Revised Common Lectionary, Year A

Twelfth Sunday After Pentecost

August 20, 2023

Lectionary Texts:

Highlighted Text: Matthew 15:(10-20), 21-28

Summary of the text:

I think it’s good to start with the observation that Matthew 15:21-28 is not an easy or straightforward text. Trying to turn it into an easy text will probably leave your congregation with many questions unanswered and feelings unaddressed. I will use the various ways someone could hear and experience this text as a framework for examining the preaching themes. You don’t need to focus on all of these, but people will usually walk further with you if you first help them feel seen.

The bullet point summary way of seeing this text is that this woman was faithful and persistent, so Jesus eventually answered her prayer. Some in your congregation will see that as a hopeful message and a reminder to stay persistent and faithful in their own lives.

Augustine points out that this woman’s humility is praised whereas Jesus frequently reprimands the Pharisees and teachers of the law in Israel for their misplaced pride [ACC]. This woman could have been bitter, she could have been hopeless, she could have been angry at Jesus’ words, she could have been worn down. Instead, she demonstrated greater faith and humility than most in Israel would have.

One thing we can all do no matter our circumstances is to choose to be persistent in prayer. Ben Jennings wrote in his book The Arena of Prayer, “Every prayerless day is a statement by a helpless individual, ‘I do not need God today.’ Failing to pray reflects idolatry – a trust in substitutes for God. We rely on our money instead of God’s provision. We rest on our own flawed thinking rather than on God’s perfect wisdom. We take charge of our lives rather than trusting God. Prayerlessness short-circuits the working of God.” Persistence in prayer is a useful action for everyone in every circumstance.

But others may find that a bit trite and wonder why their own faithfulness and persistence have not been rewarded. My son has seizures and intellectual disabilities. A couple of years into that journey, I organized a global prayer vigil for my son. I recruited friends and colleagues in North America, South America, Africa, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Hawaii to make sure that the sun never set on prayers for my son. One of my prayer partners prayed a minimum of seven times per day for many months. Almost eight years later, my son’s seizures are exactly the same as they were when I started that global prayer vigil. So I encourage you to consider how you will speak to those who have been faithful and persistent and yet their prayers have not been answered as obviously as this Canaanite woman.

There is a similar dynamic in many of Jesus’ miracles. The most obvious example is in John 5:1-9. Verse 3 says there were a “great multitude of sick people” and yet the only one Jesus healed was “a certain man.” Why did Jesus only heal one out of a great multitude? In this text, why did Jesus only heal this one woman’s daughter out of all the suffering in the region of Tyre and Sidon

There are no easy answers for these questions, but I highlight them because those who have suffered for a long time probably want a nod in their direction in addition to the simpler takes on this passage.

As we’ll explore more in the next section, this whole text seems to be hinting at the future.  Jesus spent almost his entire ministry inside of Israel, but he hinted at the future through encounters such as this one. Similarly, Jesus said in John 16:7, “it is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Advocate will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you” [NIV]. From my perspective, Jesus healed one woman’s daughter in Tyre and Sidon while he was walking the earth. But through the Holy Spirit, God’s presence can be with all of the people of Tyre and Sidon today. My son may not receive the miraculous healing that this woman’s daughter received, but I can see the healing power of the Spirit throughout our lives. When we dropped off our son at a recent school event, his classmates saw us coming and started chanting his name with glee. That moment of grace is evidence of the Spirit even if the bodily healing hasn’t been granted to my son. I can still wish for and pray for the miraculous healing, but I can simultaneously be grateful that Jesus sent us the Advocate to bring surprising grace every day.

Speaking of that present/future divide in this text, many of the early Christian writers saw this as a graceful and hopeful text. Augustine saw this Canaanite woman and her daughter as a precursor of the church [ACC]. Epiphanius saw this as the first hint of the eventual Gentile mission that would take off in the book of Acts [ACC]. To those who see this as a hopeful precursor of the Gentile mission, Jesus showed her kindness by referring to her with the Greek word for “pet dog” instead of a different word that connotes mangy mutt [JNTC]. Jesus is still calling her a dog, the line of thought goes, but at least it’s an affectionate term.

When I was in Israel, our guide called The Land the fifth Gospel. In other words, locations sometimes have a meaning all to themselves. In this text, Jesus departs Jewish lands and travels a significant distance to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And then Matthew uses the term “Canaanite” to describe this woman. This is the only occurrence of the word “Canaanite” in the entire New Testament [ESV]. If we take this word that clearly points us back to the Old Testament and combine it with the location of Tyre and Sidon, we can find another key Biblical figure who encountered a struggling Canaanite woman in this same region. In 1 Kings 17:7ff, Elijah encounters a widow in the region of Sidon during a deep drought. Elijah asks her for food and water, and she replies that she has only enough for one tiny meal and then she hopes she and her son will die. Undeterred, Elijah asks her to still make a small loaf of bread for him. Her faithfulness in serving Elijah first even as she hopes to die from hunger and thirst is rewarded with a miraculous abundance.

For people today, perhaps this is a chance to encourage the church to be spiritually fed and then become a blessing in a hungry and thirsty land like Elijah. Similarly, the church could be encouraged to walk beyond our comfortable boundaries just as Jesus left the traditional boundaries of Israel in this text.

Still, other hearers today may have a difficult time getting past Jesus’ words to the woman. After all, there are other stories in the Gospels where Jesus heals someone for crying out something similar to this woman’s cry in v22. Why heal those men but the ignore this woman? Jesus’ interaction with her until the end can even sound cruel to our ears today. Calling someone a dog is not exactly a complement!

I’m sure every pastor knows people who have been hurt, not just by life, but by the church itself. These words could easily be a trigger for those with past trauma. On a surface level, it looks like Jesus ignores her, tells her she’s not worthy, and then calls her a dog. What is going on here, and what can we do with it?

Dr. David Stern, a Messianic Jewish Rabbi, says the flavor of Jesus’ phrases amount to a Middle-Eastern style friendly joke rather than an insult: “in effect he says, ‘If, as you say, I am the Son of David, the shepherd who was King of Israel, I was sent to find my lost sheep and am not sent to you. So I’m surprised that you recognize me’” [JNTC]. In other words, Stern suggests that Jesus is testing her motives. When she calls Jesus “Lord, Son of David,” did she mean that as a generic descriptor or a theological statement? Did she just hear about Jesus’ miracles and want her own miracle, or did she truly see Jesus as something greater than a lottery ticket? So perhaps Jesus’ words are merely a joking way to get her to go deeper in her faith.

From the perspective of those wounded by the church, I see this text a bit differently. I think Jesus was trying to drive home an earth-altering lesson to his disciples by reflecting their negative feelings back to them. They would rather stay in the comfy confines of their own country, but Jesus marched them way up to Tyre and Sidon. We know from many other texts that the disciples were uncomfortable when Jesus interacted with women in general, so Jesus reflected their attitude back toward them by ignoring the woman at first until the disciples themselves asked Jesus to reply to her.

We know from the book of Acts how hard it was to get official approval for the mission to non-Jews. So here Jesus reflected that insular attitude back to his disciples. And yet, by the end of this encounter the woman’s faith could not be ignored. Just as the disciples would eventually be forced to recognize the Gentile mission because of the Holy Spirit’s works among them, even the hesitant disciples had to acknowledge the incredible faith and humility of this Canaanite woman by the end of this text.

So to those who feel too far away to be seen by Christ, we can remind them that Jesus marched his disciples way outside of their home country to be with this woman face to face. To those who feel ignored by the church, we can point to how Jesus spoke with this woman even when his disciples wanted her sent away. To those who feel judged and looked down upon, we can highlight that the religiously up-right Pharisees were called “you brood of vipers” a few chapters before, while this woman was called a woman of “great faith.”

Looked at from this angle, Jesus is acting out the journey that we, as his followers, might need to take sometimes as well: from ignoring to engaging, from insular to expansive, from judgmental to graceful, from separated to one in Christ.

Preaching Themes

• Stay persistent and faithful
• Sometimes our persistence and faithfulness don’t result in the answer we want, but we can still see the healing presence of the Holy Spirit
• Jesus lays the groundwork for the eventual expansion of the Gospel outside of Israel
• Jesus’ approach to this woman can sound cruel or heartless, but there are many other ways to interpret it

References

[ACC] Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture

[JNTC] Jewish New Testament Commentary by Dr. David Stern

[ESV] English Standard Version Study Bible

Cody Sandahl has been the Pastor/Head of Staff at the First Presbyterian Church of Littleton, Colorado since 2015. Prior to that he was the Executive Pastor and Associate Pastor for Discipleship at the First Presbyterian Church of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He is passionate about equipping the saints for the work of ministry (Ephesians 4:12).

Cody came to pastoral ministry after a lifetime of programming computers and building robots, and he is the founder of the nonprofit Code4Kids. You can still find him down in his basement tinkering with computers, making things on his 3D printers, and shooting laser beams into things.

Cody is married to Becca, and they have two playful boys and one spunky dog who collaborate to ensure life is never boring.

Sermon Resources

Key Quote

Key Sermon Illustration

Additional Sermon Resources

Liturgical Elements

Call to Worship

Prayer of Confession

Inspired by Matthew 15:10-20

Assurance of Pardon

Benediction