Matthew 15

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0:00 The text for this morning, the gospel that they gave us is in Matthew's account of the gospel. If you want to look there with me, it's the first book of the New Testament. Matthew chapter 25, if you're in a paper copy of the Scriptures, it goes Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans. And we're in Matthew chapter 25. Scratch that. Matthew chapter 15 will be in Matthew chapter 25 in a minute, Carol. Don't jump the gun.

0:30 Yeah. But Matthew chapter 15 is where we're starting. And the reading that they gave us is verse 21 through 28. And the reason I was talking about places to withdraw is because look here in verse 21, our very first verse for the day, it says, and Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon.

1:06 And you may remember a couple weeks ago, we were talking about the role of the church in the life of Jesus. We were looking at this interaction that he had with the Pharisees, where they were pressuring him about the observance of the Sabbath. And he was kind of pushing back on them, challenging their notion about the Sabbath. And he got right to a point where they got really frustrated with him. And just as he did, as they started to plot against him, then in that passage, it says that he withdrew to the region of Galilee.

1:41 And something new occurred to me a couple weeks ago when we were looking at that passage, I always felt like Jesus would anger the Pharisees and then leave to protect his life. Which could be the case, but two weeks ago when I was reading it, I thought that maybe the withdrawing was a move of grace. The reading we were had Matthew Parader with that Old Testament prophecy that said, a bruised read, he will not break. And the idea that Jesus pushes the Pharisees right up to the breaking point of their understanding, right until they can't quite handle what he's describing to them.

2:19 And then he withdraws and gives them time to think about it. And he comes back and there's also this element that happens in the life of Jesus where he's doing lots of teaching and then he withdraws. It's almost like he's managing his energy load. Remember that Jesus is a hundred percent God and a hundred percent man. He has incredible capacity for forbearance and forgiveness and grace, but also he has limitations. And we see in this that he's right before this, he's had an interaction with the Pharisees where they're pressing him on some rules.

2:58 And he tells them that they're wondering why the disciples don't ceremonially wash their hands before they eat. Hey, Jesus, why don't your disciples follow the tradition? And it wasn't like washing hands like we had. It was like a very ceremonial thing where you would just dip your fingers in a thing of water before you, in a little bowl of water before you eat. And it was very traditional and it could be very sanctimonious.

3:30 Very like, I know how to do this right. I'm taking the time to do this and you're not. And the Pharisees said, hey, Jesus, why don't you guys do that? And he was like, please. And then he pushes back on them about another law and says, why? You guys are not actually interested in following the laws. You're actually interested in looking the right way. And he goes even further and he says, it's not what comes, it's not what goes into a man. It's not what the things that he does, but it's what comes out of his heart that reveals his worthiness.

4:07 He says, right before our verse in Matthew 15 verse 19, verse 20, wait, oh, there, verse 18, but what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart. And this defiles a person for out of the heart comes evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. These are what defile a person, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile anyone. He's saying, your notion of churchly holiness, you're following your small church rules, doesn't make somebody holy.

4:47 What makes them holy is the position of their heart which is borne out by the actions of their life, not whether they follow your church rules. And then right after that in the frustration, he withdraws to Tyre and Sideness. This is an area north outside of traditional Israel where people who are not Israelites, not following the church rules, not descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, not coming to Jerusalem for festival days, not worshiping God at the temple, not making the sacrifices.

5:20 He withdraws to Tyre and Sideness for people that are outside of the nation of Israel where he can get some respite, where the Pharisees aren't going to be busting his chops all the time about following the church rules. So he withdraws. He withdraws to Tyre and Sideness and behold a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, have mercy on me, O Lord, son of David.

5:51 My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon. And then it goes on, but he did not answer her a word and his disciples came and begged him, saying, send her away for she's crying out after her. He goes into Tyre and Sideness which is an area outside of Israel and a Canaanite woman, a woman who is not an Israelite, not making sacrifices, not living according to the law, not going to the temple for festival and holy days. By all accounts, not following any of the church rules, calls out loudly, O Lord, son of David, which is important.

6:26 She's recognizing he's an Israelite. She's recognizing he's part of a different group of people. She calls him Lord and son of David. Both are loaded terms. O Lord, son of David, it recognizes she thinks he's in charge and he's an Israelite. He's not a Canaanite. O Lord, son of David, she says, my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon. Interestingly, she doesn't ask him for anything. She just calls that out.

6:56 Amen. My daughter is severely oppressed by a demon. And he doesn't answer her. I think mostly Jesus doesn't answer this situation because he withdrew. Like, he's checked out, man. That's why I came up here. Because nobody knows me up here. I have to deal with the church folk up here. In other places, when he goes into Galilee and he doesn't tell people he's coming, it's because he wants to teach the disciples and he can do it in peace without people coming out all the time. And there's a degree to which if he kicked out the demon here, he's going to have to

7:29 deal with a whole mess of folks because they're going to hear that he's solving problems and then all the problems will come to him and he didn't come to tire inside of the solved problems he came to withdraw. Right? And so this woman is crying out loudly and he just keeps moving. Right? But the lady is undeterred. This is a virtue, by the way.

7:59 Persistence after the one who has your answers is throughout the gospel in multiple occurrences of virtue. This woman recognizes that Jesus is not acknowledging her and continues on so much that the disciples are like, Jesus, this is conspicuous and annoying. This woman is following us yelling. Would you tell her to go away?

8:29 Tell her to go away so that we can get back to what we need to do here. We're up here withdrawing and tired inside and this woman keeps yelling behind us. She's a Canaanite woman who knows what's going on. Of course she has a demon, right? And the disciples came to beg him, saying, send her away for Jesus crying out after us. Verse 24 and he answered, so he does. He works to send her away. Right? Verse 24.

8:59 I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Hey lady, you're a Canaanite, he says. Go to your Canaanite solutions. I'm an Israelite. I deal with the Israelites. Now we could unpack this for a long time, but the short version of this story is for you to know that Israel is intended to be a group of people at the service of the rest of the

9:29 world. It's a way of living that is passed down from one generation to the next, but it is open. When Solomon dedicates the temple, he says, I wish that all nations would come and worship God here. That there are ways for people to become Israelites. This Canaanite woman could have become an Israelite and Jesus says, I've circumscribed my responsibility to the people of Israel. So this would not be alarming to her or confusing to her. This would be perfectly in order for him to say, you're a Canaanite.

10:03 Go to your Canaanite solutions. I'm an Israelite. I deal with Israelites. That's how the world works right now. She's not offended by this. She is expecting this response from him. That's why she calls him son of David. So acknowledge this. He's not pretending she's an Israelite. She knows who she is relative to Jesus. He answered her, I was sent only to the law sheet of the house of Israel, verse 25, but she came and knelt before him. Persistence in the gospels is a virtue over and over again.

10:37 But she came and knelt before him saying, Lord, help me. He's not giving up yet. Look, I'm withdrawing. I'm not solving your problem. He's like, I told you I came for Israel. Would it make sense for me to take the food that I had prepared for the family and give it to the pet, to the dog hanging out into the table? Right? When we read this story, it sounds terribly offensive.

11:09 Right? We do not call people dogs unless we are, I don't know, really cruel. Right? Uncarrying. What tells you that contextually it bore a different weight is that this woman rolls with it. She acknowledges in the metaphor that Jesus is giving, yes, I am the dog. What she means is I'm not Israelite.

11:39 I recognize that. I'm a Canaanite. But what she comes with next reveals how she understands who Jesus is. So don't get bogged down in the contextualized metaphor. Listen to the message behind it. She says, yeah, you're right. You didn't come for me. You came for the Israelites. I'm not Israelite. But even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters table. You can solve this problem in my demon like in your spare time, man.

12:16 I don't have to be the reason that you came for you to solve this problem. This is like, this is like just an accident for you. You can let something fall off the table and solve this problem. She's like, I don't even need your full attention. I just need you to solve this one little thing for me. I recognize who I am and what I recognize that I have no bearing to demand this from you. I'm just asking you to let something fall off the table.

12:46 And then Jesus goes, oh woman. And now this is another contextualized term. Remember when in John's account of the gospel, when Jesus was performing his first miracle, he called his mom, oh woman. When someone says, oh woman in the gospel, it's like they can't keep from hugging this dear woman. Ah, he says, oh dear woman.

13:19 Oh dear woman, great is your faith. Be it done for you as you desire. And then her daughter was healed instantly. We're going to break that down in a second, but I just want to call your attention to his chance to withdraw is blown now, by the way. Like the next section, verse 29 says what? The heading on mine says, Jesus heals many. He's like goes to the lake, sets up camp, they bring them all, they're sick and demon-possessed

13:53 and he's healing everybody in the entire inside and now. It doesn't matter where they came from. He's going to ask them. And he's up in Galilee and actually it says that they end up at the end of that section, it says that they glorified the God of Israel, implying a lot of the people that he then healed were not Israelite, but they glorified the God in Israel because Jesus was an Israelite. So his chance to withdraw is blown, but this woman called it out of him because what did he just say to the Pharisees out of the mouth is evidenced the position of the heart.

14:27 And this woman in her place of trouble was undisturbed in her persistence of Jesus. She didn't know what she was going to do, right? Clearly. Her kid had this problem that she could not solve.

14:58 She heard the dude from Israel was there and she called out the Greek order. She called out him again, the disciples tried to put her away. She called out him again, he tried to dismiss her. She stepped up her call, knelt in front of them. He tried to dismiss her. She asked one more time in faith, recognizing she had no claim, but act for the gift of mercy

15:30 and he solved the problem. Persistence is a virtue and out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. This was not like, she was not calculating how do I get on the good side of Jesus. In her distress, she called to the one who she knew could answer.

16:05 In this London season, as we look at our distress, it is a fair question to say, where do you go with it? This woman went to Jesus because she knew he had answers for her. In your distress, where do you look for answers?

16:38 Maybe it is similar to when you look for your withdrawal place. Maybe you look for your withdrawal place when life gets a little more hairy than you are comfortable with. Who is in your head and heart space like in your withdrawal space? Let's look at this passage here in Matthew.

17:21 Oh, yeah, in Matthew chapter 25, where I was trying to take you earlier. Verse 31. Just a little bit later, Jesus is talking about giving a metaphor about the end and he says, when the Son of Man returns when he comes, in all his glory, this is when the Son of Man is revealed for who the Son of Man truly is,

17:54 the source of all creativity, the beginning and end of beauty and justice, the fawns of mercy. When the Son of Man is revealed as the Son of Man truly is, and all the angels come with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne, and before him will be gathered all nations, and he will separate people one from another as a separate separate sheet from the goats. It's important for you to see that at one time, the people of God were associated with one nation group, Israel,

18:28 but no longer. So Jesus is living in a period where everything is changing, and though this woman is pain in the night, he doesn't require her to become an Israelite in order to heal her, because out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, she's got faith living inside of her, she's one of his, he heals her daughter. So that when these describe in the end, he says, I've got all nations, and I've got people amongst all the nations.

18:58 He goes on to say how he knows which are his, he separates the sheet from the goats, and the sheep has lived lives that are different. Like a Canaanite woman, in places of hardship, they have gone to Jesus, and they have acted in ways similar to Jesus, given grace and mercy, because out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, and the actions of life are born out.

19:28 This woman didn't have to premeditate how I get on the right side of Jesus, she just did, because her heart had faith. This is the season of Lent to go, what's coming out of my heart? What's overflowing? What actions am I taking in life? What words am I speaking into the world? Where do I go in my distress?

19:59 Out of the overflow of the heart, faith is rooted in the heart, and it comes out in action. And it doesn't matter what nation you're a part of, what church you're a part of, right? The people of God are evidenced by the lives they lead. They can't contain the faith inside of them, that Jesus is the place to go for distress,

20:29 and that his life is a model that we emulate. They just do, they look like sheep, not toast. And they're spread throughout all the nations. For me, this is helpful because in Lent, I spend time considering the choices that I make in life that are less helpful. The ways in which I disagree with God.

20:59 We call the ways in which I say, I know better than God, and I go in a different direction. Historically, these choices are called sin, right? So I look at the sin in my life. And this perspective that says, out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, actions are created, allows me to look at sin, not as merely something wrong I need to fix. Sin in my life is a red flag that something brewing in my heart is not helpful.

21:37 And I'm placing faith in something other than Jesus of Nazareth, the son of David. Like when all of my withdrawal is entertainment, actually nothing grows in my heart. It's just put away for a little while. When all of my withdrawal is self-satiating tools, nothing grows.

22:15 It's just put off for a while. This season of Lent, we have the courage to look at the sin in our life, not so that we recognize how wrong we are, but so that we have a minute to consider what's growing in our heart. Do we see evidence of faith in the words that are coming out of our mouth, in the actions that are bubbling out of our heart?

22:47 Do we see evidence of faith in the Lord, the son of David, Jesus of Nazareth? Does our lives look like what he says faith will look like? One more passage for you this morning. It's Ephesians. It's in Paul's letter to the Church in Ephesians, which is a small little letter. It's after Acts, Galatians, Ephesians, it's before Philippians and Colossians. In Ephesians chapter 2, the first, like, 10 verses of Ephesians chapter 2 are really sweet.

23:26 It's like really beautiful stuff, but we don't have time to go through all of it because I'll get sidetracked. So if you go to chapter 2 verse 8, you can see 4 by grace you have been saved through faith. Oh, okay, faith. And this is not of your undoing. It is the gift of God. Not a result of works so that no one can boast.

23:57 This is what Jesus is telling the Pharisees when they're asking, why don't your disciples wash your hands? He's like, man, washing your hand is not going to work up faith inside of you. So faith comes out of the heart. And Paul learned, because he got it in an instant on the road to Damascus and then cultivated it for the rest of his life, that faith is a free gift from God. If you, in the season of Lent, start to look at your life and go, oh man, all my actions don't look like faith.

24:32 They look like the things described as sin in all the story of the Scripture. Nothing fruitful or faithful is growing in my heart. I'm not cultivating love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. I'm not speaking words of life and forgiveness and love. I'm finding only fear or anxiety. I'm finding only greed and sinjiness. I'm finding only judgment and harm growing in my heart. But if we are in this Lenten season, we are uncovering places of sin and we are noticing our lack of faith.

25:09 The answer is to recognize that Jesus gives faith freely to those who ask. The response to a realization of sin is not to work harder. To fall on your knees, I say, oh Lord, I recognize all I need are crumbs from you today.

25:40 Not that I am only worth crumbs, but that your grace is so large, the crumbs will change my life. Lord, please drop some crumbs for a new life for me in this season. I hope that we can be people whose sin drives us to the grace of God, that we are aware of our sport-commings, of our lack of faith,

26:11 and that that drives us not to despair nor to more work, but back on our knees to Jesus asking for the free gift of faith. And again and again and again. Persistently like the woman. Let's pray towards that end. Hey Lord, make us people like the woman. Aware of our need and persistently pursuing you as our answer. We want to be people of faith.

26:44 And we know that comes from you, so make us people of faith this morning. And Jesus, the name of God is sacred.