and yet he seems to be ignoring us.  Or worse yet, it seems like he is against us.

At times like this it is easy to waver in doubt.  We begin to question God.  We even get angry at God. There is the temptation to turn away from him.

Today’s text speaks to this experience.  We begin with the content of the woman’s cry: “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David.”  We do not know how the woman had heard about Jesus.  The report about Christ had gone throughout the region, and obviously it had even penetrated the area of Tyre and Sidon.

She addressed Jesus as “Lord.” We understand in a way that she could not that Jesus is the Lord.  He is the Son of God who entered into our world as he was sent forth by the Father.  Conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary, he is Immanuel – God with us.

And he is the Son of David.  He is the Messiah promised by God who fulfills his saving promises.  He is the One who brings rescue and deliverance.  Yet during this season of Lent we prepare to remember that he did so in an unexpected way. Jesus the Messiah came to be enthroned on a cross with placard over this head, “This is Jesus the king of the Jews.”  He died as the sacrifice that takes away our sin and gives us forgiveness.

Buried in a tomb, it appeared that Jesus had been a false Messiah.  Yet King David himself had prophesied in Psalm 22, “For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, or let your Holy One see corruption.”  David spoke about the resurrection of Christ, that he was not abandoned to Hades, nor did his flesh see corruption.  On Easter God raised Jesus from the dead.

Jesus ignored the woman. He rebuffed her. He insulted her.  And yet the woman kept calling upon Jesus in faith.  She refused to be turned away.  She persistently came to the Lord.

There are times when this is how God deals with us.  God hides his “yes” under a “no.”  He seems to ignore us. Yet he does so to lead us into deeper faith.  He forces us to ignore the circumstances and what they seem to be saying.  He leads us to cling to his word – his word that speaks of Christ crucified and risen for us.

The Holy Spirit has provided the woman in our text as a model for us. She refused to let go of Jesus.  She kept coming to him in faith. She would not be turned away.  She was so confident that Jesus could help that she said even his crumbs were enough.

Like the woman, we persistently turn in faith to the Lord who suffered, died, and rose for us.  God has revealed his love in the death and resurrection of his Son.  He has spoken his great Yes to us in Christ.  In him we have forgiveness and peace with God.  In him we have life and the hope of the resurrection.

Of course, this faith is not something that we created.  It is God’s gift – it is God’s creation.  And so if we are to walk by faith in Jesus, we need to focus our lives on where Jesus is present for us – on where we meet Jesus.  We need to continue to return to those ways that the Spirit of Christ strengthens and sustains faith.  We come to Christ’s Word and his Sacrament for these are far more than crumbs. They are the life giving means by which the Spirit leads us to say, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David.”