More Than We Can Ask Or Imagine

St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, Gainesville FL
The Chapel of the Incarnation, Gainesville FL
August 14, 2011

Year A: Proper 15, the Ninth Sunday after Pentecost
Genesis 45:1-15
Psalm 133
Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
Matthew 15: (10-20), 21-28

More Than We Can Ask Or Imagine

Many of you know that one of the first things I did when I arrived in Gainesville last year was to start offering Morning Prayer each weekday at the chapel – or, actually, in the chapel garden.

I did that for a couple of reasons but mostly because like everybody else I can get a little lazy. But, I realized that if I put Morning Prayer on the schedule then - no matter how lazy or busy I was - I had to start my day with prayer.

At the end of Morning Prayer the officiant may say one of three verses from Scripture. My favorite of these verses is from Ephesians. It begins:

“Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine…”

That’s a beautiful description of how God is at work in our lives.

If our hearts are open, God takes us to unexpected places.

If our hearts are open, God brings amazing people into our lives.

If our hearts are open, God uses us to heal our broken world.

“Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine…”

I’ve been hearing that verse from Ephesians in my head as my time here with all of you in Gainesville draws to a close. Over the past year God has done more in my life than I could ever have asked or imagined.

And I’ve also been hearing that verse in my head as I’ve been reflecting on this week’s lessons, in which, as usual, God does more than anyone could have asked or imagined.

You may remember that last week we heard the story of Joseph being sold into slavery by his jealous brothers. They were jealous that Joseph was his father’s favorite. They were angry that Joseph had dreams in which they bowed before him. And, don’t forget, they were irritated that their father honored Joseph by giving him a fancy robe with long sleeves.

Ah, family!

To make a long story short, Joseph did very well in Egypt, rising to a position of great honor and power.

The rest of his family didn’t do as well. Things got so bad that during a time of famine, Joseph’s brothers go to Egypt looking for help.

At first, Joseph played some mind games with his brothers who don’t recognize him. The last of these games was demanding that Benjamin, the youngest and Joseph’s only full brother, stay behind in Egypt as a slave.

In an act of great courage and love, Judah, who had been primarily responsible for selling Joseph into slavery, offers to take Benjamin’s place because he knows the loss of both Joseph and Benjamin would devastate their father.

It’s a powerful moment and an amazing reversal. It’s so powerful and amazing, in fact, that in the passage we heard today Joseph breaks down and reveals his identity to his shocked brothers.

The healing of a family broken by jealousy, deceit and violence begins.

“Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine…”

If our hearts are open, God takes us to unexpected places.

If our hearts are open, God brings amazing people into our lives.

If our hearts are open, God uses us to heal our broken world.

Today’s lesson from the Gospel of Matthew might, at first, seem a little disjointed.

It begins with Jesus challenging the teaching of the Pharisees, who usually get a bad rap in the New Testament. We don’t know as much about the Pharisees as we’d like but it seems that they were interested in sanctifying everyday life. So, they intensified some of the demands of Jewish Law, for example requiring ritual hand washing before meals.

There’s nothing wrong with those kinds of practices unless of course they become more important than the way we actually live our lives. In the gospel, Jesus emphasizes that it’s not our rituals but our moral behavior that makes us clean or unclean.

Important words for the Pharisees and for us - and then almost immediately Jesus is challenged to put those important words into practice.

Jesus goes into the non-Jewish territory of Tyre and Sidon where he encounters a pushy and persistent Canaanite woman. She honors Jesus when she shouts to him, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon.”

Now, this is a familiar scene. Throughout the gospels we see Jesus in these kinds of situations – people begging him for healing. But, in this case, Jesus acts in an un-Jesus like way.

After all, she’s both not Jewish and a woman. So, Jesus and any other Jewish man shouldn’t have anything to do with her.

The disciples want to get rid of her – undoubtedly her shouting was attracting a crowd in this foreign land. Jesus offers a very narrow vision of his mission when he says, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”

The woman persists, “Lord, help me.”

And then Jesus does something very un-Jesus like. He insults the woman:

“It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”

Yet, even after this ugly insult, the woman not only persists but is quick-witted:

“Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.”

And then, impressed by her faith and maybe her wit, Jesus relents, and heals her daughter instantly.

This is a difficult passage for us to hear. It’s often interpreted as a story about faith and persistence – and, in part, it’s certainly about that. But, if that’s all that this story is about, what does it say about God? Would God’s attitude towards the woman really be, “If only you had gone back at Jesus after he insulted you then your daughter would have been healed! Too bad you didn’t have more faith and persistence!”

No, this passage isn’t so much about the Canaanite woman. This story is much more about Jesus. There has always been a tendency in the Church to overemphasize either Jesus’ humanity or his divinity. I think in our time the tendency is to focus so much on his divinity that we lose sight of Jesus our brother, a flesh and blood human being who had to learn and grow like we all need to learn and grow.

In this passage we glimpse a flesh and blood human Jesus who was challenged by a persistent Canaanite woman to put his important words into practice.

The rules say no contact with this woman. But this quick-witted woman seems to have reminded Jesus that our conduct is far more important than our rituals.

And maybe in that encounter Jesus had the nearly overwhelming realization that his identity and his mission were far greater than he had previously believed.

Maybe Jesus’ heart was opened to realize that he wasn’t only the long awaited Messiah of Israel, but he was also the Savior of this Canaanite woman and her daughter - and the Savior of the whole world.

Maybe in that encounter with the persistent woman, Jesus recognized that in him and through him, God was doing more than this Jewish peasant from Nazareth could have ever asked or imagined.

And now it’s our turn. We’re all aware of the challenges we face in our lives, our families, our community and the world. But, God is at work today in Gainesville just as God was at work when Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers and when Jesus chose healing over rules and regulations.

If our hearts are open, God takes us to unexpected places.

If our hearts are open, God brings amazing people into our lives.

If our hearts are open, God uses us to heal our broken world.

“Glory to God whose power, working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine. Glory to him from generation to generation in the Church, and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever.”

Amen.