As You Desire :: Matthew 15:21-28
And her daughter was healed from that hour.
One of the most comforting truths we find in the gospels is the willingness of Jesus to perform miracles. Everywhere he goes, he is moved with compassion that leaves us in awe. The Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John record three dozen different miracles and leave many, many more unspoken. The sick are cured. The dead are raised. The blind are given first-light. The deaf begin hearing pin drops. Thousands are fed. Last week we even saw Peter walking on water.
Lord, have mercy.
And he does ... bringing order out of the chaos as he constantly seeks you, calls you, pursues you, calms you, nurtures you, heals you, making you whole.
Yes, He gathers the outcasts of Israel (Isa 56:8) so that they too can be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth of who Jesus really is.
And then comes today’s Gospel reading.
A mother approaches Jesus on behalf of her daughter, pleading with him ... not once, not twice, but three times ... crying out to him: Lord! Lord! Lord! Have mercy! Help me! Even the dogs eat the crumbs from the master’s feast of forgiveness.
At first, Jesus doesn’t say a word to her. He’s silent ... Just like God was last week with Job ... for 37 chapters. So the disciples interceded. Lord, this Canaanite woman won’t leave us alone. She keeps calling, crying out, Lord, have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord, have mercy.
Yet, still, she receives no reply.
Like the Canaanite woman, we all find ourselves desperate for help at one time or another. We all want to know the Lord is hearing our prayer, that he will answer our prayer. That he will make us whole, too.
How many of you have had cancer?
How many of you have been so poor you didn’t have enough to buy a can of soup?
How many of you have had to share that one can with your brother or sister?
How many of you have suffered in a marital crisis?
How many of you found yourselves helpless while your child was hospitalized?
How many of you have faced a life or death decision in pregnancy?
How many of you have suffered with the demon of depression, the demon of despair, the demon of drug abuse? How many demons of oppression have I left unnamed?
Yes, how often have you cried out, Kyrie Eleison ... Lord, have mercy ... Help me.
5. Such is our cry through true faith.
If you have a faith that cries out like this, thank God. When one stops to think about it ... this ... is the plea of true faith. It recognizes God incarnate. And through this true faith in Christ, God enables us to recognize our demons and our need for a savior. Through this true faith in Christ, we know he hears this plea and answers our prayers. He himself has commanded us to pray and has promised to hear us. It is according to his will.
4. But Lord have mercy, too often we struggle with doubt.
In our lectionary this year, we are just now getting to the miracles of our Lord. Jews everywhere had been rejecting them outright, first in Judea, then in Galilee, even though they witnessed them over and over and over.
Matthew had recorded a dozen miracles in chapters eight and nine, which weren’t included in our Sunday readings this year.
All of the signs and wonders and ultimately the rejection of the people must have left Jesus weary. People were constantly pressing in upon him. The Pharisees were becoming bitter in their hostility toward him, stirring up hatred among the people and placing all manner of obstructions in his way. They even wanted to kill him.
So today we see Christ deliberately withdrawing out of Galilee into the region of Tyre and Sidon, two pagan cities on the Mediterranean coast. And behold, a Canaanite woman came out from those borders, and was crying, Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David. My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.
That’s just the job for Jesus, isn’t it?
But Jesus didn’t answer her a word. ... He gave her nothing ... but silence.
Could there be a greater frustration than having the One who is able to do something seemingly not willing even to listen to you? Lord? Have mercy?
It’s like knowing that there is a great scientist who has discovered a cure for cancer, and then discovering that he’s unwilling to share that cure.
Now here Jesus is ... silent.
So when two or three of the disciples gathered together, they interceded, urging Jesus to do something. ... She is crying out after us.
And Jesus answered, I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.
It seems so unlike Jesus. It does anyway until we realize that ...
3. We, too, were lost sheep until he came to us and drew us to him, enabling us to join in the cry of faith: Lord, have mercy.
Some would turn away, convinced there is something wrong with their faith, their life, their plea. Some would turn away thinking that their faith is misplaced. Some might turn inward ... thinking the cause of the failure is their own.
I’m not good enough, we tell ourselves. I haven’t lived life right enough. I haven’t read the Bible enough. I don’t pray enough. I haven’t gone to church enough. I haven’t returned to my Baptism enough. I haven’t received the Lord’s supper enough.
But if you are saying any of that to yourself, hear the promises of God again, and say enough is enough. Lord, have mercy.
2. Because faith isn’t about you. It is about Jesus, who saves those who recognize the truth apart from miracles that truly he is the Son of God.
Today’s reading is providing a beautiful expression of this faith.
And today we see that in full color. The woman has faith.
Faith is not just historical knowledge about Christ.
Faith is not based simply on the miracles he performs in each of our lives.
Faith is trust and certainty that God is who he says he is in Christ ...
that God in Christ will make you whole ... not just now but in eternity.
Faith is exemplified when we join this Canaanite woman, prostrating ourselves in a Divine Service, where we confess our sins and receive absolution, where Christ draws near to us bringing us to repentance, where Christ brings you back to your baptism and delivers to you his body and blood.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, you don’t have to be a literal son of Israel to be one of the chosen ones of God, one of the lost sheep. Christ has made you one of his own, too.
You don’t have to excel at living as piously as the Pharisees. God has given you faith in the Gospel he is proclaiming.
We have not seen him, yet we love him and even though we don’t see him now, still we believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy as we ... like this Canaanite woman ... receive the outcome of our faith, the salvation of our souls. And so we fall at the feet of Jesus, crying out, Lord, help me!
And he does ... saving us by grace through faith in him.
1. Through this faith: Christ has set you free from sin, death, and the devil, just like the woman’s daughter who was healed that very hour.
There are times when we .... like Peter ... take our eyes off Christ, set our minds on the storms of life, and find ourselves drowning in sin. But then comes the Canaanite woman who stands in contrast to Saint Peter, who bows before her Lord, despite the absence of miracles.
Jesus did not answer her prayers so he could have some peace and quiet from her pleas. He answered her prayer and yours, so we can have his peace and hope, his mercy and strength, his comfort through the forgiveness of sins.
This is realized fully in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Our Lord Jesus Christ humbled himself by taking on the very flesh of a servant who went to the all the ends of the earth to serve you. He who knew no sin became sin for you, serving you in ways you couldn’t do for yourself. He lived life in perfect righteousness and then bore the full wrath of God against sin, death, and the devil.
Lord, have mercy, he did this for you ... suffering, bleeding, dying for you.
But death could not hold the author of life.
He is risen! He is risen indeed! Hallelujah.
Now through the baptism he continues to pour out upon you, He has united himself with you so that you will not die but will live eternally. Our Lord Jesus is drowning your sins daily through his water and word, and is raising you into eternal life so that you can receive the feast of his forgiveness that he has prepared for you here at this altar. This meal, this Supper, provides you with a crumb of the bread of life and a foretaste of the cup of his salvation.
O taste and see that the Lord is good. This feast nourishes your faith in him, and delivers the joy of joys ... the forgiveness of sins.
These are all matters of faith. So today let's thank God that he responds to our faith-filled pleas for mercy and help by sharing with us the fullness of his steadfast love and mercy declaring ...