But, Then Again, I Could Be Wrong!

Matthew 15: 21-28

Roger Lynn

July 7, 2019

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The passage we just heard read from Matthew has always left me squirming. I have often had a difficult time knowing what to make of it or what to do with it. How did this story even get included in the Gospels? It seems to run against the grain at several different levels. In this story Jesus doesn’t come off looking very, well, very Jesus-like. He isn’t very nice, or kind, or fair, or just. It has always seemed just a little bit creepy to read this story. The floor tips a bit off-center.

But then I read it this time, and something different clicked. I saw something new. The trick is to set aside what you think Jesus is “supposed” to be like, and simply look at what he is actually doing. And what he is actually doing is being very human. In fact, it might be argued that this story represents one of the most honestly human glimpses of Jesus in the whole Bible. And in so doing, we find him offering us a faithful path to follow in our own humanity.

The episode begins with a distraught mother pleading for a miracle from anyone who will listen. She has apparently heard about Jesus’ reputation as a person of great faith, and maybe even a healer and miracle worker. To make a long story short, she makes a nuisance of herself as only a distraught mother can. Her child needs help and she simply will not stop until she gets it. Unfortunately, her distress is falling on deaf ears because she isn’t Jewish. She was born on the wrong side of the tracks and was raised in the wrong church. The message from Jesus’ disciples – “Go away and stop bothering us.” That’s not all that surprising. The disciples frequently demonstrate their seemingly limitless capacity to “not get it.” But what is surprising is Jesus’ response. “My mission is clear. My target audience has been identified. And you are not a part of it. I won’t have anything to do with you.” But even then he hasn’t reached the low point of this story. That comes when he makes his disdainful remarks about not throwing food to the dogs. He calls her a dog! And it’s about here that my head has always started swimming. This is Jesus we’re talking about here! What’s going on?

What’s going on here, I believe, is a glimpse into Jesus falling into a trap which is all too familiar to most of us at one time or another in our lives. He is operating out of unexamined beliefs. They are things which are so firmly entrenched in our understanding of the world that we aren’t even aware of them. We don’t question them. We don’t even think about them. They just are. And we proceed merrily on our way through life, until something unexpected shakes us loose from our deeply embedded “truths” about who is acceptable and who is not. For Jesus, it was the notion that the Jews were God’s “chosen” people and therefore no one else really counted for much. It was only a short hop from there to calling them dogs. He wasn’t trying to be rude, or mean, or unkind. He was simply speaking the truth as he understood it. It was so far below his radar that it just never occurred to him that it was inconsistent with his vision of God as all loving and accepting. But two things came together to change his world. The first was a mother who refused to go along with his understanding of reality. She knew it simply wasn’t true. She wasn’t a dog, she needed help, and she wasn’t afraid to ask for what she needed. But by itself, the challenge of her tenacity might very well have gone unheeded. What allowed it to make a difference was Jesus’ willingness to hear her, admit that he’d been heading in the wrong direction, and then change course. He said, in essence, “But, then again, I could be wrong!” He allowed a Gentile woman to teach him something about life and something about God. And his faith grew as a result. His ministry expanded. The Good News of God’s love was proclaimed in dramatic new ways. Another piece of the world’s brokenness was healed.

What an amazing lesson Jesus offers us here. No matter where we find ourselves in life, no matter what unhelpful turns we’ve chosen along the way, no matter what unhelpful foolishness we’ve blindly believed to be true, there is always the promise of a new day when we are willing to say “But, then again, I could be wrong.” Growth remains elusive only when we are so certain of the “truth” we possess that we are unwilling to even entertain the possibility of a different path. But even then, God is persistent. Even in the face of our stubbornness, angels (like the Gentile woman with Jesus) will find their way into our lives, prodding and challenging us to examine our unexamined beliefs so that we can grow. 

The 13th century Sufi poet, Rumi, offers these words that God might be saying to us.

Great lions can find peace in a cage.

But we should only do that

as a last

resort.

So those bars I see that restrain your wings,

I guess you won’t mind

if I pry them

open.

I invite you to be on the lookout for those moments when God is trying to pry open the bars of your life to set you free. Such moments will likely catch you by surprise. And there is every chance that it will be an uncomfortable experience. Having our deep, unexamined beliefs challenged always is. May we be as brave and as faithful as Jesus as we learn to say, “But, then again, I might be wrong.” The freedom which results when we open ourselves to such experiences is immeasurable, both for our own lives and for all those who are impacted by our living.