by CCW | 12 March 2017 15:00
It is a most powerful Gospel story, the encounter between “a woman of Canaan”, as Matthew calls her, and Jesus whom she addresses as “Lord” and as “the Son of David”, terms of address that arise out of the story of Israel. Some of the most intense encounters with Jesus happen with those who are somehow outside of Israel and yet remind Israel of what actually belongs to her truth and life. One thinks of the Centurion about whom, Jesus says, “I have not found so great faith, no not in Israel” or about the Samaritan woman at the well of Jacob with whom he has an extended conversation about the living waters of eternal life and about worshiping “the Father in Spirit and Truth”. But this encounter is, I think, almost unparalleled in its troubling intensity.
She comes out of the coasts of Tyre and Sidon crying out to Jesus “have mercy upon me”, but her concern is for her daughter, “grievously vexed with a devil.” This is of another order than the healing of the body though soul and body are intertwined and interdependent, we might say. It’s just that spiritual and mental disorders are deeper and darker, it seems. And as such, there is the suggestion of the diabolical, of our allowing ourselves to be taken over by other forces and so surrendering our freedom and dignity. We become captive to some disorder in ourselves. The problem is within us, however much we might like to blame others, society, or the environment, whatever. We can sense the distress of a mother dealing with a deeply troubled daughter. It is the stuff of our own times.
The encounter illumines the nature of faithful prayer and challenges our indifference to matters spiritual, the casual and lukewarm way in which we approach Church and religion, the easy and indulgent excuses that we make that keep us from the very things that contribute most to the good and the health of our souls. The woman is insistent on what she senses and knows about Jesus. But this, paradoxically, is her humility that grants her access to the mercy she seeks. What we have here is what we pray in our liturgy in The Prayer of Humble Access; a prayer shaped by this Gospel story and the story of the healing of the Centurion’s servant.
At once poetic and theological, The Prayer of Humble Access speaks directly to the nature of our engagement with all things divine, particularly the Sacrament of Holy Communion.
“We do not presume to come to this thy table, O merciful Lord; Trusting in our own righteousness, But in thy manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy So much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table. But thou art the same Lord, Whose property is always to have mercy…”
We pray this as a necessary and critical part of our preparation and approach to the Sacrament of the altar, echoing explicitly the story of the Canaanite woman who approaches Jesus so resolutely and yet so humbly.
The words ‘humble’ and ‘access’ stand here in a complementary relation. Humility is the condition of our access to God. What the prayer expresses is a fundamental attitude of Faith. It is not our presumption – our “trusting in our own righteousness” – but our humility – our trusting in “the manifold and great mercies of God” that is altogether crucial. Against all that is thrown at her, this woman has a hold of this one thing – the mercies of God in Jesus Christ. To have a hold of that is humility – she presumes upon nothing else – and it is this that gains her access to the heart of Christ. Humility gains access.
Humility is not the same thing as low self-esteem. It is not the whinge of “I can’t do that” which really means “I won’t even try”. It is not the whine of the “poor-me’s” which is really our groveling for attention, in other words our self-centered pride. Humility is not groveling self-pity. For such things are really our presumption. We demand all the attention as if we were the center of everything. We aren’t. Humility is the recognition that Jesus is the center and that we can have access to him – on his conditions, not ours.
“Then came she and knelt before him, saying, Lord, help me”. There is an encounter and an engagement with Jesus. The dialogue is quite intense – even frighteningly so. But her kneeling down is neither manipulation nor groveling self-abasement. It is, instead, the attitude and posture of Faith. It says, in effect, that God is God and we are not. Such is humility. This is the condition of our access to God. The woman does not presume to be the center of attention. What is constant is her focus on Jesus. He has her undivided attention. She sees in him the mercies of God which she seeks. “Lord, help me”.
It is not a plaintive cry. It is the prayer of Faith. The strong sense of the mercy of God is the counter to our self-presumption and self-preoccupation. She seeks a healing mercy from Jesus for her daughter. A mother’s love is a strong and compelling motive. The sickness of a child or some other crisis in our lives will often bring us to our knees. We are rendered helpless. “We have no power of ourselves to help ourselves”. It would be foolish to deny this. It belongs to the biblical insight about our broken-heartedness.
But the point of this Gospel is not that we should wait for some emergency to bring us to our knees before God. No. The point of the Gospel is seen in its application as expressed in The Prayer of Humble Access. “Have mercy upon me” is a constant prayer, a daily prayer. It belongs to the constantly recurring theme of our liturgy: “Lord, have mercy upon us”. It belongs, in other words, to the maturity of our faith, the faith that holds onto the mercy of God and will not let go, more than content with the crumbs which fall under the table, knowing that what God provides is always more than sufficient and knowing that it is all grace and mercy.
Humility ever looks to Christ. It is our openness to him as the center of our lives. It is the condition of our access to him. When we are presumptuous, we are full of ourselves. There is no room for God. We presume to be the center which we are not. Humility opens us out to the mercies of God in Jesus Christ. In the knowledge of our brokenness, there is the turning which is already the motion of divine mercy and grace in us.
Fr. David Curry,
Lent II, 2017
Source URL: https://christchurchwindsor.ca/2017/03/12/sermon-for-the-second-sunday-in-lent-6/
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