Who has God created me to be? That
is a question the gospel opens for us this morning in two seemingly unrelated
passages.
We begin this morning’s gospel
with Jesus turning inside out any ideas about what is clean and what is not. In
Jesus’ time part of daily life, because it was part of religious observance,
was to stay clean, to be pure. Part of this purity, this staying clean, was to
avoid touching those things and people considered unclean: outsiders,
foreigners, those who had been touched themselves by something unclean.
Surprisingly, Jesus describes
purity as coming from within, rather than from without. No doubt he shocked and
dismayed his listeners. If purity comes from within instead of by ritual
observances everyone can see, how does one maintain purity?
Once Jesus has explained the kind
of purity God desires, the gospel shifts. Suddenly the abstract instruction
about what things are pure and what are impure becomes real. Purity would not have
included the person in the second part of this morning’s gospel: a woman so
unclean herself that her daughter has been tormented by a demon. She is an
unclean Canaanite woman, an enemy, and an outsider. One would have nothing to
do with these persons to avoid the risk of becoming unclean oneself.
And, this woman, this unclean Canaanite woman,
demands Jesus’ mercy to heal her daughter. At first, Jesus does not answer her.
When pressed, he explains he was sent only to those who are concerned about
purity, the pure themselves. Sure, they may be “the lost sheep of Israel” but
they are God’s chosen sheep. There seems to be an edge to his response, no
matter what translation you look at, no matter in what language.
There are a host of explanations
for Jesus’ behavior. Jesus reflected the disciples’ behavior by demonstrating
how they didn’t listen to him. Jesus called the woman a dog
affectionately, not angrily. Jesus wanted the disciples to see how persistence
would get you what you wanted. I don’t believe these explanations are particularly
compelling or even helpful.
Suppose instead we focus on who
God created Jesus to be. Jesus was divine, but he was also human. Jesus had all
the human feelings with which we are endowed: anger, grief, hope, joy, love. If
you doubt this, read the gospels. Jesus got angry. Jesus got frustrated. Jesus wept.
Jesus got irritated. Jesus got hungry. Jesus got thirsty. So while we may not
like it much, to deny Jesus’ irritation with the Gentile woman is to deny his
humanity.
But what is the focus of Jesus’
irritation? I find in this story the focus of my own irritation when I fail to
live out who God calls me to be. Could it be that this very human experience is
what is going on with Jesus?
Jesus has spent his ministry
demonstrating to the disciples and to the crowds that God calls all of us. And
in particular, God calls all of us to minister to the least of his kingdom: the
children, the poor, the unclean, the insane, the different, the disabled, the
imprisoned. God calls us to minister to everyone who is not part of the ruling
class, to minister to everyone who is nowhere near the top of the heap and
those not even in the heap.
Is it
possible Jesus is caught up in his own “stuff?” That he is tired, and tired of
people? That he decides he only has enough energy left for the Children
of Israel? Is it possible that our Gentile woman has a job to do with Jesus?
Does she show us that even Jesus – precisely because he is human – has
those moments when he does not live up to who he’s called to be?
Yet Jesus
allowed himself to be instructed with humor. The woman said to him, “Sir, even
the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.” She points out to Jesus
that while she may be the lowest of the low, she’s still part of God’s creation.
She may be a Canaanite, but even Canaanite dogs under the table are part of God’s
creation.
It’s as if she’s saying, “Okay
Jesus, fine. I know you’re rejecting me. You think you’re reserved only for
certain folks. Even so, I’ll settle for the tiniest crumb of you. For someone
like me, that’s plenty!”
And what does
Jesus’ do? He acts. He becomes once again who he is called to be. The woman
reminds Jesus he has acted outside his calling. He himself has not only said,
but also demonstrated that he is called to all, not just to Israel. Yet in his
tiredness, in his irritation, in his humanness, he has forgotten who he is.
He has forgotten that everyone is in and no one is out. He has forgotten that
he has taught and spoken and acted as though everyone has a seat at the table.
This woman begging for mercy has reminded Jesus to act the way God made him to
be!
The struggle
Jesus entered with this woman reminded Jesus who God created him to be. Jesus
emerged from his encounter with this woman stronger, wiser, tempered by the
fire of the God he touched when she reminded him who God created him to be.
This is good news
for us. It is good news especially in reflecting on the recent events in
Charlottesville. We have forgotten who we are created to be. We have erred and
strayed from the ways in which God has created us to act. We have moved away
from peace and inclusion to violence and divisiveness. We have failed to speak
out and to act.
Let this Canaanite
woman this morning be our prophet of what is to come. Let us become who we are
created to be. Let us turn toward those things of peace and inclusion. Let us
fill our hearts with the Jesus we fell in love with in the beginning of our
days. Let us embrace the Jesus we knew before we even knew his name. Let us emerge
stronger, wiser, tempered by the fire of God. Let us speak as God calls us to speak,
and act as God calls us to act. AMEN.
The
Rev Nicolette Papanek
©2017
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