Sound Familiar?
A Sermon For The Second Sunday In Lent
Based Upon Matthew 15:21-28
February 17, AD 2008
And behold, a woman of Canaan came from that region and cried out to
[Jesus], saying, "Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! My daughter
is severely demon-possessed." But He answered her not a word (Matthew
15:22-23).
Sound familiar?
Does this story sound familiar to you?
Doesn’t this story sound like one of the stories from your life?
Admit it. You know exactly what this woman from Canaan is experiencing.
She is praying to God for help; in this case, she is praying for help
for a loved one, a daughter. She is crying out to Jesus, “Have mercy
on me, O Lord!” And what does she get in response to her prayer?
(Pause.) That’s right. Nothing. There was no apparent change in her
daughter. And there was no apparent explanation given, for “He
answered her not a word.”
You’ve been in that same situation, haven’t you? You prayed to this
same Jesus for help--help for yourself, help for a loved one. You
asked for healing of the body. You sought strengthening in spirit.
You cried out for comfort in the midst of mourning. You looked for a
lift out of the depths of depression. You requested relief from a
pressing burden. And what did you get in response to your prayer?
(Pause.) That’s right. Nothing. You saw no change in the
circumstances for your self or your beloved. You heard no word of
explanation thundering from Heaven. You called upon The Lord in
prayer, as He has invited you to do--in fact, as He has commanded you
to do--and He answered you not a word.
So, you do know what this woman from Canaan is experiencing. Like her,
you prayed to Jesus, and, like her, you received no answer from Him.
So you know how she likely felt. Confused. Frustrated. Hurt. “Why
has God not answered my prayer? Will He answer my prayer? It seems
like He doesn’t care. . . .”
Yet, look at what this woman does next. She sets those emotions aside,
and continues to pray; as the Gospel lesson tells us: “[Jesus’]
disciples came and urged Him, saying, "Send her away, for she cries out
after us." But He answered and said, "I was not sent except to the lost
sheep of the house of Israel" (Matthew 15:23-24).
Sound familiar?
Does this story also sound familiar to you?
Doesn’t this story also sound like one of the stories from your life?
Admit it. You know exactly what this woman from Canaan is experiencing.
She is continuing to pray to God, tirelessly, for the help that she
needs. She has made her need known to other disciples of Jesus, and
they now have an opportunity to serve their sister by bringing her
request to Jesus through their own prayers. The disciples do ask Jesus
to respond to the woman’s prayer, although it seems that they do not
share the same intensity with which the woman brings her own prayers to
Jesus, and they ask Jesus to answer her speedily simply to shut her up.
Despite all of this, Jesus does not answer the woman’s prayer. Her
daughter is no better. And Jesus does not speak a word to her in
answer to her prayer, for His words about His mission being only to the
lost sheep of Israel was spoken directly to His disciples, not to the
woman. Now, the disciples might have relayed that word to her, but the
net effect is the same as before: the woman’s prayer is met with
silence from Jesus Himself.
You’ve been in that same situation, haven’t you? You prayed to this
same Jesus for help. You received no response at first, but you
persisted in your prayer. You made your needs known to fellow
Christians and to the Church, and petitions were made to God daily in
the homes of your brethren and on Sunday in The Lord’s Own House. In
many and various ways, God’s people spoke of your needs to God,
imploring Him to bring the help you needed to you--perhaps some even
asked for a speedy answer for you simply to shut you up. Yet, despite
all of these prayers by you and for you, what did you get in response?
(Pause.) That’s right. Nothing. There was no change in your
condition or in the condition of your family member or friend. There
was no word spoken to you that would make you think anything other than
perhaps those words of Jesus in the Gospel lesson were directed at you:
"I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel--and
that does not include you."
So, you do know what this woman from Canaan is experiencing. Like her,
you prayed to Jesus but received no answer, and, like her, you
continued to pray and continued to receive no reply.
So you know how she likely felt. More confused. More frustrated.
More deeply hurt. And on the brink of despair. “Why has God not
answered my prayer--or even the prayers of His other people? Will He
ever answer our prayers? It seems like He doesn’t care. Maybe I am
not one of the sheep of Israel, one of Christ’s precious lambs, after
all. . . .”
Yet, look at what this woman finally does. “Then she came and
worshiped [Jesus], saying, ‘Lord, help me!’ But He answered and said,
‘It is not good to take the children's bread and throw it to the little
dogs.’ And she said, ‘Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs eat the
crumbs which fall from their masters' table’ ” (Matthew 15:25-27).
Sound familiar?
Does this story also sound familiar to you?
Doesn’t this story also sound like one of the stories from your life?
If it doesn’t, it should. Because just like the experience of the
woman from Caanan, this is where the story of every prayer ultimately
ends. It ends with the Christian despairing of all other things and
bowing in total worship and devotion before Jesus, and
begging--literally begging like a dog--for nothing but a crumb of His
grace and mercy.
You see, this is the point to which God has been leading the Christian
the entire time of the crisis. Through the silence that God provided
as the response to the prayers, God actually was speaking volumes.
Through the silence, He was reminding the woman from Canaan--and
reminding you--of precisely what God owes you. (Pause.) Nothing.
Through the silence, He was testifying to you what you deserve from God
as a result of your sinful nature and your disobedience to His
commandments. (Pause.) Nothing. Through the silence, He was putting
you in mind of what you are to bring to Him when you come before Him
with your prayerful petitions for your needs. (Longer pause.) Yes;
nothing. You come with nothing, as a beggar comes with nothing,
begging for His mercy upon you.
And He provides mercy. Because He is merciful.
We see His mercy fully in the way that He has completely done away with
our sin. Because of what we inherited from Adam and Eve, the original
sin that has corrupted our very nature, and because of what we have
brought upon ourselves, the guilt of our disobedience to God’s
commandments in ways great and small, intentional and unintentional, we
deserve nothing other than God’s full wrath. God would be completely
justified in punishing each and every one of us from the first moment
of our existence until the end of time. But He Who is perfectly just
is also perfect in His mercy. God in His mercy has heaped our sin upon
His perfect sacrificial Lamb, Jesus Christ. Jesus in His mercy endured
the punishment--even death--that our sin justly deserves, that we might
be declared perfectly sinless on His account. The Father in His mercy
awakened His Son from the dead on the third day, that we might see how
our Heavenly Father will one day mercifully awaken our bodies from
slumber in the grave to new and everlasting life, in perfect, glorified
bodies free from sin and all other ills, all because of what Jesus has
accomplished for us by His life and death and resurrection.
And the Holy Spirit in His mercy has brought all of these blessings of
Christ’s salvation of the world to you, personally. The Holy Spirit
has come upon you through the Gospel-laden waters of Holy Baptism,
through the Gospel-laden words of the Holy Declaration of the
forgiveness of your sins, through the Gospel-laden bread and wine that
are the very Body and Blood of Jesus in the Holy Supper. Through this
Gospel, the Spirit has created faith within your heart, causing you to
believe in God, making you one of Christ’s lambs in the flock of
Israel--an Israel defined not by a shared ethnic heritage, but by a
shared heritage in the one true faith in the one true God: Father and
Son and Holy Spirit.
By this faith, you live like your sister in the faith, the Canaanite
woman. You pray, ceaselessly, tirelessly, doggedly, for yourself and
others, despairing completely of yourself, and trusting totally in Your
Master, begging for but a crumb of His mercy, trusting that His grace
is all-sufficient, and knowing that He will pour out His grace and
mercy upon you in response to all of your prayers, not as sparse
crumbs, but in abundance, for so He loves you, even as He loves our
sister: “Then Jesus answered and said to her, "O woman, great is your
faith! Let it be to you as you desire." And her daughter was healed
from that very hour (Matthew 15:28).
Sound familiar?
God grant this be a familiar story to you--the story of your life under
His grace--through all your days, unto life everlasting.
Amen.
The Reverend Jeffrey A. Ahonen
Deacon, Salem Lutheran Church, Malone, Texas
Mission Pastor, Saint Henry Lutheran Mission, Montreal, Wisconsin
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
www.sainthenry.info
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