Astounding Grace: Sermon for Proper 15A

I don’t know about you, but I love the underdog. Whenever I see a competition, and I don’t have a particular dog in the hunt, I usually end up rooting for the side that is most disdained or overlooked. This probably is partially due to the fact that I grew up as a sports-loving girl, which in a time when Title IX was just getting started, made me already an underdog. I was good enough at sports that the boys actually asked me to come out and play. Football, baseball, soccer—all through elementary school I was out on the playground with a few other sporty girls and the guys, even in the summer time.

Then I got to junior high, and things got weird, and many guys didn’t want to compete with girls and risk “losing” to girls, and suddenly they got to grow another foot tall while we girls didn’t. And so suddenly, as a girl, for a while there, I and my female sporty friends became the underdog, the overlooked, when it came to sports.

And then, I grew up in a state which had no professional sports, which is how—and I can confess this to you because there is no one actually IN the nave right now to throw things at me-- I grew up to be a Cubs fan.

Yes. Because when cable TV came to Tulsa, the Cubs games were always broadcast on WGN. And during the time I was a Cubs fan, although the Cubs had many talented players, like Greg Maddux, Leon “Bull” Durham, Ron “the Penguin” Cey, and my favorite, Ryne Sandberg, they never had much success. They were supposedly under a curse having something to do with a goat, we were told. Whatever. They were always the underdogs. The discounted. The excluded.

Todays’ reading all feature discussions about underdogs, about those who are excluded, about the tensions between having “insider” status and having “outsider” status. In our story from Genesis, we once again skip a whole lot of the good stuff in the story about Joseph, and jump to the end. Now Joseph has gone from being slave to being the master of Egypt, and his brothers have had to come to Egypt during a famine to try to buy bread for the large family of Jacob to survive. They do not recognize Joseph, who now goes by an Egyptian name, dresses like an Egyptian, walks like an Egyptian, has an Egyptian wife and half-Egyptian children, and is second only to Pharaoh in power. And maybe because he has come out on top, Joseph forgives his brothers for considering murdering him, and then selling him into slavery.

But this story is placed here for the sake of our gospel reading to remind us of an important point about the identity of the people of Israel, as Biblical scholar Wil Gafney points out. “Joseph's complicated family history teaches us that Israelite identity was a cultural and religious one and not an ethnic or even national one in his time -- and for some time to come. In Joseph's story the Israelites and Egyptians are not pitted against one another. There will be enough food for all because of his stewardship.” But the This point will be important later.

As we have been reminded especially at the start of the COVID pandemic, when suddenly all kinds of necessities disappeared from our store shelves even in the American Land of Plenty, in the face of scarcity, the temptation is always to cut others out, to hoard and store up for ourselves. And we certainly see that fear leading some in our society to try to lock others out, especially those in need. Even before COVID, we saw that fear play itself out on our borders, and it continues even though we are distracted by a global pandemic.

It’s human nature to look for some markers so that we can draw bright, circular lines around groups of people. The people on the inside of that line? That’s “us.” And those on the outside of that line? That’s “them.” They’re the “others.” The outsiders, the unworthy.

And in times of stress, or crisis, or scarcity, those we label as “other” risk being seen not just as different but as the enemy, as competition for scarce resource whose needs must be denies so that then insiders can, if not prosper, then at least have “enough.”

Note I said it was human nature. But the question is: is this tendency to exclude a part of God’s plan and vision for God’s kingdom, for the creation of God’s family here on earth than Matthew’s gospel calls “the kingdom of heaven?”

That’s where the story of our Canaanite woman in our gospel today comes in. Hers is the third scene in chapter 15 of Matthew’s gospel. We missed scene one, where Pharisees come and criticize Jesus and his disciples for not observing "traditions of the elders" regarding washing hands before eating and so on. Jesus argues back that violating traditions is not nearly as important as violating commandments, especially the commandment to be generous and expansive in taking care of those in need.

Scene two in this chapter is what we see at the beginning of today’s gospel portion, where Jesus explains to his disciples that true righteousness starts not from the outside of a person, but from the heart—from the inside. For Jesus, true purity and righteousness is about relationships, not about legalism—about how we care for others rather than making a big show of how perfect we ourselves are. Jesus exasperatedly explains that what comes out of the mouth originates in the heart, and bad intentions from the heart leads to real impurity. The six specific impurities he mentions all have to do with broken relationships.

Jesus is accused in the first part of our gospel reading of not having respect for the Law, tradition, and his own culture. In the second half of our gospel, he starts from a prejudice rooted in his culture, and is brought to new amazement by a demonstration of faith where the prejudices of his time would least expect them—from a Canaanite woman. We also have one of the times when Jesus appears to be rude to a woman (remember also his response to his own mother when she asks him to perform the miracle at the wedding at Cana in John’s gospel).

This woman has all the marks of not just an underdog, but an outsider. She is called a “Canaanite,” to remind Matthew’s audience that she is by birth not just an outsider but an enemy of the people of Israel, a competitor for scarce resources— space, land and water. And she is a woman, and women were to be seen and not heard. Yet heard she most certainly is. She comes out and trails behind Jesus and his crowd of followers, caterwauling and braying at the top of her lungs—first from behind the crowd, and then, when she is ignored, she comes around and throws herself down on the ground right in Jesus’s path. She makes it impossible for him to ignore her.

The Canaanite woman asks her favor, will not be denied, and actually argues back to make her case. Only one who believes that Jesus could actually do something would be so determined. In fact this unnamed Canaanite woman is the only person in scripture to be depicted winning a debate with Jesus.

Although at first Jesus answers rudely to our ears (answering rudeness for rudeness, perhaps, but still rude), he does eventually note the power of her faith—and that faith makes her daughter well.

By acknowledging Jesus as the “son of David,” she shows, outsider or not, a familiarity with the Jewish scriptures. The term is also used ten times in the gospel of Matthew alone starting with the very first verse of the gospel. She also uses the language of prayer, “Lord, have mercy,” the same language used in many of our own prayers of intercession, or in the Kyrie eleison. In fact, this short scene is drenched in liturgical action, as she also kneels before him in a position of petition.

Four times in Matthew’s gospel, the plea “Have mercy on me, Son of David!” is used by people asking Jesus to be healed: the two blind men of 9:22-32 and two more in 20:25-21:1, who repeat the plea twice; and here, by the Canaanite woman. In each case of healing, Jesus makes it clear that their healing comes about through their faith, and this Canaanite woman is no different. In each case, the person seeking healing seizes the initiative.

The Canaanite woman is different in that she is a mother seeking healing for her daughter, who is not present. Her faith is so great that she believes that Jesus can heal an outsider’s daughter regardless of distance.

Here is where also we see the tie with the claims in Romans —God’s grace and mercy is for everyone, and no one is left out. Where we might expect Jesus to proclaim this himself, here we see an outsider CLAIM this for herself and her daughter. The teacher is taught something by the student he is inclined to disdain.

This epiphany to Jesus reminds us again that he was fully human as well as fully the Son of God, and could learn things and be surprised by them. It also reminds us that far too often are we prone to see others of different backgrounds as the enemy when in fact they are our brothers and sisters, with just claim upon us that should stir a just response rather than resentment. This also reminds us, as we noted in our reflections on Paul, that God’s love is universal, and is not limited to just people who hold the correct sets of beliefs or lineage.

I don’t know about you, but BOY is this a message for our time! Almost every policy discussion surrounding economics and the social safety net revolves around who does and does not deserve help.

So is tenacity a part of faith? What else is faith but perseverance and tenacity even in the face of obstacles? Faith, like any spiritual muscle, is strengthened especially when it is under stress. Only a few days ago we heard the story of Jacob wrestling with God/the angel in the middle of the night in a literal no-man’s land. Jacob couldn’t win, but he refused to back down until he endured a “cheap shot” to his hip—and then demanded a blessing.

Just like Jacob, this woman won’t let go until she, too, gets her blessing. She perseveres. In a popular phrase from our own time, “Nevertheless, she persists.” And in doing so, she invites Jesus into living deeper into the claim he had just made—that God’s grace is not just amazing, as the song goes, but astounding and boundary-exploding.

In the first part of our gospel, Jesus reminds us it is not what goes into a body that defiles, but what comes out. People are not “in” or “out” by accident of birth—where they are born, or who their parents are, or the color of their skin or the language they speak or whether they are outwardly good at following rules while inwardly cruel and hard-hearted. At some point in your life, you are responsible to choose whether to follow God and God’s expansive vision of community or not.

We see it a lot in our society right now, all over what was formerly known as “Christendom.” There are people who were born into Christian homes, and brought up with going to Church. They even absorbed knowledge of Bible stories and perhaps can quote the Lord’s prayer and the 23rd Psalm. They’re “culturally Christian”—nominally fluent in the language and rituals of the Christian religion. But unless they decide for themselves to walk in the Way of Jesus, no matter how imperfectly, their knowledge doesn’t translate into faith.

Luckily, if we can hear this message of radical generosity and inclusion, it means that as we embark on our journey of faith, we are assured that we are not only never outsiders, we are never alone. We not only have Jesus. We have each other. We are called to deny the forces of the world that seek to exclude, to divide, and instead to embrace those we encounter, especially those who call out for help. We ourselves have received astounding grace and mercy. It’s time to demonstrate that same grace to the world around us—especially when everything around us tries to make us hard-hearted and afraid. That’s how the light of Christ will shine, even in this time of fear and darkness. It will shine from inside us, once we embrace each other in true charity and empathy.

Amen.

Preached at the 10:30 am online worship service at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville, MO during the cessation of in-person worship due to COVID-19.

Readings:

Genesis 45:1-15
Psalm 133
Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28

Nevertheless, Persist-- Sermon for Proper 24C, the 19th Sunday after Pentecost

She was used to waiting around for the left-overs, this unnamed, persistent, probably even irritating widow. 

Under the law of Moses, widows always got the left-overs. But if you know anything about left-overs, they are almost always an afterthought. In the Book of Deuteronomy, chapter 24:19-21, Israelites were admonished to not harvest so thoroughly that there was nothing left. 

If they forgot a sheaf of wheat in the field, they were to leave it for the orphan and the widow; if they harvested olives, there were not to strip the trees bare. They were to do a good job but not a thorough job, so that the orphan and widow could pick what was left—you know, after you’d picked all the good olives, all the ripe ones, all the ones that weren’t already squishy. Same thing with grapes in the vineyards. You also weren’t to harvest from edge to edge of the field, but were told to leave the trees or vines on the perimeter less thoroughly harvested, but lots of landowners didn’t take that seriously. 

So basically, widows and their children—who were called “orphans” in those days even if they had a living mother, that’s how male- centered that society was—they got the crumbs, which they had to pick themselves, and often they might wait around all day to get nothing at all. And all this was because a widow was forbidden to make her living any other way. It was inconceivable for a woman on her own to work for herself without a man as the head of the operation to make the decisions and “own” the work of her hands. 

There was a word for this kind of higgledy-piggledy gathering of the leftovers from the various fields: gleaning. You can hear the word “lean” right in there. Lean pickings, based on the probable ruthlessness with which they landowners and the day-laborers they hired adhered to the principles of profit-margins. 

Even worse, if a widow’s husband died without children, especially a son, for her comfort and protection in such a male-centric society, the law stated that her husband’s brother should marry her. Later, that got stretched to include more distant kin. If that kinsman refused to “redeem” her, she was commanded to try to shame the brother at the city gates. Which of curse also broadcast HER shame at being alone and defenseless. 

Now, sometimes, it worked out. Ruth, even though a foreigner, insistently went back with her beloved mother-in-law, Naomi, to Israel after Naomi’s husband and sons died, and while Ruth was gleaning, she attracted the attention of the wealthy landowner named Boaz, who was her husband’s kinsman. 

Ruth ended up marrying him and having a son to comfort Naomi in her old age. That son became the grandfather of King David, and therefore Ruth became an ancestor of Jesus. 

The widow Judith, likewise, not only castigated the generals of Israel to their face when they failed to trust God enough to deliver them from the Assyrians, she worked it. 

She didn’t leave it there—no, she worked her considerable beauty, charmed her way into the trust of the enemy general, was taken to his tent, got him drunk, and decapitated him. Bam! Off with his head! And after she saved her people, she refused to marry any of her many suitors, and lived out the rest of her life as a widow. 

Probably to save herself from rolling her eyes a dozen times a day, given the shallow dating pool she had to pull from. 

Insistence, persistence, and bravery seem to be defining characteristics of Biblical widows. There are other widows who appear in scripture: the unnamed woman who fed Elijah the last bit of food between her son and herself and starvation based solely on his assurance that all would work out. She ended up not only NOT going hungry, but having Elijah pray her son back to life when he died suddenly, just as Jesus would revive a widow’s dead son in the Book of Luke. 

Jesus criticized his religious opponents for sucking widows dry of all their savings, and immediately watched a widow put two small coins in the temple treasury—all she had to live on—and he raised her up as an example of righteousness and faith. The widow Anna was a prophet who rejoiced when Jesus was presented in the Temple as an infant. 

So, we get a picture of insistence, persistence, bravery, boldness, and faithfulness. It’s remarkable how strong they are, given the way the deck is stacked against them. So when Jesus introduces this widow in his parable, I think we can see her in a long line of women who have been pushed around by virtue of their outcast status. Living without a male protector and provider, literally drawing her living from the margins of the fields and the margins of society, forgotten by all her married friends because she doesn’t fit in to a society based on large family units that were necessary for survival, she’s not beaten down. 

She’s enraged. 

She’s had all she can take, and she won’t take any more. 

She reminds me of a meme that made me laugh a couple of weeks ago: it showed a beautiful night scene, but in bold white letters it said. “Never pick a fight with a woman over 40. They are full of rage sick of everyone’s … um, nonsense.” 

Even though she knows the judge over her case is corrupt, contemptuous, and evil, not caring about any of the responsibilities of his office, she doesn’t quit. Even when shushed and dodged and told to shut up, nevertheless, she persists. She persists in speaking truth to power. She has a claim, her claim is just, her situation is dire as a widow, and she will not—cannot—give up. 

And finally, just like a raindrop and its kindred will wear down even the most solid rock, or the way a delicate flower will shoot up through the minutest crack in the pavement until it causes the entire sidewalk to buckle, she wears down this judge who just doesn’t give a damn about anyone but himself. The story states that the judge tells himself he didn’t want her to “wear me out”—but the actual translation is “give me a black eye.” I like that—her persistence scared him a little, or maybe a lot. Kablam! Good! She uses his own sense of self-importance against him, and for love of his nerves, he gives in and grants her justice. 

Now let’s get something very clear right now. The dishonest and unjust judge is NOT a metaphor for God. Instead Jesus is using this story in a method of argument known as via negativa—the “negative way.” But the unjust judge is not EQUATED with God. Jesus uses the unjust judge to describe what God is NOT. Via negativa. God is GREATER than the unjust judge. 

The promise embedded here is this: if even the unjust judge can be moved to acceding to the widow’s demands, how much more trust can we have in God when we ask for justice? It is the job of a judge—and of God-- to fulfill the demands of justice. If a judge who is arrogant before God and the people will eventually give in to the demands of a persistent widow, surely God can be depended upon to do even more. 

In fact, here’s an interesting twist. Consider the scope of scripture, with God constantly urging us to do justice, love mercy, and walk in humility with each other and God—and most of the time we flat-out refuse. What if we saw the persistent widow as God, and the unjust judge as the community? That may be the sermon I preach the next time this comes around in three years. Think about it. Because prayer is a conversation between us and God, that reversal also works, and also teaches us a lesson about prayer as a two-way conversation with God

It is unusual that this parable—which only occurs in Luke—begins with a statement about what it is about. That is not normally the pattern. But prayer is something that most of us do at various points throughout our week and our lives. Of course, most of us have experienced the feeling that our prayers are seemingly not heard, much less answered. That’s what happens when we think of prayer as a laundry list of demands that we hurl at God like the widow’s unceasing cascade of demands for justice. 

Prayer will not succeed when it is simply a way for us to do all the talking. Prayer is certainly not going to work if it is merely seen as a way for us to demand what we think we want and cannot get unless we beg, plead, or wheedle endlessly in some sort of superstitious loop. The point of prayer is that it is a conversation with God. It is only in the silences between our words that we leave any space for the movement of the Spirit in that conversation. 

Prayer is opening ourselves to the possibilities of God’s will, which of course is a scary proposition. We like to be in control, and do what we want. The first verse of this reading actually tells us the real point: we need to pray always in order to keep our hearts grounded in God. Prayer is not just a demand for satisfaction but a conversation, in which we need to listen, not only speak. Prayer is a means of building a relationship with God, of seeking out our own heart and to open it up to the voice of God in our lives. Prayer is a means of strengthening our trust in God and God’s promise of never-ending love. 

As our gospel reminds us, prayer is a way to enter into the presence of God, to be surrounded by the presence of God. This is the kind of immediate experience needed to maintain faith, more than anything else, so that when Jesus returns, faith will be found on the earth. Jesus urges us to be persistent in prayer, to be persistent in being grounded in God, just as Jesus is depicted repeatedly engaging in prayer himself. Being persistent in prayer will also lead us to be persistent as faithful people if not always in faith, and indeed will carry us through those times when our faith flickers, which happens to everyone—even saints. 

When I was in seminary, I once got pulled into a discussion about pastoral care. Whatever you do, I was told, DON’T pray. Several people nodded sagely around me, but I tried not to let my chin hit the floor. Why not? I asked, incredulously. In response, I was told that if you prayed for someone to be cured and they weren’t, it could cause them or their family members to lose their faith. To my mind, that made just about as much sense as arguing that a surgeon shouldn’t operate on someone in case their condition might worsen. 

What we have here, I thought, is a failure to communicate. I remarked that we Episcopalians don’t have a Book of Common Prayer for nothing. We are a praying people! Now, of course, being present with people and listening to them is a vital part of caring for them rather than quickly offering up a rote prayer and going about our business, but to not pray at all? As Episcopalians, prayer is what we do and how we are formed. The law of prayer is the law of belief, after all. 

Of course, prayer is NOT a cure-all, and many of us would very careful about couching our prayers in the language of seeking a “cure.” To be relieved, to be brought to comfort or peace, to be granted resilience and endurance, to feel supported, heard, and known as beloved, yes. But the fact is, as Mahalia Jackson sang, I believe that prayer changes things. 

Prayer changes things-- starting with the person who does the praying. Prayer changes things by giving the one who prays a chance to both speak and listen to the presence and support of God in that person’s life. Prayer is not a wish-fulfillment system, but a mostly-intentional conversation between ourselves and the Almighty. 

I say “mostly intentional” because we’ve all had those times of calling on Jesus when a child or a deer or another car darts out in front of us when we are going full-speed down the road. You know the ones: something like 

"OhsweetbabyJesusdon'tletmehitthat18wheeler!"

But even then, I think that prayer is part of our longer conversation with God. Sometimes—more often than we like to admit, probably-- that conversation calls us to silence and to opening ourselves to the movement of the Spirit in our hearts and minds. 

Sometimes prayer comes in a torrent of words. Sometimes prayer centers on the same word repeated dozens of times. Sometimes it comes in praying with someone who is ill and reminding them that they are not alone, physically or spiritually. Sometimes prayer comes with the click of one prayer bead sliding against another on a rosary, or a deliberate footstep on the path of a labyrinth. Sometimes, prayer is just the name of Jesus, or, as Anne Lamott noted, “help,” or “thanks,” or “wow” prayed on each breath. 

And as we have learned a lot recently, sometimes it comes with praying through selections of scripture that do not seem to be all that congenial at the moment. Sometimes, one of the greatest aids to our prayer life is to realize that we have to get over ourselves, and get out of the way of God. 

Certainly, there are times when it is difficult to pray, or to know what to pray. I’ll tell you one thing, though: when in doubt, there’s never been a time I have regretted praying when choosing between that and not praying. 

So let us ever persist in prayer, that our hearts and minds may be tuned to the presence of the holy alongside us and within us. 

 Amen.


Preached at the 505 on October 19, and at 8:00 and 10:30 am on October 20, 2019, at St. Martin's Episcopal Church, Ellisville, MO.


Readings:
Jeremiah 31:27-34
Psalm 119:97-104
2 Timothy 3:14-4:5
Luke 18:1-8