To fully understand our Gospel account of the Canaanite woman, we have to understand that the Canaanites were ancient, hated enemies of the Jewish people and vice-versa. The Canaanites had inhabited the Promised Land before God led the Children of Israel to their land flowing with milk and honey. The Canaanites worshipped idols and false gods. Canaanites were Gentiles. Canaanites did not follow the Law of Moses; they did worship the true God of Israel. Canaanites were unclean and they were to be avoided at any cost. If you were a Jew and you wanted to hurl an insult at a Canaanite, you would call him or her “a dog.”
Given that background of the centuries-old hatred between Jews and Canaanites, the Canaanite woman displays some very uncharacteristic behavior. When she hears that Jesus is nearby she goes to Him – she searches Him out – and she brazenly approaches Him. In ancient times, it was unheard of for a woman to approach a man and strike up a conversation with him. It wasn’t proper; it just wasn’t done. But that’s what this woman does, for Matthew writes: “And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and was crying, ‘Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely oppressed by a demon.’” She obviously was willing to break the social norms because she saw Jesus as her only hope of saving her child.
But even more unusual is the manner in which she addresses Jesus. She begins by addressing Jesus as “Lord.” In the Old Testament days, the Jewish people considered God’s name – the name YHWH – to be too holy to be spoken by human lips. As a result, whenever the Scriptures included the name YHWH or whenever it was used in prayers, they always substituted the spoken word “Adonai.” Adonai is translated as “Lord.” So when the Canaanite woman addressed Jesus as Lord, she was proclaiming that Jesus was and is God. Think about that for a minute. There’s nothing to indicate that this woman worshipped the true God, and when you factor in who she was and where she lived, it’s pretty much a certainty that she was an idol worshipper. But when she comes to Jesus she calls Him Lord – she calls Him God – she confesses Jesus as the true God of all creation.
And that’s not all. She also addresses Jesus as “Son of David.” “Son of David” was a name reserved for the Messiah, the Messiah promised by God to the Children of Israel. To Canaanites who hated everything about Jewish people and the Jewish religion, “Son of David” was nothing more than some meaningless words, a bunch of Jewish mumbo-jumbo. And yet, this Canaanite woman addresses Jesus as both God and the Son of David, the Messiah, the Son of God.
The woman is not the only one here who displays some uncharacteristic behavior. Two weeks ago our Gospel lesson described the great compassion that Jesus felt for His people – compassion to heal them of their illnesses and diseases, to raise the dead, the feed the thousands in the wilderness and even to suffer and die for our sins. But today’s lesson doesn’t seem to show us the Jesus we expect, the Jesus of unsurpassed love and compassion. The Jesus we see today comes across as rude, as unfeeling, as uncaring. When the woman begs Him for help, Jesus keeps on walking and doesn’t even respond to her. The disciples respond – they tell Jesus to send her away – but when Jesus finally does speak, He responds to the disciples and not to the woman: “I was sent only for the lost sheep of Israel.” It’s like He was saying, “She is not Jewish. I am not here to help her.”
But that doesn’t stop her. She kneels before Jesus – she throws herself at his feet – and she continues to beg. “Lord, help me.” And once again Jesus answers with words that shock and surprise us: “It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” Pretty strong words. Pretty insulting words. Jesus sounds just like any other Jew, insulting her by calling her a dog.
But still, the Canaanite woman is undeterred. She shakes the words off and comes back with an answer. “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” Even the dogs eat the table scraps that fall on the floor. She’s not asking for a lot; she’d be more than happy with just one crumb. She’s really not even asking for herself. She simply asks – she begs – for the demons to be driven out of her daughter. She knows that she deserves nothing from Jesus, but she keeps on begging. She’s like a persistent and annoying dog that just won’t give up. All she needs is a crumb – some table scraps. You don’t have to give me the world, Jesus – just heal my daughter.
That’s when Jesus does heal her daughter, and He gives her much, much more than the world. He gives her salvation. He gives her life. Jesus never criticizes her for her heritage or her background or for her prior life. Jesus never condemns her or belittles her for being a Gentile and not a descendent of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Instead, Jesus commends her: “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” In faith she understands and believes that Jesus came to save both Jew and Gentile, that the abundance of His love and compassion extends beyond the narrow scope of the Children of Israel to all of God’s children.
This account of Jesus and the Canaanite woman is traditionally seen as a story showing how her faith led her to seek out Jesus. This was one of the few times that Jesus ventured beyond the borders of Israel, and many might say that it was a coincidence that when Jesus did travel to Gentile country He was approached by this Gentile woman who came to beg for her daughter. But there’s no such thing as “coincidence” in Scripture – God doesn’t work through chance encounters. Yes, this woman came looking for Jesus. But more importantly, Jesus came looking for her. Behind the seeming indifference and rudeness and lack of caring was actually the Lord, the Son of David, whose mission on this earth was not to save just some people, but to save all people. Jesus was testing her faith – and He found that it was, indeed, very great.
It seems more than a little ironic that in last week we read that the disciple Peter – whose faith in Jesus should have been strong – was actually a “littlefaith” when he focused on the world rather than on Jesus. But this week we read of a woman who seemingly should have had no faith at all, but was commended by Jesus for her confession, her great faith.
The Children of Israel had this false sense that God’s love was extended to them but extended no further. They had this false confidence that only descendents of Abraham could have faith in the true God. But faith in God has no territorial limits, and God does not limit to faith to one group of people but not another. The Canaanite woman may have been a dog as far as the Jews were concerned, but in God’s eyes she was His precious treasure. We don’t know when it happened and we don’t know the details, but the Holy Spirit had brought that woman to faith. Her faith brought her to Jesus. And Jesus brought her to forgiveness and eternal life.
Truth be told, we are no more worthy of God’s love than that Canaanite woman. We may not worship idols as the Canaanites did, but our sins are every bit as damning as hers. We don’t deserve God’s love. We don’t deserve His compassion. We don’t deserve even the table scraps, the crumbs from the Master’s table. But he feeds us nonetheless. He feeds us with His holy Word and with His true body and blood in the Sacrament of the Altar. He gave His life for that Canaanite woman, just as He gave His life for us.
The Canaanite woman saw Jesus face-to-face, and she saw the healing that He brought to her daughter. She saw Jesus and His good gifts, His love, His compassion, with her physical eyes and with her eyes of faith. Today we too see Jesus and His love, His compassion, with eyes of faith. That’s enough for now, because we know – by faith – that on the final day we will see our Lord with our resurrected and perfect and glorified eyes.
I want to tell you a story – a true story – that took place at a hospital in Tennessee. A nurse by the name of Jenny was caring for a man who was dying of AIDS, a young man in his thirties whose body had been ravaged by a life of drug abuse. As she did every morning, she washed him, shaved him, attended to his medical needs and made him as comfortable as possible. Later that day the young man was visited by a minister who spoke no words of judgment, who never condemned the man for his sinful and self-destructive life, who never criticized him for the fact that he hadn’t seen the inside of a church for decades. Instead, the pastor spoke only words of sweet Gospel. The pastor spoke of how Jesus was there for this man’s needs, how He had given His life for the sins of that man and for all people. He said that this poor man’s life, as wasted away and ruined as it was, was still loved by Jesus.
A few minutes later the pastor told Nurse Jenny that the man desired to be baptized – to be baptized now. Because the young man asked to be fully immersed, Jenny set out to use the hospital’s whirlpool normally booked solid each day for patient therapy. She ran into all kinds of objections, but she knew how to cut through the red tape and the bureaucracy and get the permission she needed. The dying man was carried to the whirlpool, and he was baptized in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
After the man had been baptized he was dried off and was taken back to his bed. A few minutes later Jenny was in his room when he used every last ounce of strength he had to sit up in bed … to look up to heaven … and to say: “I thank you, my God in heaven.” And then he died.
Once again, this is a true story. God had not forgotten this man. God had not given up on him or written him off as being worthless. He had destroyed his life with decades of drug abuse. He had lived his years as an outcast from society and from his family and even from his church, but God was there to the end with the power and promise of forgiveness of sins. God was there to bring him to faith. God was there to save not his body, but to save his immortal soul. God was there to the end to redeem his life from all unrighteousness. So it was with the Canaanite woman. And so it is with you. God desired the salvation of the Canaanite woman, that woman of great faith, just as he desires your salvation. He found her just as He has found you. He waited for her and He waits for you – patiently and with unknowable compassion – to receive his everlasting mercy in Jesus Christ.
Note: the illustration of the dying AIDS patient was adapted from Concordia Pulpit Resources.
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