Latest / Belin Memorial UMC / Rev. Will Malambri - "The Faith of the Unfaithful"
Transcript
- Belin Memorial UMC: I invite you to remain standing as we hear together the gospel reading from today. It's from the 15th chapter of the Gospel according to Matthew, where we read Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre in Sidon. Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, Have mercy on me, Lord, son of David. My daughter is tormented by a demon. But he did not answer her. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us. Jesus answered, I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. But she came and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me. He answered, It is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs. She said, Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master's table. Then Jesus answered her, Woman, great is your faith. Let it be done for you as you wish. And her daughter was healed from that moment. This is the word of God for the people of God. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. A story bothers you, doesn't it? I say that with confidence because there is so much in that story that is bother some. If you're convinced as I am that Jesus is filled with compassion, that he hears our pleas and responds, then Jesus' initial silence in the face of the Canaanite woman's trouble. Troubling. Troubled for her. Well, troubled for her daughter. We're troubled for the people we know who feel like they've been shouting out, seeking help and hearing nothing in return. The silence is bothersome. As is the rejection. Jesus says he was sent only for the lost sheep of the house of Israel, which has us wondering what would have happened to us, Gentiles though we are, had Jesus kept to that word. What about we remind him that God so loved the world Scholars will explain to us that Jesus was not ready to expand the ministry beyond the house of Israel, that he started there, eventually would get to the world as a whole. You know about that, a reminder that his final words to the disciples were that they be his witnesses to the ends of the earth. Jesus got there, but the scholars will say it was not yet what he thought was the time to go there. Whatever the explanation You don't have to understand the reason for the rejection to know that it is painful. Why someone was rejected, why someone would want to be with someone who would reject them. You don't have to know why, you just know it stings. Life teaches us that. I heard a comforting word about it recently. That sometimes a person's rejection is God's protection. That sometimes good comes out of it that we don't see in that moment. I've experienced that in my own life. I've seen that in the lives of others. That sometimes what I thought I wanted, what they thought they wanted, turned out to be not what they needed, not what I needed, God's protection in the midst of rejection. But this is more complicated than that. Because it is Jesus. God among us Who rejected And he does so with that uncomfortable language. Jesus compared the Canaanite woman the and the Gentiles she represents to dogs. Now I know for some of you there is no higher compliment than dog. But that's not how that would have been heard two thousand years ago in Palestine, a time before dogs were man's best friend. Or his best listener. I want you to know that is not in any way AI manipulated. That is an exact photograph of my dog at my parents' house. It's from a simpler time, a time when dogs, or not a simpler time. We're thinking back to simpler times 2,000 years ago. And these days, dogs get the best seat in the house. They get the best conditions. They get fed well. Not then. Not then. Jesus is talking to a time when the dogs did well to get the scraps. The dogs were grateful for whatever crumbs fell from the table. Canaanite understood what Jesus was saying. She understood that any blessing would be a scrap she did not deserve. Do we understand that? The Canaanite woman knew that the scrap the crumbs, the scraps that fell from the table were eaten by the dogs with gratitude. So she took the unflattering comparison and she barked up that. She could have left that scene with her tail between her legs. She could have raged at his dehuman dehumanizing comments. She could have reminded him that he preached about mercy and he had an opportunity right before him to ex to experience mercy, to show mercy to her daughter who was dealing with those demons, and yet he was ignoring her. He was silent in the face of an opportunity to share mercy. Practice what you preach. Could have easily called out to Jesus. Instead, the Canaanite woman kept her wits, steadied her nerves, and worked with what he gave her. If the table was set for the house of Israel, she said. Since that is who you came to serve, she said. By all means, Lord, son of David, go and do what you are here to do, but remember that the master's crumbs also fell to the dogs who were grateful to receive them. That's when it happened. That's when we finally get the happy ending to the story we've been waiting for. That's when Jesus commends the woman for her faith. That's when her daughter gets healed. That's when we can exhale and whatever it was, those strange things that led to the outcome we desire, whatever was behind all that, at least the woman got, the daughter got. We get what we want from this story, the healing that she begged for. Ready to turn the page. R ready to move on, ready to relegate this story to some strange, happy, and forgotten part of Jesus ministry. But I think there's one more part that should bother. Strangely, it's the part that relieved your concern as I read the story, the part that that made you feel a little bit better about all that strange story, and I think it should bother us. Think about what it means that a Canaanite woman whose daughter was suffering with demons is commended by Jesus for her faith. That's a lot to take in. Let's try again. Think about what it means that a woman from another ethnicity, a member of a group of people who worshipped idols and were frequently the enemies of Israel, a woman whose child is possessed by demons, yells at Jesus until it forces him to deal with her, makes her case before him, and by the end of the story, she is the one who is lifted up as an example of faith. This woman. It would have been considered. Who might still today be considered as the antithesis of a faithful person? And there it is, Jesus declaring her the example. In case you don't know, Jesus does not go around telling people that they have great faith. It's a rare thing for him to do that indeed. Twice in the Gospel of Matthew does he do so. Two occasions, a Roman centurion whose servant had fallen ill and who believed that Jesus from afar could heal his servant back to health. And this story of the Canaanite woman. Those are the two times Jesus commends somebody for their great faith. Two times. And neither to someone who grew up hearing of God's faithfulness to the people of Israel. Neither to someone who had a front row seat to what Jesus was doing among the people, the miracles that Jesus was working. Neither to someone that anyone who thought they were in a position to judge who had great faith would have said, has great faith. And that's who Jesus called faith. Not among the people of Israel, not among his followers. The leaders of the people of Israel, on the other hand, they were the ones being antagonistic to the Messiah they'd been waiting for. His followers, those who were in the best positions of all to see what Jesus was up to and to believe his mighty works, well, they did not always impress. His audience, Jesus said, had little faith when they began to worry about whether or not God would provide for them. A storm capsized his disciples' faith. Peter shrunk. Peter's faith shrunk when he stepped out into the water and took his eyes off of Jesus. And the disciples who had seen Jesus multiply bread and fish just days before demonstrated how malnourished was their faith when they doubted he would do it again. When the disciples had a chance to heal an epileptic boy, they failed to. Jesus' explanation was because of their little faith. It should get our attention. People of faith. It should get our attention when those who are in the best position to have great faith had little. And the ones who did not have the stories of their ancestors being freed by God, being saved by God, being provided for by God, who were not firsthand witnesses of Jesus' wonder-working ministry, struggled. The faith of the unfaithful might shame us. It might inspire us. But at the very least it should challenge us who claim to believe. If we've been served our faith on silver platters for so long that we have forgotten what it is like to beg for bread. That crumb begging Canaanite has something to say to it. She's the one who Jesus, who she, she's the one who believed that Jesus could heal her daughter. She's the one who accepted that he did not have to, but she's the one who loved her daughter enough to keep trying until maybe perhaps he would. She needed it enough to yell at him until she got his ear. She needed it enough to honor him as his as Lord and Son of David, the Messiah, showing that she knew more about him than his reputation for healing. She needed it enough to use his words to make her case, because despite how much it stung to have received silence in the type of time of need, and despite how hard and painful it was to experience rejection in a desperate moment. The Canaanite woman determined she would not be defined by silence or rejection. What do we know her from? The Canaanite woman is defined by her faith that Jesus could save the daughter she so loves. She's defined by faith. And love. And maybe that's why Matthew included such a troublesome story. For all the ways that people might define us. Those who ignore or those who are ignored. Those who exclude or those who are excluded. Those with little faith or those with great faith. For all the ways the world might define us, Jesus defines the one with great faith as the one who believes that he can work mightily in her daughter's life and the one who loves her child enough to seek it. The story the one who was thought to be unfaithful. Turns out to be the very one who is defined by her faith. Two of the primary characteristics of those who seek to follow Jesus. Who knew we'd learn it? We'd learn them from someone like her.