Listen and Understand
Texts: Isaiah 56:1, 6-8; Matthew 15:10-28
I have seen the wind, our framing metaphor for sermons this summer, gives opportunity to reflect on some of the surprising ways in which God speaks to us. As I’ve meditated on today’s sermon over the past month or so, there have been a number of instances where it wasn’t difficult to sense the Spirit’s presence. One was at Mennonite Church Canada’s Annual Assembly. Marilyn spoke of this in her sermon of 10 July. Another was a week or so later when Erna and I drove the Banff – Jasper icefields highway, seeing with eyes anew God’s handiwork, and reminiscing about previous travels through that glorious part of earth. No doubt you, too, have experienced a sense of wonder when encountering nature. Both the Assembly and time spent in the grandeur of nature lent themselves to a powerfully positive feeling of God’s presence. Yet, there wasn’t a strong resonance with today’s readings.
A very different experience has been the storm gripping much of the world these past few weeks – a storm marked by wildly fluctuating stock markets, riots laying waste to parts of cities, and dysfunctional political responses. Here one senses that God has been all but forgotten, and that there is a need for a ‘spritual reset’. Indeed, when issues of this kind occur, or others closer to home where deep seated differences of view exist, one senses that God is prompting us to think again about what it is that is worthy. It is this question – what is aligned with God’s mission; and, who worthy of God’s mercy and love that captured my attention.
Let me begin by telling you the end of todays lesson. God’s mercy and love is available to all of us – to anyone else who seeks it. We are beloved daughters and sons of God. That which was said of Jesus, is said of you – I – we – all of us (see passages in Jeremian, Isaiah, Romans and Ephesians, amongst others).1
One of the enormous spiritual tasks we have is to claim that understanding – to internalize it – and to live a life based on that knowledge – to align ourselves accordingly. And that is not very easy. In part, it’s not easy because we humans are prone to doing things that undermine our relationship with God. And, in part, it’s not easy because we fall into the trap of thinking we know better than others what it takes to be godly.
Today’s Lectionary readings reflect something of that difficulty. The Isaiah reading speaks to the Lord’s intent to maintain justice and do what is right – AND then makes it clear that ‘God’s chosen people’, the Israelites, aren’t the only ones he will gather to His house of prayer. Those ‘foreigners’, those unclean people who join themselves to the Lord will also be amongst those invited. The mercy of God is for everyone aligned with God’s mission, is the message.
This theme is elaborated on in the two-part reading from Matthew 15. In the first, verses 10-20, Jesus seems frustrated and annoyed. “Listen and understand…” he begins. That’s a rather startling opening to a talk. Jesus seems more than a little impatient with the dull witted bunch around him. ‘Don’t you guys get it?’ Then he proceeds to instruct them in blunt language as to what defiles human relationship with God.
In the second part, verses 21–28, the lesson is put to the test. Jesus has an intense encounter with a woman who, by every criterion of the day, would have been considered unclean and defiled – not worthy of God’s mercy. Jesus’ first response seems just plain mean, if not arrogant. He dismisses the woman as not worthy of mercy. But, then, Jesus makes a surprising reversal.
Part I
Before getting into the text, let’s think a little about the context. Jesus has been ministering for some time in areas around the Sea of Galilea – traveling from one place to another, speaking at synagogues and on mountain sides, turning water into wine, healing the sick and disabled, even feeding a crowd of 5000 from a few loaves and fishes. Word of his teaching has reached Jerusalem. Immediately before today’s reading, Jesus’ patience has been tested by a group of Pharisees and scribes who’ve come to check him out. The topic of conversation was about washing your hands before eating, something Pharisees were careful to do. The Pharisees challenge Jesus with: “Why do your disciples transgress the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.”
To our way thinking, this ‘washing hands’ issue seems a little silly. It’s the sort of argument that has given Pharisees a bad name amongst Christians over the years. Yet, if you pardon the pun, it would be a mistake to dismiss their concern out of hand.
As best as I can tell, as a group, the Pharisees were a lot like you and I – some good, even followers of Jesus; some bad, interested primarily in their own status or wealth or power; most probably somewhere in between – all were people caught up in the traditions and conventions of their time.
Every society, ours included, lives by social conventions – they’re important, giving predictability and order to our lives. They are time-tested codes of behaviour for living rightly with our families and neighbours. We have conventions on how to be courteous in talking to one other, in what it means to be clean, on which public bathroom to use, on how to eat in public so we don’t offend our neighbors, and so on. These are learned early in life, and are carried with us until we die. They’re not written down. There isn’t necessarily a right and wrong. They haven’t been explicitly discussed and agreed upon. But, cross a social convention, and others are bound to be upset because these codes are embedded in our most deeply held sense of what is true and right and just.
The problem with social convent
ions, of course, is that they are also, by definition, conservative, closed, static, and unimaginative; and not progressive, open, dynamic, or creative. So while they maintain the distilled wisdom from past experience, they also inevitably collide with the on-going creativity of God. Or as Isaiah puts it, social conventions are human wisdom and not God’s wisdom.
For the Pharisees of Jesus day the question on washing hands before eating was not about hygiene. They had no knowledge of bacteria. It was a social convention. To them hand washing was a behavioural way of saying grace before a meal – it was part of a ritual preparation that outwardly expressed inner reverence and respect for the Creator of the Universe who provided the food about to be eaten. So, when the Pharisees publicly challenge Jesus and question why his disciples are not washing their hands before eating (Verses 1-2), they are really saying “You and your disciples cannot be holy men because you are not behaving in holy ways.”
As usual, Jesus does not directly address their challenge. Instead of talking about handwashing, he changes the topic to what goes into and comes out of our mouths. He’s trying to get his disciples to see through external social conventions to the inner reality of what God desires for individuals and communities. His response is about how what is in our hearts leads to what comes out of our mouths. And, without saying so directly, he implies that what has just come out of the mouths of the Pharisees has shown their inward evil thoughts.
And to the disciples he says: “Are you also still without understanding? Do you not see that what goes into the mouth enters the stomach, and out into the sewer? But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles?”
The language Jesus uses to describe what comes from the heart is blunt and direct. Out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander. In constrast, eating without washing your hands is nothing, he says.
These words could as well be addressed to us – a useful reminder that what comes out of our mouths is not always pure or without self-interest or coloured by one social agenda or another. Further, like the Pharisees, the social agendas we choose to pursue aren’t always as pure as we think them to be.
Part II
Then, Jesus retires to to the district of Tyre and Sidon where the lesson he has just taught is put to the test. A Canaanite woman appears and cries out to Jeus to heal her daughter. Matthew presents an intricately woven account of what happens, presenting a very human Jesus and a very specific picture of this woman. She is called a Canaanite woman, though it should be noted that the region of Canaan had long since disappeared. What is clear is she is not one of Jesus’ people. And, by definition, she’s ‘unclean’. If we hold on to the message that what comes out of our mouths is what makes clean or unclean, then we can hear this story in a new light.
Matthew presents the story in a dramatic way. It could be an opera. Jesus stands middle stage. On the one side is one woman, all alone, trying to get his attention, calling for help. She’s obviously not welcome. On the other, we have the disciples. They’re the bouncers. They bristle with indignation, on guard lest the mercies of God are wasted on the unworthy.
On this side the woman cries out: “Have mercy on me…” – kyrie eleison!
On that, the disciples respond: “Get rid of her?”
And, what does Jesus do, this messenger of good news? At first he joins the ‘bouncers’ – adding a few choice phrases himself: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
She’s persistent – again, another kyrie: “Lord, help me” she says.
Jesus’ response is unsympathetic, even arrogant: “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.” If there ever was doubt of Jesus’ humanness, this should put it to rest.
But, she doesn’t back down – the life of her daughter is at stake. She picks up his words and throws them back: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” It seems she knows about the feeding of the 5000, and the baskets of crumbs picked up at the end.
And then, Jesus makes a U-turn in the face of this wondrously-strange and persistent faith that stands its ground against all opposition. Jesus seems converted to a larger vision, a fuller revelation of God in the voice and face of this woman: “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And, her daughter was healed.
Conclusion
I began with the question: “what is aligned with God’s mission and who is worthy of God’s mercy and love?” This combination of passages, Verses 10 – 20 and 21 – 28, illustrate all too well struggles we face as communities of faith in addressing this question.
The ‘who is worthy part’ is easy. This story, like the Isaiah passage, challenges a too narrow tradition that would restrict God’s mercies to a chosen few. God’s mercy and love is available to all of us – to anyone who seeks it. We ARE beloved daughters and sons of God. We were beloved before we were born. We are beloved after we die. In between our calling is to live our lives as one of the beloved.
But, to claim that heritage we have to internalize it – to live a life based on that knowledge – to be imitators of God as Paul says to the church in Ephasus. The ‘aligning with God’s mission’ part – that is not easy.
Few of us are strangers to compromised personal motivation – where what comes out of our mouths needs to be received with a measure of grace. Whether the issues we struggle with are intensely personal, or within our families or neighbourhood, or within our community of faith, we inevitably are caught u
p in the knowledge and social conventions of our time – even as we seek to discern God’s wisdom. If even Jesus could be trapped in a socially conventional way of thinking about who was ‘clean’ or ‘unclean’, how can we expect to do better?
Yet, it is this very story that gives hope. By linking these two encounters of Jesus – first with the Pharisees, then with the Canaanite woman – Matthew makes it clear that pursuit of justice, claiming one’s birthright as beloved of God, with persistence, will eventually reap results. It is the persistent faith of the Canaanite woman, in the face of immense resistance premised on human wisdom, not God’s, that makes the difference.
The good news is that, following on this encounter with the Canaanite woman, Jesus began ministering beyond Galilee to feed those who had not yet been fed. This legacy is ours to claim.
1. “I have loved you with an everlasting love…” (Jer. 31:3); “I have written your name on the palms of my hand” (Isaiah 49:16); “To all that be in Rome beloved of God called to be saints…” (Romans 1:7; “Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children; and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us… (Ephesians 5:1, 2a).