There is a story of a group of the very pious who are
waiting in heaven for judgment. As they are waiting and complaining about the
wait, they begin to see some of the “sinners” they knew on earth coming into
the waiting room: a corrupt politician, an itinerant woman who had been
convicted of shoplifting many times, a prostitute, a drug addict, a criminal,
etc.
With each of these arrivals, the feeling of hostility
increased in the first group. They glare at the others. They talk among
themselves. Within a short time, words were spoken to those others, “What makes
you think you’re going to get in with the evil, sinful lives you lived on
earth?”
“We are relying on the mercy and grace of God. What
makes you so sure you’re going to get in?”
“Our good lives, of course.” They turned their backs
to the others.
Time began to drag on for the first group. They began
to complain to one another. “If those other people get in, there’s no justice.
After all the sacrifices we’ve made. It’s not fair.”
The Lord arrived. He turned toward the first group, “I
understand you’ve been wondering why there has been no judgment.”
“Yes!” they cried out. “We want a judgment. We want
justice.”
The Lord replied, “The judgment has already taken
place. You’ve judged yourselves. By judging these, the least of my brothers and
sisters, you have judged yourselves. In rejecting them, you have rejected me.
You have shown yourselves unworthy of the Kingdom of God”.
The issue in Matthew 15:10-28 is true holiness.
Specifically, what constitutes true holiness? Is it strict observance of the
law or rituals, as the Pharisees or some church-goers think? After all, the
Pharisees were so concerned about obeying God’s law that they wrote countless
rules to cover every conceivable situation. It makes me wonder if some
government bureaucrats are descended from the Pharisees!
Or perhaps true holiness comes from the heart instead,
as Jesus argues. He is right when he says that evil thoughts and deeds come
from the heart. One only has to read the comments made by the man behind the
2011 terrorist attacks in Norway to see that this is true. On the other hand,
we only have to look at people such as Mother Theresa or Desmond Tutu, or
organizations such as Samaritan’s Purse and the local food bank to see that
good thoughts and deeds also come from the hearts of people, especially people
who are willing to work for social justice.
Jesus continually pointed out the conditions of the
Pharisees’ hearts. They held on to outward religious practices, but God wanted
their hearts, which were hardened and cold. He wants the same thing from us today.
Often times our hearts are hardened because of the world we live in and Jesus
warns us of what will happen if we do not soften our hardened hearts. In
Matthew 12:33-37, Jesus states:
The good man brings good things out of the
good stored in him, and the evil man brings evil out of the evil stored in him.
But I tell you that men will have to give an account on the Day of Judgment for
every careless word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted
and by your words you will be condemned.
Purity also affects the issue of just who can be
admitted to God’s kingdom, as we can see from the discussion Jesus has with the
Canaanite woman. His reaction to her request shocks us, but it should not
surprise us when we consider the culture of Jesus’ time-a culture that treated
women and children as second-class citizens. For example, Jews also thought
that Gentiles were “dogs”.
In Jesus’ time, people did keep dogs as pets, but dogs
were mainly scavengers who ate garbage and the carcasses of dead animals. Dogs
that were pets were often fed food scraps from their owner’s table, as they
sometimes do now-hence the Canaanite woman’s reference to dogs eating the
crumbs from the master’s table. The Canaanites were also considered to be dogs
in the eyes of the Jews because they were descended from Noah’s son Ham. He was
the son who saw his father naked and passed out from being under the influence
of alcohol. Instead of doing the sensible thing by covering Noah and keeping
his mouth shut, Ham went and told people what he saw. Now there’s a good example of someone having an unclean heart!
In contrast, the Canaanite woman had a pure heart. She
was motivated by concern for her daughter and she knew that Jesus could heal
her. While Jesus did open the door of God’s kingdom to the Gentiles in his
Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20, his priority at this time was the
Israelites. Jesus represented God’s faithfulness to the covenant he made to the
Jews in the Old Testament.
The reference to dogs eating the crumbs from their
master’s table is a metaphor for the way in which the early Gentiles heard
Jesus’ message. Although Jesus’ ministry was aimed at the Jews, some Gentiles
did hear his messages and believed. These Gentiles were the “dogs” who ate the
crumbs from Jesus’ table. In the eyes of God, we are all dogs, and we are all
dependent on free scraps from God’s Table.
The Canaanite woman and the woman in the parable of the widow and the unjust judge prove that persistence pays off. Both of them refused to give up until they got what they wanted, and in both cases they showed true faith. God will grant our requests in his own time and in his own way if it falls within his plan for our lives, especially if our requests show true faith and holiness that comes from the heart.
Matthew’s Gospel was written for a Jewish Christian audience,
but by the time it was written, the church had long since begun opening its
doors to the Gentiles. The Gospel reflects the tension between the Jewish
community, where the church had its roots, and the Gentiles who were being
admitted to the church’s membership. Jesus unites what divides us. In him our
many causes of exclusion become opportunities for embrace. Jesus, himself a man
on the margins of society, brings the outsider inside.
A similar tension exists within some churches today,
especially when they deal with issues such as the blessing of same-sex
marriages. God breaks through such tensions. God is much bigger and more
inclusive than any religious box people might use to contain God. When we turn
to Jesus like the Canaanite woman did, and we receive a favourable response
like she did, we learn to reflect on our shared religious customs and life
together.
The story also reminds us that we too have come to
Jesus through the Jews. We share the same faith; we see the hope this faith
gave our ancestors in their wait for salvation. We are reminded that we have no
claim to priority with Jesus. We are all equal in the eyes of God. We are
recipients of grace-all has been freely bestowed on us. What we see is the God
Jesus reveals to the woman; a God who would draw us close, sees our distress
and helps us.
“Lord, I’m leaving the situation in your hands now.
Please bless the doctors and nurses who are caring for her. If it’s your will
that Mom gets better, then please heal her. If it’s your will that she not
survive, please don’t let her suffer. If her condition gets to the point where
I have to make the important decisions that Mom and I have discussed, please
give me the strength, wisdom and courage to make the right decision; and please
give me the strength and courage to accept the consequences of my
decision-especially consequences from other family members”.
Thankfully, God answered my prayer in the way I wanted
him to answer it. Medical tests the next day revealed that the doctor made the
wrong diagnosis. Mom did not have a heart attack-she had blood clots in both
lungs. With proper treatment, Mom slowly got better and stronger, and she was
released from the hospital after one week. Faith comes from an abundance of
trials, not from the lack of trials. Great faith achieves great victories over
these trials.
Only two people in the Gospels are said to have had
great faith, and both of them were Gentiles. Great faith does not depend on
background or position, but on the attitude of the heart. If we are fully
committed to God, our entire lives will be expressions of worship and adoration
to Him.
As I mentioned a few moments ago, God’s original plan
was to bring salvation first to the Israelites and then to the Gentiles, but he
responds to all who call on him in true faith. Those who call on him in true faith
have some degree of both faith and spiritual poverty. This is nothing new in
Jesus’ ministry. From its very beginning he insisted that his message was
directed to the lowest of the low in heart, to the emotional down-and-outers,
to those knocked down on all fours and willing to crawl. In other words, his
message has been directed to “dogs”. The Canaanite woman took this to heart,
groveling and grateful for any crumb that might fall from his table. She became
a dog, and this was exactly the humility Jesus was looking for.
Legalism destroys spiritual life, makes us narrow and
causes us to miss what is most important to God. We condemn those who differ
from us in style of worship, language and culture because of legalism. While
legalism stresses external behaviour, Jesus emphasizes the motives of the
heart. By focusing on the motives of the heart, rather than the legalistic
purity, Jesus makes religious observances both easier and harder. It is easier
because broad guidelines have replaced legalistic complexity. It is harder
because we have to let our devotion to God affect us in the innermost parts of
our being.
We live in a world that still needs a Saviour. The
Canaanite woman points us to a greater resource than human love. It’s God’s
infinite mercy in the person and work of Jesus. He is God’s love in action for
her and for us. When she cries out to Jesus, she does so because she knows who
he is and what he can do.
This story reminds us how the Church, which is
Christ’s earthly body, is repeatedly taught, not so much by respectable
insiders, but by those on the margins, the people without power and
credibility. These marginal people storm in, insisting that the church should
live up to the pattern offered by Jesus. They rock the boat, and in so doing they
force the church to remember its reason for being. Often these and others like
them come to the church with a commendable faith, even as the Canaanite woman
drew near to Jesus. They might come from outside the bounds of power and
acceptability, yet they’re eager even for scraps from the table. What they
need, what they deserve, is a seat with the rest of us at God’s Table. There is
much we can learn from them. Will we acknowledge them, listen to the, welcome
them?
Bibliography
1.
Charles
F. Stanley Life Principles Bible, NASV
2.
Exegesis
for Matthew 15:10-28. Retrieved from www.sermonwriter.com
3.
Barnes’
Notes on the New Testament-Matthew 15:10-28. Part of Lessonmaker Bible software
package.
4.
Matthew
Henry Concise Commentary. Part of Lessonmaker Bible software package.
5.
Wycliffe
Bible Commentary. Part of Lessonmaker Bible software package.
6.
ESV
Study Bible. Part of Lessonmaker Bible software package.
7.
Selwyn
Hughes, “When Evil Thoughts Oppress”. Retrieved from www.crosswalkmail.com
8.
Dr.
Philip W. McLarty, “The Faith of a Dog”. Retrieved from www.sermonwriter.com
9.
The
Rev. Charles Hoffacker, “A Fool for Love”. Retrieved from www.sermonwriter.com
10.
The
Rev. John Bedingfield, “Who Are the Dogs in Your Life?” Retrieved from www.sermonwriter.com
11.
The
Rev. Dr. James D. Kegel, “Those People”. Retrieved from www.sermonwriter.com
12.
The
Rev. Gregory Seitz, “Count on Christ’s Mercy for you”. Retrieved from www.lhm.org
13.
Micca
Monda Campbell, “Great Faith”. Retrieved from www.crosswalkmail.com
14.
“The
Voice of the Lord” for Shevat 24. Retrieved from www.lists.studylight.org
15.
Jude
Siciliano, OP, “First Impressions: 20th Sunday (A)”. Retrieved from www.preacherexchange.org.
16.
Trygve
David Johnson, “Faith to Fire Back”. Retrieved from http://christiancentury.org/blogs/archive/2008-08/faith-fire-back?print
17.
The
Rev. Brian P. Stoffregen, “Matthew 15: (1-10)21-28”. Retrieved from www.crossmarks.com/brain/matt15x110.htm
18.
The
Rev. John Ortberg, “True Grit”. Retrieved from www.religion-online.org/showarticle.asp?title=2899
19.
Sharon Jaynes, “Changing
the Way We Speak by Examining the Heart”. Retrieved from www.crosswalkmail.com
No comments:
Post a Comment