Latest / Reformed Thinking / The Master's Crumbs for Gentile Dogs: Sovereign Grace and the Triumph of Justifying Faith (Matthew 15:21–28)

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The Master's Crumbs for Gentile Dogs: Sovereign Grace and the Triumph of Justifying Faith (Matthew 15:21–28) · Reformed Thinking

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  Welcome to Reformed Thinking. We have a massive stack of notes
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  and research in front of us today.
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  We really do, and we are turning our attention to a very specific
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  narrative in the Gospel of Matthew.
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  We are looking at chapter 15 and honestly, looking at the raw
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  text. This is one of those passages
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  that if you read it quickly over your morning coffee, it just
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  feels jarring. It feels dangerous.
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  I mean, it is the kind of text that makes you stop and check
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  the Greek translation to make sure you read it right.
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  It does. It feels like a public relations
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  nightmare for Jesus. Absolutely.
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  We are jumping into verses 21 through 28, the story of the
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  Canaanite woman, and the mission for this deep dive is to figure
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  out why Jesus, who we know as the definition of compassion,
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  appears to act in a way that is cold, dismissive, and frankly,
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  offensive. It is a text that shakes people.
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  You have this desperate mother. Her daughter is suffering, The
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  text says she's severely oppressed by a demon.
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  She screams for help. Jesus gives you the silent
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  treatment. Then he tells her essentially
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  that he is not there for her. And then the hardest part of
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  all, he compares her to a dog. That is a tension we have to sit
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  in today. If you are a modern reader, or
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  if you are looking at this through a secular lens, Jesus
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  just looks rude. He looks prejudice.
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  He looks like. Everything we usually say, He is
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  not. So the core question we are
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  grappling with is how we reconcile the merciful Christ
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  with these incredibly hard words.
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  Right, because for you listening to this, it is not just an
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  academic exercise. We have all been there.
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  You pray, you plead. The heavens are like brass.
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  You get silence. Is God angry?
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  Is he absent? Or is he doing something else
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  entirely? Our source material today argues
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  that this is not accidental harshness.
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  Jesus is not having a bad day. He's not just tired.
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  No, this is a sovereignly orchestrated Crucible.
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  One of the articles we reviewed calls it a divine anvil.
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  A divine anvil. I like that image, but it
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  implies a lot of heat and pressure.
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  Well, anvils are where things are forged.
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  They were where metal is beaten into shape.
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  The argument here is that Jesus is forging a specific kind of
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  faith, what theologians call elect faith, and he's doing it
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  in a very specific, very intense way.
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  So to understand this anvil, we have to use the right tools.
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  The research highlights 2 distinct theological lenses we
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  need to apply. We cannot just go with our
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  feelings here. If we go with our feelings, we
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  just get offended and close the Bible.
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  We need the redemptive historical lens and we need the
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  systematic or reformed lens. Let us pause there.
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  Redemptive, historical. That is a mouthful for anyone
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  not in seminary. Break that down for us.
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  What does that actually mean for this text?
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  It sounds technical, but it's basically a timeline.
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  It means understanding the Bible as an unfolding story of
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  covenants. God works in an order.
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  He does not just do everything at once.
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  Right. He called Abraham, He created
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  Israel. He made promises to that
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  specific family. Redemptive History asks where we
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  are on the timeline in Matthew 15.
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  We are at a moment where the focus is still strictly on
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  Israel. So it is about the Israel first
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  priority. We have to respect the order of
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  the story. Precisely.
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  If you ignore the timeline, you misinterpret the main character.
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  You misinterpret Jesus. And the second lens, the
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  systematic view. This is where we get into the
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  mechanics of salvation, concepts like total depravity, the idea
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  that we have nothing to offer God, the verdict of the law, and
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  then the nature of true justifying faith.
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  This story is a master class in how a human being is made right
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  with God. The goal today is to see the
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  logic of faith that this woman possesses.
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  She figures something out that the disciples missed.
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  She figures something out that the Pharisees completely missed
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  just a few verses earlier. She cracks the code.
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  Let us start the beginning, the setting.
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  Matthew 15 verse 21 says Jesus went away or withdrew to the
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  district of Tyre and Sidon. And when I hear withdrew, I
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  think of a retreat. A nice vacation.
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  Right, getting away from the crowds a break.
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  But our notes say this is theologically charged geography.
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  What makes Tyre and Sidon so charged?
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  This was not a hiking trip. Tyre and Sidon are coastal
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  cities north of Galilee in the ancient world.
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  In the Old Testament mind, these places were the headquarters of
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  paganism. This is the land of Baal
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  worship. Baal worship, that is the heavy
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  stuff. The heaviest Think about Queen
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  Jezebel, the woman who haunted the prophets of God, the one who
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  tried to exterminate the worship of Yahweh.
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  She was a Cydonian Princess. She came from here.
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  Wow. So for a Jewish rabbi, for the
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  Messiah of Israel to walk into Tyre and Sidon is huge.
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  This is entering enemy territory.
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  It is like walking into the villain's fortress.
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  Essentially, yes. It is the heart of darkness.
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  Liberal commentators will often say Jesus was just tired.
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  They argue he needed to escape the political heat in Galilee,
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  so he went to the border to rest.
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  Just looking for a quiet hotel. Right, but a reformed
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  understanding of Scripture rejects that.
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  The Sovereign Lord does not just wander aimlessly.
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  He does not stumble into geography.
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  He went there on a mission. The force material suggests this
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  was a search and rescue operation.
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  He went there to extract one specific person.
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  He crossed enemy lines for one woman and let us talk about her.
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  Matthew introduces her with a label.
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  He calls her a Canaanite. No, I checked the other Gospel
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  accounts. Mark calls her a Sira
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  Phoenician. That was the accurate political
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  term for that time period. If you looked at her passport,
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  it would say Sira Phoenician. But Matthew digs up this old
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  archaic word Canaanite. That feels very intentional.
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  It is incredibly intentional and it is not a compliment.
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  It is like calling someone a Babylonian today or a
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  Philistine. Even worse, Canaanite was the
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  label for the ancient sworn enemies of Israel.
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  These were the people who were in the land before Israel
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  arrived. They were the idolaters God
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  commanded Israel to drive out. They were supposed to be judged.
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  So it is a loaded word. Very.
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  By using that term, Matthew is flashing a neon sign overhead
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  that says Enemy, outsider under judgement.
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  So he is stacking the deck against her right from the
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  start. He's showing us her spiritual
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  resume, and her resume is 0. She has no covenant badge.
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  She is not a daughter of Abraham.
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  She has no civil rights in the Kingdom of God.
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  In terms of Reformed theology, she is the perfect illustration
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  of total depravity. Total depravity is one of those
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  terms that gets misunderstood a lot.
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  People hear it and think it means as bad as you can possibly
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  be, like you are a serial killer.
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  Right, that is utter depravity. Total depravity is different.
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  It means that sin affects the total person, mind, will,
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  emotions, and it means you are dead in trespasses and sins.
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  You have no natural ability to claim God's favor.
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  You are spiritually bankrupt. So this woman, as a Canaanite,
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  represents all of humanity outside of Christ.
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  She has absolutely no claim on God.
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  She is the ultimate outsider. And yet this is where the text
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  gets wild. This outsider comes out
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  screaming and listen to what she screams.
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  Have mercy on me, O Lord Son of David.
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  It is amazing. That stops me in my tracks.
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  She is a Pagan. She lives in ball country.
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  How on earth she know to call him Son of David?
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  That is a highly specific Jewish messianic title.
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  You do not pick that up on the streets of Sidon.
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  It is astounding. The Pharisees, the guys with the
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  theology degrees, the guys are the Torah memorize.
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  They just finished rejecting Jesus in the first half of the
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  chapter. They saw the miracles, they
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  heard the teaching, and they said no, they missed the King.
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  They were the insiders. They were the insiders.
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  And here's the outsider, the dog, and she nails it.
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  She gets the theology right, Lord son of David.
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  So where did she get that information?
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  Did she read a scroll somewhere? This brings us straight to the
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  doctrine of unconditional election, Sovereign grace.
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  Where did she get this Orthodox Christology?
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  Flesh and blood did not reveal this to her.
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  So you were saying this is a supernatural insight?
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  It has to be. The source material highlights
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  this beautifully. It is a striking evidence that
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  God grants eyes to see to whom He wills.
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  The insiders are blind. The outsider sees.
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  It flips the script on who we think understands God.
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  And the text says she was crying out.
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  The notes here dive into the Greek a bit.
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  The word is ecra Gazan. Yes, it is an imperfect active
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  indicative verb. OK, break that down for the non
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  Greek scholars listening. Why does that tense matter?
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  The imperfect tense implies continuous action in the past.
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  It means she did not just shout once.
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  She did not say excuse me, Lord, and then wait politely for a
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  response. She was keeping on screaming.
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  She was wailing. It was a continuous, desperate,
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  gut wrenching noise. It was a scene.
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  There was a massive scene, it was loud and it was embarrassing
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  and. Look at what she asks for.
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  Have mercy on me, Elise and me. She does not ask for justice.
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  She does not ask for a fair wage.
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  That is the key right there. When you ask for mercy, you are
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  admitting you do not deserve the thing you're asking for.
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  Mercy is for the guilty. Mercy is for the helpless.
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  He comes empty handed. Completely empty.
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  She's not saying Lord, I have been a really good mom.
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  I have volunteered at the local Pagan temple, so you owe me this
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  healing. I have paid my dues.
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  Right, none of that. She's saying I have nothing.
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  I am a Canaanite. But you are the son of David.
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  Please. She identifies the problem
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  clearly too. My daughter is a severely
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  oppressed by a demon. And notice she says, have mercy
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  on me. The daughter is the one with the
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  demon, but the mother feels the pain.
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  The daughter's suffering has become the mother's agony.
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  That brings us to what might be the hardest race in the whole
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  story, verse 23. She is screaming, she is
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  acknowledging Him as Lord. She is begging for mercy.
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  She is doing everything right according to the theological
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  textbook, and the text says he did not answer her a word.
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  The silence of God. It is heavy.
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  You can feel the vulnerability of her prayer just hitting a
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  brick wall. Why?
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  Why would Jesus, who we know is love Incarnate, who healed
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  lepers, who touched the unclean? Why would he give her the silent
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  treatment? This is where we have to be very
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  precise. We have to discuss what this
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  silence is not because our insecurities fill in the blanks.
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  When God is silent, what do we naturally assume?
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  We assume he did not hear us, or he does not care, or he is angry
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  with. Us, precisely.
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  But biblically we know that is not true here.
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  It is not ignorance. He knows what she needs.
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  It is not weakness. He is fully capable of healing
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  her. And despite how it feels, it is
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  not coldness. This silence is purposeful.
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  Purposeful silence. That is a tough concept to
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  swallow. One of our sources describes it
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  as a test, but I want to be careful with the word test.
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  It is not like a pop quiz to see if she passes or fails so Jesus
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  can find out new information. Jesus already knows what is in
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  her heart. So the test is not for him, it
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  is for her. Yes, our source references the
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  Westminster Confession of Faith chapter 5.
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  It talks about Providence. It notes that God, in His most
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  wise and righteous Providence, often leaves His children to
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  manifold temptations to discover unto them the hidden strength of
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  their faith. To discover unto them so silence
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  is, so she can find out what she's actually made of.
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  Yes, if Jesus had answered her immediately, if he had said
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  sure, here you go, her faith would have remained small and
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  untested. But by waiting, by staying
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  silent, He forces her faith to dig roots into the ground.
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  True faith is revealed when it has to wait.
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  That makes a lot of sense. If her faith was just an
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  emotional impulse, just a panic reaction, it would have faded
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  when the silence stretched on. She would have given up and gone
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  home. It separates the wheat from the
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  chaff. It does.
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  It is the divine handle we talked about.
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  He is forging something that cannot be broken.
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  He is strengthening her capacity to trust Him.
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  That is such a vital corrective to how we usually think.
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  We usually interpret silence as outright rejection.
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  God hates me. I did not pray the right
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  formula. I need to pray harder.
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  But you are saying the silence is actually a form of
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  engagement. It is a summons to press in.
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  It is an invitation to wrestle. Think about Jacob wrestling with
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  the Angel in the Old Testament. You do not get the blessing
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  unless you hold on through the night.
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  And this stands in such stark contrast to the modern seeker
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  sensitive model we see in so many churches.
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  Too. Oh for sure, if a modern church
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  consultant saw Jesus doing this, they would panic.
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  They would have an absolute meltdown.
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  They would say, Jesus, you're being unwelcoming.
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  You are creating a barrier to entry.
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  You are going to lose this demographic.
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  Our retention numbers, they're going to tank.
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  She is going to give us a one star review on Google.
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  Completely. But Jesus is not trying to
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  market a brand. He is not trying to make her
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  feel comfortable. He is forming a soul.
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  It also critiques the prosperity gospel idea, the idea that God
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  is a cosmic vending machine. Right.
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  You put the prayer coin in, you push the faith button and the
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  blessing drops out immediately. And if it does not, it is your
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  fault you did not have enough faith.
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  This text destroys that false teaching.
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  She has great faith. Jesus eventually says so.
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  And yet she faces agonizing silence.
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  Silence is not a sign of a lack of faith.
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  It's the gymnasium of faith. While she is wrestling with this
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  silence, she is also dealing with the bystanders, the
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  disciples. They decide to chime in and
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  honestly they are not helpful at all.
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  Verse 23 continues. And his disciples came and
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  begged him, saying, Send her away, for she is crying out
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  after us. After us, did you get that
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  pronoun? Yeah, not she's crying out for
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  her daughter, but she is bothering us.
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  They reveal so much about their hearts in that moment.
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  They make her suffering about their inconvenience.
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  They view her as a nuisance, an interruption to their day.
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  To be fair to the disciples, she was probably really loud and
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  they were tired. They thought they were on a
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  retreat. Oh.
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  Surely it is very relatable human behavior, but it is also
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  very ugly. They are probably thinking we
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  came here for a theological retreat with the master.
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  We want to sit at his feet and learn mysteries and this loud
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  Pagan woman is ruining the atmosphere.
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  She is ruining the quiet time. That is it.
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  It is a classic case of the insiders acting like
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  gatekeepers. They want to protect their
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  comfort and their order. They want a clean, organized
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  ministry without messy people. It is a warning, isn't it, for
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  anyone in ministry or just anyone sitting in the Pew.
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  A serious pastoral warning. Our sources point this out,
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  especially for office bearers, elders, pastors, deacons, even
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  us doing this deep dive. Do we view messy, suffering,
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  loud people as interruptions to our orderly services?
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  Do we want to send them away so we can get back to our nice
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  quiet Bible study? Please leave, we are studying
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  the mercy of God. The irony is so thick.
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  The disciples are physically close to Jesus.
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  They're standing right next to Him, but their hearts are miles
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  away from His. The woman is physically distant,
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  treated as an outsider, yet her heart is beating in rhythm with
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  His mercy. Proximity to Jesus does not
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  guarantee likeness to His heart. You can be an insider and miss
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  the point completely. So the disciples want her gone.
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  They say send her away and Jesus finally breaks his silence.
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  But what he says, well, it does not seem to help her case at
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  all. In fact, it sounds like he is
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  agreeing with the disciples. Verse 24 I was sent only to the
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  lost sheep of the House of Israel.
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  This is the dispensational distinction we mentioned in the
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  outline. It sounds like a rejection
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  letter. Sorry ma'am, wrong department.
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  I want to hear for Israel. Is Jesus saying he does not care
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  about Gentiles? Is he saying his grace stops at
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  the border? No.
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  And this is where we really need that redemptive historical lens.
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  This is not about ethnic superiority.
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  It is not about racism. It is about redemptive order.
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  Break that down. Why is the order so vital?
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  Think about a legal will or a trust fund.
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  If a father leaves an inheritance, there are strict
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  rules about how it is distributed.
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  First to the eldest son, then to the others.
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  God is a God of order. He made a covenant with Abraham.
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  He promised that through Abraham's family the whole world
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  would be blessed. But the blessing has to come to
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  the family first. So Jesus is legally bound by the
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  promises of the Old Testament. Yes, Paul says in Romans 116,
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  the gospel is to the Jew 1st and also to the Greek, not only to
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  the Jew but to the Jew first. Jesus is the minister of the
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  circumcision, as Romans 15-8 says.
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  He came to fulfill the promises made to the patriarchs.
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  The Messiah must come to Israel, present himself to Israel, and,
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  crucially, be rejected by Israel so that the blessing can flow
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  out to the nation. 'S he has to follow the plan.
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  He cannot just freelance his ministry.
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  Right there the Greek construction here is very
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  strong. UK Pestilan I may I was not sent
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  except to it is exclusive. But, and this is key, this
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  exclusivity in his earthly ministry is the necessary
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  prelude to the Great Commission later on.
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  He focuses on Israel now so that later, after the cross and
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  resurrection, he can legitimately tell the disciples
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  to go to all nations. So if he skipped Israel now and
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  just started healing Gentiles everywhere, he would actually be
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  breaking the covenant. He would be a covenant breaker.
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  He would be untrustworthy. If God does not keep His
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  specific ancient promises to Israel, how can you or I trust
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  His promises to US? Jesus is telling her there is a
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  plan and I am sticking to it. It safeguards against the idea
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  that Jesus was just a wandering miracle worker doing whatever he
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  felt like on any given Tuesday. He was working a highly
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  structured plan. Precisely.
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  And one of our sources points out that this guards against
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  novel revelations. We do not get to bypass
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  Scripture or God's appointed means.
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  God works through his established covenant order.
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  So Jesus effectively says my mission is currently focused on
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  Israel. Most people would hear that and
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  say OK, I get it, I'm not eligible and they would pack up
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  and leave. Most people absolutely would,
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  but she does not. She does not leave at all.
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  The text says she came and knelt before him.
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  Other translations say she worshipped him.
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  She physically blocks his path and she simplifies her prayers.
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  She drops the title. She just says, Lord help me. 3
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  words. Lord help me.
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  The theology is simple, but the desperation is at its absolute
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  peak. She's refusing to take no for an
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  answer. She's pushing through the
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  theological barrier he just set up.
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  And then comes the hammer blow, verse 26.
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  This is the voice that makes everyone cringe.
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  Jesus looks at this kneeling, weeping mother and says it is
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  not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.
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  Ouch. There is no way around it that
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  stings. Now I've heard preachers try to
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  soften this over the years. I've heard them say, oh, the
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  Greek word is canarian. It means little puppy.
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  It is affectionate. It is like he is calling her a
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  cute little house pet. We have to be honest with the
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  text here. That is sentimental garbage.
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  It is an insult you. Really think so.
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  Absolutely. Even if Canarian refers to a
• 18:06
  small household dog rather than a wild St. scavenger, it is
• 18:10
  still drawing a massive line between the children, the
• 18:13
  humans, the rightful heirs and the animals.
• 18:15
  It is a severe metaphor. In the ancient Near East, dogs
• 18:19
  were not like our golden retrievers, sleeping at the foot
• 18:22
  of the bed. They were unclean.
• 18:24
  Calling someone a dog was the ultimate slur.
• 18:26
  So what is the exact metaphor here?
• 18:28
  Who is who in this picture? The children are Israel, the
• 18:31
  covenant members. The bread is the messianic
• 18:33
  blessing, the gospel the healing, the strength of the
• 18:36
  Kingdom. The dogs are the Gentiles, those
• 18:38
  outside the covenant. Jesus is looking right in the
• 18:41
  eye and saying you do not belong at the table, you are outside.
• 18:44
  Why? Why kick her when she is already
• 18:46
  down on the ground? This seems unnecessarily cruel.
• 18:49
  If he knows he's going to heal her later, why crush her first?
• 18:53
  This is the function of the Law. Before the gospel can heal, the
• 18:57
  law must kill. The law must kill.
• 18:59
  Untack that for us. It means Jesus is methodically
• 19:02
  stripping her of any last shred of entitlement.
• 19:04
  If she had any thought in her head that said I deserve this,
• 19:08
  or I am a basically good person, or my culture is just as valid
• 19:12
  as yours, this statement crushes it completely.
• 19:15
  He puts her in a proper place. He is agreeing with the
• 19:18
  judgement of her being a Canaanite.
• 19:20
  He is saying you are right, you have no claim on me.
• 19:22
  He is. Bringing her to the absolute end
• 19:25
  of herself. Yes, he puts her in the place of
• 19:27
  the beggar so she can receive grace as grace, not as a wage.
• 19:31
  If she thinks she deserves it, then it is not Grace anymore, it
• 19:35
  is a transaction. It forces the question for you.
• 19:37
  Listening to this right now too. Do you come to God with
• 19:40
  entitlement? Do you sit there and thank God I
• 19:42
  have been good? I go to church, I give to
• 19:44
  charity. Surely you owe me a smooth life.
• 19:46
  Precisely. And if she had responded with a
• 19:49
  fence, which 99% of us would have done, she would have walked
• 19:51
  away empty. Imagine if she stood up and said
• 19:53
  how dare you? I am not a dog.
• 19:55
  Who do you think you are? That is exactly what our modern
• 19:58
  culture tells us to do. Stand up for yourself.
• 20:00
  Know your worth, defend your boundaries, speak your truth
• 20:04
  right. But offended pride walks away
• 20:06
  from Jesus. Offended pride leaves the
• 20:09
  daughter demon possessed. But faith, faith stays.
• 20:13
  Faith can handle the insult because faith knows the truth
• 20:16
  about its own depravity. And that leads us to her
• 20:19
  response in verse 27. I really think this is one of
• 20:21
  the greatest moments in the entire Bible.
• 20:24
  This is the turning point of the whole narrative.
• 20:26
  She does not get offended. She looks at him and says, yes,
• 20:29
  Lord. Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs
• 20:31
  that fall from their master's table.
• 20:32
  It is breathtaking, it really is.
• 20:34
  I get chills every time I read that line.
• 20:36
  It is what Martin Luther called spiritual Jiu jitsu.
• 20:39
  She uses his own move against him in a brilliant way.
• 20:42
  Breakdown the logic here. How does she win this
• 20:45
  theological argument with the Son of God?
• 20:47
  The text says she answers, yes, Lord Nye Kyrie in the Greek,
• 20:51
  that is the very first step of true faith.
• 20:53
  She agrees with his verdict. She admits you are right.
• 20:57
  I am a dog. I have no right to the
• 20:58
  children's bread. I am a Sinner.
• 21:00
  I am a Canaanite. I am outside the covenant.
• 21:03
  She does not fight the theology, She embraces it.
• 21:06
  She submits to it entirely. She swallows the pride, but she
• 21:11
  does not stop it. Yes, Lord, she adds yet.
• 21:13
  Or for even. For even the dogs eat the
• 21:16
  crumbs. This is the analogy of faith.
• 21:19
  She interprets the hard word through the lens of his
• 21:21
  character. She is effectively saying, true
• 21:23
  Jesus, I am a dog. I do not deserve the loaf.
• 21:27
  I do not deserve the steak. But Master, your table is so
• 21:30
  incredibly big and you are so abundant, and your grace is so
• 21:34
  overflowing. You are such a rich king that
• 21:37
  you drop crumbs. She is banking entirely on his
• 21:40
  abundance. Yes, she is saying there is
• 21:42
  enough for the children and the dogs.
• 21:43
  You do not have to rob the kids to feed me.
• 21:45
  Just give me the overflow. Just give me the waste.
• 21:48
  That is incredible humility, but also incredible boldness at the
• 21:51
  same time. She values a tiny crumb from
• 21:54
  Jesus more than a feast from the world.
• 21:56
  That is the heart of it. She understands the sufficiency
• 21:58
  of Christ. She knows he is not stingy.
• 22:01
  He does not have to ration his grace out.
• 22:03
  He does not say, oh sorry, if I heal your daughter, I will not
• 22:06
  have enough battery power left to heal Peter's mother-in-law
• 22:09
  next week. I.
• 22:10
  Am running low on miracles for the quarter.
• 22:12
  Right. No.
• 22:13
  His table is a table of infinite abundance.
• 22:15
  She knows that the crumbs, the absolute smallest measure of his
• 22:19
  power, are more potent than all the idols of Tyre and Sidon
• 22:23
  combined. More potent than the demon, more
• 22:26
  potent than her sin. A crumb of Jesus is enough to
• 22:29
  conquer hell. This is justification by faith
• 22:31
  alone in live action, is it not? It is the dictionary definition
• 22:35
  of it. Think about her posture.
• 22:36
  She offers no works. She offers no resume.
• 22:39
  She offers only empty hands, or rather an open mouth, trusting
• 22:42
  solely in the Master's abundance.
• 22:45
  She is looking away from herself and looking entirely to him.
• 22:48
  That is why it is such a massive victory.
• 22:50
  She conquers the apparent rejection by clinging fiercely
• 22:53
  to the true character of the king.
• 22:55
  She catches him in his own linguistic trap.
• 22:57
  She says if I am a dog then you are the master and good masters
• 23:01
  feed their dogs. Precisely.
• 23:02
  You called me a dog, so you have to feed me.
• 23:04
  It is brilliant covenantal logic.
• 23:06
  And Jesus loves it. Look at verse 28.
• 23:08
  Then Jesus answered her. Oh woman, great is your faith.
• 23:12
  He commends her openly, and our notes point out this is the only
• 23:15
  time in the Gospel of Matthew he calls someone's faith Great.
• 23:19
  And it is a Gentile, it is a woman.
• 23:21
  It is not Peter, it is not John. It is the outsider.
• 23:25
  It is a massive rebuke to the disciples standing right there
• 23:28
  watching this. It is He is constantly telling
• 23:30
  the disciples, Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?
• 23:33
  How long must I put up with you? But here to the dog, to the
• 23:37
  Canaanite, he says. Great is your faith.
• 23:39
  What makes it great, though, is it the emotional intensity?
• 23:42
  No, it is the persistence against massive obstacles.
• 23:46
  Great faith is not about how loud you shout in a worship
• 23:49
  service. Great faith is about what you do
• 23:51
  when God is silent. She climbed over the barrier of
• 23:54
  silence. She pushed past the barrier of
• 23:56
  the annoyed disciples. She crawled under the barrier of
• 23:58
  the law itself. She refused to let go until she
• 24:01
  got a crumb. That is great faith.
• 24:03
  And the result is immediate, be it done for you as you desire.
• 24:07
  And her daughter was healed instantly.
• 24:08
  Instantly notice the method too. He does not go to her house, he
• 24:12
  does not perform a ritual, he does not wave a hand or use holy
• 24:15
  water. Just the word spoken for miles
• 24:17
  away. The absolute authority of his
• 24:19
  word distance is no barrier to the Son of David, and this
• 24:24
  affirms the cessationist viewpoint mentioned in our
• 24:26
  sources. This was a specific messianic
• 24:29
  sign. It proved exactly who he was.
• 24:31
  But the source makes a really crucial point here.
• 24:33
  The physical healing was amazing.
• 24:35
  The demon was gone, but the greater miracle was the Mother's
• 24:39
  faith. The miracle of justification.
• 24:41
  Yes, the miracle that a dead Pagan heart was turned to trust
• 24:44
  the Jewish Messiah. That is the eternal miracle in
• 24:47
  this text. And we see the third use of the
• 24:49
  law here too, right for our listeners who lean heavy into
• 24:52
  reformed categories. We do.
• 24:53
  Her faith led to grateful obedience.
• 24:56
  She persisted. She modeled the head, heart, and
• 24:58
  hands aspect of faith perfectly. Her head knew who he was, son of
• 25:02
  David. Her heart felt the utter
• 25:04
  desperation and the trust, and her hands metaphorically reached
• 25:08
  out and kept knocking until the door opened.
• 25:10
  So as we wrap this deep dive up, let us zoom out for a second.
• 25:13
  We started with a silent, seemingly harsh Jesus.
• 25:16
  We end with a healed daughter and a highly commended mother.
• 25:19
  What did we actually learn from all this source material?
• 25:22
  We learned that silence is not absence.
• 25:26
  That is the big take away. Just because you do not hear an
• 25:29
  answer does not mean God is not actively working the anvil.
• 25:34
  He is forging you in the silence.
• 25:36
  We also learned that true faith agrees with the laws guilty
• 25:39
  verdict. It agrees that we are sinners,
• 25:41
  that we have 0 rights. We do not come to God demanding
• 25:45
  things based on fairness. We come agreeing that we are
• 25:47
  dogs in terms of our own merit. But we do not stay on the floor.
• 25:51
  No, we do not. We cling to the Gospels,
• 25:54
  promise. We refuse to believe that God is
• 25:56
  stingy. We believe he is a generously
• 25:58
  abundant master. It is the lesson of the crumbs.
• 26:01
  The crumbs that conquer hell, That is the specific phrase from
• 26:04
  our source material. The smallest measure of Christ's
• 26:07
  grace is more than sufficient for our absolute greatest need.
• 26:11
  I want to leave you listening with this final thought today.
• 26:13
  It is something that has been sticking with me as we've been
• 26:16
  unpacking this. We talked about how Jesus called
• 26:18
  her a dog and how she accepted that lowly place to receive
• 26:21
  grace. She took the lowest possible.
• 26:23
  Position the absolute low. But think about the cross a few
• 26:27
  trailers later in Matthew, Jesus is the one who is cast out of
• 26:30
  the city. He's the one surrounded by dogs.
• 26:33
  As Psalm 22 prophecies, he's treated as the unclean thing.
• 26:37
  He's the one who cries out to the Father and hears only
• 26:40
  agonizing silence. My God, my God, why have you
• 26:43
  forsaken me? Precisely the silence this woman
• 26:46
  felt he felt the ultimate silence.
• 26:48
  The exclusion she felt, he felt the ultimate exclusion.
• 26:52
  Jesus took the place of the dog. He was cast out so that we
• 26:55
  Gentiles, outsiders, sinners, could be brought to the table
• 26:58
  and treated as beloved children. That is the Gospel right there.
• 27:01
  He became the curse so we could eat the bread.
• 27:03
  He took the hunger, so we had the feast.
• 27:05
  So the challenge for you listening today is this, are you
• 27:08
  standing on your rights? Are you trying to negotiate with
• 27:10
  God like a Pharisee saying Lord look at my resume or are you
• 27:14
  willing to kneel like this Canaanite woman?
• 27:16
  Are you willing to be a beggar? Are you willing to say, Lord, I
• 27:19
  do not deserve anything, but I trust that you are good, because
• 27:23
  if you are willing to take the place of the beggar, the master
• 27:25
  has a guaranteed seat for you at the table.
• 27:27
  And his table is completely full.
• 27:30
  There is plenty of bread for everyone who asks.
• 27:33
  Thanks for joining us on this deep dive into Matthew 15.
• 27:36
  It is a hard text, but man is it a beautiful one when you get to
• 27:39
  the bottom of it. It really is a massive comfort.
• 27:42
  We will see you next time on reformed thinking.
• 27:44
  Grace and peace.