Eleventh Sunday after Trinity
“Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed instantly”
Summary
I love today’s gospel reading, Matthew 15:21-28, it has swearing, it has jokes, what’s not to like? It is also a painful read: here is Jesus ignoring, talking over and abusing a woman who comes to him for help because she is a foreigner of a different faith. He does, however, listen and respond to her quick-witted reply. He calls her a dog (a common insult that Jews would throw at Canaanites), he has come not to feed the dogs but the children of Israel. What she points out is that God has enough for everyone. This story is sandwiched between the two miraculous feedings (one of the 5,000 and one of the 4,000); miracles that revel in the super abundance of God’s grace. Jesus’ final response is excessive he commends her “great faith” having previously lambasted Peter’s “little faith”. As Isaiah tells his people in Isaiah 56:21-26, no one is excluded from God’s grace: the foreigner, the eunuch, those who were excluded from the Temple are included in God’s presence. Human beings are genius at excluding, we want our resources, our time, our energy spent on OUR people; the church does not have the best of records in challenging this tendency but Jesus (and Isaiah) are clear, there is more there enough for everyone: we just need to stop viewing the world through the lens of scarcity and open our eyes to the excessive, generous abundance of God’s love.
FIRST READING
Isaiah 56:1-8
Thus says the Lord:
Maintain justice, and do what is right,
for soon my salvation will come,
and my deliverance be revealed.
Happy is the mortal who does this,
the one who holds it fast,
who keeps the sabbath, not profaning it,
and refrains from doing any evil.
Do not let the foreigner joined to the Lord say,
‘The Lord will surely separate me from his people’;
and do not let the eunuch say,
‘I am just a dry tree.’
For thus says the Lord:
To the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths,
who choose the things that please me
and hold fast my covenant,
I will give, in my house and within my walls,
a monument and a name
better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
that shall not be cut off.
And the foreigners who join themselves to the Lord,
to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord,
and to be his servants,
all who keep the sabbath, and do not profane it,
and hold fast my covenant—
these I will bring to my holy mountain,
and make them joyful in my house of prayer;
their burnt-offerings and their sacrifices
will be accepted on my altar;
for my house shall be called a house of prayer
for all peoples.
Thus says the Lord God,
who gathers the outcasts of Israel,
I will gather others to them
besides those already gathered.
GOSPEL
Matthew 15.21-28
‘Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and 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 at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, ‘Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.’ He 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 their masters’ table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed instantly.
