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S. Pentecost 12.26 Matt. 15:21-28

‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.’

This is a jarring passage to modern sensibilities—especially for those who think the main mission of the church is to reach the unchurched and bring them into the church, and who think Jesus is a “people person” who just luuuvs everybody and does his miracles chiefly as ads to lure them into his lair (and thus, that we should be the same way 😉

This notion—that has swept through most all of modern Christendom—is, surprisingly to most, entirely absent from the holy scriptures (which also shows me there are very few people, especially among the seminary professors, who’ve thoroughly read the canonical holy scriptures as I’ve been doing the last 34 years, and get the gist of the Story—Luther and C.S. Lewis being the outstanding exceptions to this rule, BTW… 😉

Our Gospel today shows Jesus’ and the prophetic/apostolic attitude toward non-Israelites—basically, an insouciant, aloof indifference to them as beneath contempt and basically sub-human, brute beasts, somewhere between people and pet, but shading more towards undomesticated beast—which is why God (through the faithful Israelites) killed a whole bunch of Canaanites in the Old Testament; ‘yep, lotta killin’ in that one…’

This is jarring to modern humanist sensibility—which imagines that simply being born to human parents makes you a full human being in the Image of God and worthy of all attention, love and concern, and to think otherwise is a Thoughtcrime, the worst sort of Wrongthink, that must be obliterated by state-sanctioned Newspeak… (‘Where have you gone George Orwell, a nation turns its lonely eyes to you, woo, woo, woo’… 😉

So we gloss over a Gospel reading like this and go, “see how nice Jesus is to everyone, even Canaanites!? He just luuuvs people, and is messing with this dear Canaanite woman, putting on an act of treating her as a dog, sub-human, which of course neither Jesus nor any right-thinking Christian ever has or ever really would think!

But what if we’re wrong on this? David wasn’t satisfied with being merely human! He yearned to see God’s face and awake in his likeness. What if Jesus isn’t happy with us until… we’re reborn in his Image? What if he says what he means and means what he says when he calls the Canaanite woman a canine-ite—a dog? What if God looks down on us the same way? BTW, if you knew Greek you’d see the language itself literally demands this reading! There is a very mean (though extremely witty 😉 homonym here that, joyfully!, works as well in English as it does in Greek if you translate literally…

The word for Canaanite in the Greek is χαναναια which sounds like κυναρια which does mean ῾little dog῾, but when you translate it literally “canine-ite” you get the very mean joke homonym: χαναναια/κυναρια—Canaanite/canine-ite! Beautiful, right? See; all those Greek classes have a pay off if you pay attention and use ‘em! You’re welcome! 😉

It’s only our ingrained modern belief that it is intolerably cruel and misanthropic to see some people as sub-human, lacking entirely the Image of God, that keeps us from seeing the shocking truth in our Gospel reading today and having to deal with the staggering implications…

What is the truth and what are the staggering implications?

Well, simply put: that all sinners (a group that includes you and me!—as we confessed to start Divine Service this morning 😉 have entirely lost the Image of God, the indwelling of his Spirit that transfigures us into his own Image, so that we really are, simply by being born in sin, sub-human, brute beasts unworthy of God’s notice or concern!!! (which the Psalms like 49:20 and 73:22—Luther’s favorite—clearly state 😉

Not a pretty picture is it? Well the Truth hurts, just like Love does, as Graham Parsons insightfully sang before he OD’d in ’73 in Joshua Tree. “Love hurts, love scars/ Love wounds and mars/ Any heart not tough/ Nor strong enough/ To take a lotta pain/ Take a lotta pain/ Love is like a cloud/ Holds a lotta rain/ Love hurts/ Mmm, mmm, love hurts…”

As Jesus demonstrates, dying on the cross…

And on the way there, this Canaanite woman encounters him and begs “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David: my daughter is severely demon-possessed.” But Jesus doesn’t answer her a word. Just cuts her, cold!

But why would she want to hang with Jesus?—I mean it’s a lot, to turn from our pagan worship, throw ourselves on the mercy of God who provides, hisownself! the Lamb slain, as Abraham discovered on Mt. Moriah, promising: it’s only by sharing his dying ourownselves that we get spit out, reborn! It really is the worship, stupid!—the worship of the Crucified God, the Lamb slain on Golgotha—that’s the less-traveled-by Road that makes all the difference… 😉

Oh yeah, love hurts all right! See how it hurts the Son of God himself? Imagine how it will feel when his burnin’ love comes under our own roof? And we safety loving brute beasts naturally recoil from anything divine and holy because, like a hot stove, it burns! Just ask Isaiah how the hot coal from the altar felt in his mouth!

So, it’s not simply insouciant, aloof indifference when Jesus won’t even speak to the canine-ite “woman”. He’s also respecting our rejecting of his love as too much for our hearts not tough, nor strong, enough to take the kinda pain Jesus in his love is dishing out for us…

“I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” where BTW, is the only place he sends his Apostles in the Great Commission of Matthew 10:5! It’s pointless to look outside God’s House for God’s children! Duh! Even Israel’s lost sheep are still beasts, rather dumb actually, and smelly. But his lost lambs retain a dormant capacity for the Spirit to come under our roof and transfigure us…

It’s a test to see if that capacity for God’s indwelling Spirit yet remains in the Canaanite woman, when Jesus just ignores her and then says to his disciples rebuking him, “It’s not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the canine-ites”… 😉

And she jumps on that bone Jesus throws her: “Yes, LORD, yet even the canine-ites eat the crumbs that fall from their Master’s Table!” And I am dead sure she drops to her knees and begs and barks, “WOOOF!” I love that lady! She’s our kinda… people!

She can take a lotta pain, that woman… 😉

Make no mistake: the love of Jesus hurts, and scars, and wounds and mars every heart; but, eating the crumbs that fall from the Master’s Table, his body and blood make us tough enough to take the pain of the cross, dying with Jesus, and rising a real boy, a real girl!—better still, re-creating us as gods! sons, daughters of the Most High, higher than the cherubim, way better than Athena and Zeus, as Psalm 84 christens us…

Jesus love is yours, today, by faith, word and sacrament. And Peace, surpassing understanding, guards your tough-enough heart and mind in Christ Jesus. Amen.