Scripture: Matthew 15:21-28
21 Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22 A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.”
23 Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
25 The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
26 He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
27 “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
28 Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Sermon: “Who Gets the Bread?”
Rather than preach a traditional sermon today, I am going to tell a story based on today’s Scripture Reading. I decided to put myself in the place of Peter, the rough-around-the-edges disciple of Jesus who eventually became the primary leader of the early church. I will be telling this story in the form of a monologue, imagining what Peter might have been thinking and feeling during the scene that is described in today’s reading when Jesus interacts with the Canaanite woman. I tell this story in hope that we can all put ourselves imaginatively into this text and allow the Spirit of God to speak to our hearts, thoughts, and actions.
Peter speaks:
Do you know what it’s like to be tired? And, by tired I don’t just mean physically weary. I mean emotionally exhausted. My friends and I--the other 11 disciples of Jesus--we had been working very long days—from sun-up to sun-down welcoming, organizing and taking care of all the people who had been flocking to see Jesus--and there were thousands of them! Some days we didn’t even have time to take a break to eat. Not that we minded the work. It was always amazing to listen to Jesus and watch him pray over people and heal them--we felt so privileged to be able to help him in his ministry. But listening to people’s needs day after day without any down time was tiring. Plus, we had just received the devastating news that King Herod--that tyrant!-- had just put to death our friend John the Baptist. Maybe you know the gruesome story--Herod had had John killed and actually placed his head on a platter as a present to a dancing girl!! The horror of that news made us all sick with grief and angry beyond words.
So when Jesus suggested that the twelve of us join him on retreat for a while--take a break to rest and grieve and pray-- we were all for it. Leaving our boats on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, we traveled over land a-few-days’ journey and “withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.” I say “withdrew,” because Tyre and Sidon, as you may know, are Gentile cities on the Mediterranean Sea, more than 30 miles away from the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus’ ministry was based. We were all looking forward to going there--to foreign cities where no one knew us or expected anything from us, where crowds would not follow us, and we could take a vacation for ourselves, grieve John’s loss and rest up after spending so much time and energy helping to meet the needs of others.
But our hopes for rest were cut short. No sooner did we arrive in the area, than someone—a foreigner, a Canaanite woman-- recognizes Jesus. And worse than that, just like everyone else, she wants something from him. She runs up to him, crying out loudly, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.”
I know it sounds bad, but when the woman appears, I find myself groaning inwardly. Is there no place we disciples can go to get away from this endless sea of need? Now, don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I don’t care about the woman--or her daughter. But is she really our responsibility? She is not one of us; she is not from our country, not from Israel. Can’t her own people take care of her? Where’s the sick girl’s father, anyway? Why isn’t he more involved in reducing her suffering?
All of these questions are going through my mind when Jesus stops to listen to this woman. Now, based on my experience of Jesus up to this point, I expected him to drop everything and heal the woman’s daughter--we all did. But, oddly enough, that’s not what he does. Surprisingly, for once, Jesus does nothing! “He does not answer a word.” He just turns around and starts walking away. At a fairly good clip. I’m stunned, actually, for his reaction seems to be more than a little out of character. In fact, I’m so stunned, I just stand there for a minute, watching him walk away. And then I get over it. “Okay,” I think to myself. “Well, apparently, Jesus and I are on the same page.” It feels a little odd because, to be honest, that never happens…But, if Jesus is not feeling responsible for this foreigner and her problems, hey, then I, Peter, am not going to give it another thought.
The other disciples and I turn our collective backs on the woman and high tail it after Jesus, quickly putting distance between ourselves and the woman. I feel pretty certain that the woman will get the hint and go back home and seek help elsewhere.
But she doesn’t. She starts running after us. And her cries get louder. “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me!” With each cry, her voice sounds more desperate. It’s hard to listen to--to my ears the woman’s voice sounds like the shrill yapping of a little dog. Infuriating because it won’t stop-- and is impossible to ignore.
It goes on for quite some time, and I start to get mad. Why doesn’t Jesus command her to leave us alone? After all, she is disturbing what was supposed to be our time of spiritual retreat!! Could it be that Jesus has already started to tune out the world so he can focus more on God? Maybe he’s already too caught up in prayer to notice her? (He gets like that sometimes.)
Or… Perhaps Jesus is waiting for me to take charge. I don’t want to brag, but Jesus did change my name from Simon to Peter--which means “rock.” He knows I am the solid leader he can count on. Given that, I decide to be proactive and offer him a suggestion. I jog up to the front of the group and call out to get Jesus’ attention, “Send her away, Lord, for she keeps crying out after us.”
I am pleased when Jesus seems to take my advice. He stops, turns around and addresses the Canaanite woman. “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel,” he says to her.
“That’s right,” I think to myself, “You tell her Lord. She is not one of us. Helping her or her people is not what God sent you to do.”
But, once again, the woman doesn’t listen. In fact, she ups her game. This time, she kneels in front of him. Pleads with him. “Lord, help me!” she says. There are tears in her eyes.
Honestly, at this point, I’m a bit torn. On the one hand, I do feel bad for the woman. She is obviously desperate and will do anything to help her daughter. You’ve got to commend her for that. But on the other hand, I am getting more and more annoyed that she won’t take no for an answer. Why won’t she listen? God has sent Jesus to help his own people, not hers. It’s not like Jesus has an endless supply of time or healing energy. She needs to look elsewhere. Period. That’s just the way things are. She needs to accept reality.
At first, it seems like Jesus agrees with me, because he replies, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
Woah. Did I hear this right? Did Jesus just call this foreign woman a dog? While I’ve certainly heard the racial slur “Gentile dog” on the lips of my fellow fishermen on occasion, I never, ever, would have expected Jesus to use the term! In fact, looking around at my fellow disciples, I see that a number of jaws have dropped and eyes have widened in surprise and shock. We are all paying attention now.
I look closely at Jesus’ face, and I’m not sure I understand what I am seeing. His eyebrows are raised, and his lips are slightly turned up in the corners, as if he is surpressing a smile. I don’t know how to interpret this expression, so I look at the woman, and I notice a similar expression on her face. In fact, she’s not even bothering to try to surpress her smile. She is grinning outright. I really don’t know what is going on. One minute she is crying and pleading because Jesus refuses to help her--and then the next--it’s like everything has turned 180 degrees and the two of them are sharing some kind of private joke.
I don’t get it. Jesus has just told her that it is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs, and now, she has the audacity to contradict him: “Yes, it is, Lord,” she says, “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
To which Jesus responds, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
At first, I have no idea what all this means--but then it hits me like a ton of bricks. From the moment he started his ministry, Jesus has always embraced everyone on the margins of society--tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, sinners, Samaritans, fishermen--and this woman is no different. He didn’t call her a dog because he believed that she was one. Just the opposite. With her unspoken permission, he used the term to catch the attention of the rest of us who were so distracted by our own needs and blinded by our own prejudices and that we couldn’t hear the need or even see the full humanity of the woman who was willing to risk everything to help allieviate her daughter’s suffering.
And what’s more, while my behavior was selfish at best-- the woman’s behavior was exemplary! From the moment she speaks, she uses the language of prayer. “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me.” She couldn’t be more reverent. Despite being a foreigner, she chooses to use the language of the Hebrew Psalms to address Jesus, and her words make clear that--unlike so many of my friends and fellow countrymen--she understands him to be the Messiah. Further, she falls down on her knees, in a posture of prayer and supplication and says, “Lord, help me.” She knows who Jesus is: the embodiment of God on earth.
And Jesus knows who she is: a beloved child of God, as deserving of help as any of the children of Israel. And the two of them engage in a dialog for our benefit--so they can drive that point home to the rest of us disciples, who should have known it from the start, but didn’t.
And Jesus does so much more than just toss her crumbs. In front of all of us, he commends her for her great faith and heals her daughter, which is confirmation that the woman is a full-fledged member of God’s family who deserves all of God’s richest blessings.
I suddenly feel myself blush with shame. Wasn’t it just last week Jesus had to literally reach out and save me from drowning when my faith wavered? And his words to me were, “You of little faith…” So much for me, Peter, being the solid rock on which Jesus could build his church…
“Lord Jesus, have mercy on me!” I pray, echoing the woman’s words. Because isn’t that what we all need? God’s mercy, God’s grace and forgiveness for the times when we are so focused on our own needs that we completely miss the humanity and the suffering of the people right in front of us, despite their calls for help…
Rev. Dr. Marlayna Schmidt
Franklin Federated Church
Franklin, MA
August 16, 2020
Note: A version of this sermon was first written and preached by Marlayna on 8/14/11; then re-written, twice, and preached again on 8/20/17. It was re-written again in story form for 8/16/20.