It is always good to be with you in person.  Let us start with this simple prayer: Breathe in “Thank.” Breathe out “You.” Several moments of silence.

This meeting house is at 1612 W Dalke. I had no clue where that was.  I have lived in Metaline Falls for most of my life but it wasn’t until I was in my 30’s that I knew exactly where I was.  Let me explain………

Matthew 15:21-28

²¹ And Jesus went away from there and withdrew to the district of Tyre and Sidon. ²² And behold, a Canaanite woman from that region came out and cried, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David; my daughter is severely possessed by a demon.” ²³ But he did not answer her a word. And his disciples came and begged him, saying, “Send her away, for she is crying after us.” ²⁴ He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” ²⁵ But she came and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, help me.” ²⁶ And he answered, “It is not fair to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.” ²⁷ She said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.” ²⁸ Then Jesus answered her, “O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed instantly.

Hmm?.  I imagine that listening to the reading made you a bit uncomfortable.  The all merciful and compassionate Jesus ignores the woman’s pleading, tells her she isn’t in the right group and then calls her a dog. 

At a Catholic Sunday service there is a part called the liturgy of the word during which there are 4 scripture readings, one from an Old Testament book, a Psalm, a reading from one of the apostolic letters (usually of Paul’s), and the last reading is from one of the gospels.  It is a three-year cycle.  Year A uses readings from Matthew; B, Mark; and year C, Luke.  Readings from the gospel of John are interspersed. The cycle then repeats.  You would think that Catholics would know the Bible well.  Not so.  Most Catholics don’t bother to read or ponder the Bible on their own.  Several weeks ago the reading was the one I read about the Canaanite woman.  After the gospel reading the priest gives a homily, a commentary on the readings.  So I have heard at least 20 homilies about that gospel.  I went online and looked at many commentaries on that reading.  They all have this general theme.  Jesus was testing the woman.  Jesus wanted to see if she really believed he could help her.  Did she really have faith/trust in Jesus?  The commentary will then continue talking about how we need to be persistent in prayer, etc.

I could end my message right now, be done and go into unguided worship.  However there is a problem for me.  If you look at all of Jesus’ healings, the person to be healed never has to pass any kind of test.  They do not have to fill out an application, pass an interview, or be worthy.  Jesus’s terms are unconditional.  The synagogue official, Jarius, comes to Jesus and asks him to help his sick daughter.  Jesus says, “Let’s go.”  Jesus is with his apostles and they come across the man born blind.  The apostles wonder what sin he or his parents committed. Jesus says that is baloney, goes to the man, puts a mud paste on his eyes and tells him to go wash.  The man hadn’t even asked to be healed.  Jesus just did it.  A Roman Centurion, a high official in the brutal Roman army of occupation asks Jesus to heal his servant.  If Jesus should have tested anyone, it should have been him, but he doesn’t.  Amazing, unconditional compassion.

So what is going on?  I am going to ask several rhetorical questions.  If you make a mistake, is that a sin?  No.  If you don’t know everything, is that a sin? No.  If you were taught something over and over again by people you trusted and you realize it needs to be altered, is that a sin? No.  Hebrews 4: 15 ”For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin.”

So have you ever thought of it this way?  Jesus was fully human. He wasn’t God walking around pretending to be human. He did not know everything and he made honest mistakes. Example.  Luke 2: 21-52 ⁴¹ Every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the Festival of the Passover. A 91 mile trip on foot.  Imagine Nazareth is Ione and Jerusalem is Spokane.⁴² When he was twelve years old, they went up to the festival, according to the custom. ⁴³ After the festival was over, while his parents were returning home, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but they were unaware of it. ⁴⁴ Thinking he was in their company, they traveled on for a day. Then they began looking for him among their relatives and friends. ⁴⁵ When they did not find him, they went back to Jerusalem (20 miles on foot) to look for him. In a huge city still packed with Passover pilgrims). ⁴⁶ After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. 

Stop and ponder the situation.  Jesus and Mary are poor.  Days spent on the road are costly.  Joseph isn’t working, so lost wages during that time.  What about food and lodging?  Think of the worry and anxiety.

⁴⁷ Everyone who heard him was amazed at his understanding and his answers. ⁴⁸ When his parents saw him, they were astonished. His mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us like this?  Your father and I have been anxiously searching for you.”⁴⁹ “Why were you searching for me?” he asked. “Didn’t you know I had to be in my Father’s house?”^[a] 50 But they did not understand what he was saying to them.⁵¹ Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. ⁵² And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man.

Mary and Joseph had every right to be upset.  Mary: “Why have you treated us like this?”  Talk about an understatement. I can imagine Joseph holding his temper, saying, “Jesus, it is good that you love the Torah and being in the temple but in your zeal, you forgot the Fifth Commandment, ‘Honor your father and mother.’  You don’t understand perspective, but some day you will.”  If Jesus knew everything, why would he need to grow in wisdom and stature?  Jesus was not omniscient.  Jesus had to learn how to walk.  Jesus hit his thumb with a hammer. 

How conscious was Jesus of his divine nature? Many scholars believe that it was only at the Resurrection that Jesus’ human mind and divine consciousness became one as the Christ. Until then, he “was like us in all ways, except sin” (Hebrews 4:15).

If Jesus was walking around fully conscious of his divinity, then Mark 10: 17-18 doesn’t make any sense. “As Jesus started on his way, a man ran up to him and fell on his knees before him. “Good teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”¹⁸ “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.”  Shouldn’t Jesus have said, “Good teacher? Really?  I am the source of all goodness.  I am who am.  How about most awesome, magnificent, knower-of-all teacher.  I am God.”

Or why this? Matthew 26:39 Going a little farther, he fell with his face to the ground and prayed, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.”

And above all, why this? Matt 27: 46 “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” Was he pleading to himself??

Jesus was fully human. That is the point of the incarnation.  But what about when Jesus was baptized by John?  Matt 3: 16-17 And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him.   And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.

There you go, the Spirit of God said, “This is my son.”  Proof and validation to Jesus of his divinity by God. But I am a son of God. You are sons and daughters of God. So what is the difference between us and Jesus?  We don’t believe it. We think we have to earn it or aren’t worthy of it.  Jesus in the fullness of his humanity knew it to his core.  Jesus did not come to show us how to be Godly.  He came to show us what it would be like if we lived our humanity to its fullest.   Jesus is the architype, the blueprint, the model for us.  In no way does what I have said diminish the divinity of Jesus the Christ.

I have been fumbling around trying to say what Father Sean ÓLaoire nails when writes this about Jesus being perfect.

That is what it was like for Jesus to grow in wisdom and grace. At no stage of his life was there a discrepancy between his potential and his actualizing of it. There was no ‘empty space’ in him; no gap between what, on the one hand, God and life was teaching him and, on the other hand, his instant willingness to embrace it. That’s what perfection really means; to be radically committed to the mission for which one has volunteered and incarnated. Perfection is not about not making mistakes. It is about the radical devotion to one’s life purpose. It is the acorn hell-bent on becoming an oak tree.

Part of Jesus’ growth was to, initially, buy into the 613 precepts of Torah but to, eventually, reinterpret the meaning of these laws. In his own words, he came not to abolish the Law but to bring it to fulfillment. But look at what ‘fulfillment’ meant to him. Again, and again, almost like a mantra, he would proclaim, “You have heard that it was said to the people of old…but I say to you…”  Then he would go on to take issue with some of the most important precepts e.g., an eye for an eye, the uneven field of divorce, the Sabbath rest, the death penalty for adultery. In conclusion, he would say that the Law was made to serve humans not the other way around.

We have done the believing community a major disservice by so emphasizing his divinity that his humanity was all but overridden. “He did not really have to live faith or darkness as we do, he knew everything from his youngest years,” most Christians naively assume. Yet Hebrews beautifully calls Jesus the “pioneer and perfector of our faith” (12:2).

But I have digressed a bunch.  Back to the Canaanite woman.  From his childhood Jesus was taught the law and learned to cherish it. He knew that his people were chosen, special.  His people were not like “those people” the gentiles.  Gentiles were profane, morally suspect and to be avoided.  Take that attitude and ramp it up 100 times in relation to Canaanites.  Historically, Canaanite culture was debauched and cruel, embracing such practices as ritual prostitution and even child sacrifice. 

So Jesus’s reaction to the woman makes sense.  He was doing what he was taught.  But the woman’s perseverance and last response threw him for a loop.  In Jesus’s mind the boundaries of inclusion suddenly expanded exponentially.  The laws regarding “those people” were meant to help the Jews protect their social identity, but Jesus saw that they needed to be broadened.  All people were cherished by God. 

So which is it?  Jesus was testing the woman or Jesus grew in wisdom?  Believe that which enables and encourages you to walk the talk.  To follow.  To persevere in prayer.  To expand your circle of inclusion.  To question long held beliefs and prejudices.  To let go.

Queries:

What long held beliefs do you need to reexamine and let go of? 

Who are the Canaanites to you? Who do you want to exclude?