Gospel: Matthew 15:21-28 (Pentecost 12: Series A)

I used to wait tables in a French restaurant. My customers enjoyed wonderful food, high prices, and long, leisurely dinners.

Part of my work as a waiter was to crumb the table during the meal. Our French bread had a perfect crust, so breaking bread meant a messy table. Rather than have customers brush the crumbs to the floor, I was tasked with taking my crumber (a metal device, about the length of a pencil, which was concave, with a sharp edge) and scraping the tablecloth to gather crumbs from the table. This way, the customers could enjoy their food without concern for the crumbs. The waiter was there to take them away.

Contrast that experience with sitting around the kitchen table with friends. You break bread and crumbs fall on the table. A waiter does not come to clean them away. In fact, sometimes, you may just eat them yourself. You lick your finger, touch the backside of a crumb, and put it in your mouth. At the kitchen table, crumbs are not always a messy by-product of eating to be whisked away by a waiter. No, they are part of the meal to be savored and eaten, not wasted.

I thought about these experiences when I read Matthew’s account of the Canaanite woman, because this story teaches us the value of a crumb. Here we find an unexpected disciple gathering an unexpected crumb.

As Jesus journeys toward Tyre and Sidon, a Canaanite woman cries out for mercy. Certainly, Jesus who could feed five thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fish (Matthew 14:13-21) could help heal her child... if He wanted to. But instead of mercy, she gets silence (Matthew 15:23).

So, she continues to cry out. When the disciples ask Jesus to send her away, she overhears Jesus say He was not sent for people like her (Matthew 15:24).

Her faith, however, is louder than Jesus’ silence and her courage is stronger than Jesus’ rejection. She begs again and simplifies her plea. “Help me.” This time Jesus responds directly to her, in a shocking way. He lets her know that the children’s bread does not go to dogs like her (Matthew 15:26). “But,” she responds, “the dogs get the crumbs.”

What an unexpected disciple. She does not argue with Jesus. She does not ask to sit at His table. She does not call herself a child in God’s Kingdom. She makes no demands of Jesus. Instead, she receives what He says in faith. She accepts that she is a dog in the eyes of Jesus... but, in the Kingdom of God, even the dogs get the crumbs. Licking her finger, this unexpected disciple reaches out to touch and eat an unexpected crumb.

Her faith, however, is louder than Jesus’ silence and her courage is stronger than Jesus’ rejection.

Jesus is struck in wonder at her faith. To her, the Kingdom of God is vast and glorious. In this kingdom, something as miraculous as casting out a demon is just a little crumb, a fragment of God’s gracious work. And that crumb is enough for her. She would rather be a dog in the Kingdom of Jesus than be a king or a queen in the kingdoms of this world.

With this story, Matthew reminds us that crumbs matter in the Kingdom of God. Matthew places this story between the feeding of the five thousand (Matthew 14:13-21) and the feeding of the four thousand (Matthew 15:32-39). Have you ever noticed how in each of these miracles the disciples respond in the same way? After thousands have been fed, they stick around to gather up the crumbs (Mattew 14:20 and 15:37). Crumbs matter in the Kingdom of God.

Sometimes, as Christians, we behave like people dining at a fine restaurant. We rejoice in the main course, the abundance of God’s mercy bestowed upon His people in Word and Sacrament ministry. We know of Christ’s forgiveness of our sins, and we gather to hear of His mercy and to eat and drink His body and blood. Such things rightly fill our attention, but sometimes we do not see, much less bother about, the crumbs.

Yet, disciples care about crumbs.

Today, Jesus asks us to step out of the fine restaurant and to come sit at His kitchen table. Here, there is no fine silverware, no linen tablecloths. Instead, there is a rough, wooden table around which are gathered even rougher people. In the kitchen of Jesus, God gathers individuals who live on the margins. Their lives do not fit the dress code of a five-star restaurant. Their language offends and their behavior dismays and, deep down, like the disciples, we may just want Jesus to send them away.

But, instead, Jesus invites us to come and sit with them at His table. We are not the children of Israel. We are much more like the Canaanite woman. We are Gentiles who came late to the party. But God the Father sent His Son to go to the furthest edge of the Kingdom, to die forsaken and rejected on a cross. Rising from the dead, Jesus, the forsaken One, invites all who are forsaken into His Kingdom. Having once been forsaken but now having received mercy, we know the value of a crumb.

When people are suffering, we do not send them away, we reach out to bring them in. There is plenty of food in our Savior’s Kingdom. When people are hurting, we take time to listen and share a kind word. When people are lonely, we offer our presence and prayers. Such acts of mercy are small, seemingly insignificant. They do not save the soul, but they provide sustenance for the body and strength for the journey.

In the kitchen of Jesus, God invites us to break bread together and rejoice in even the smallest act of kindness or mercy. Why? Because, in the kitchen of Jesus, all people matter and, today, He invites us to gather all people and share the crumbs.

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Additional Resources:

Craft of Preaching-Check out our previous articles on Matthew 15:21-28.

Concordia Theology-Various helps from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, MO to assist you in preaching Matthew 15:21-28.

Text Week-A treasury of resources from various traditions to help you preach Matthew 15:21-28.

Lectionary Podcast-Dr. Peter Scaer of Concordia Theological Seminary in Ft. Wayne, IN walks us through Matthew 15:21-28.