This year 2019 will be a year of Greater Faith. If we have seen faith last year, we will see greater faith. We all want to grow in our faith this year right?
In this sermon we would be looking at dynamics of great faith through a gentile woman, who came to Jesus for healing her daughter. This is one of the two occasions from bible where our Lord Jesus Christ himself calls it as great faith. One of which was a centurion and the other was the gentile woman.
Let’s read the same from the scriptures:
Matthew 15 : 21-28
21 Leaving that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.22 A Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord, Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and suffering terribly.”
23 Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
25 The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
26 He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
27 “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
28 Then Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted.” And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Let’s Pray: Lord, open our eyes so that we can understand this passage. Impart the faith in us this year. Amen
In verse 21 , we see that Jesus withdrew to a region of Tyre and Sidon. The people of Tyre and Sidon used to hate Jews. The question here is, why then Jesus went to such a place? All this while, Jesus had ministered to Israelites only and this is the first time he is ministering to the Gentiles. Jesus was rejected by the Pharisees, that’s the time when he moved to the Gentiles. This could be to break the cultural barrier from his disciples’ heart and mind. We can see it, from the below verse:
23 Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, “Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.”
The Canaanite woman approached the disciples first before approaching Jesus.
In verse 25
25 The woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said.
The posture of the woman can be seen as “Lord have mercy on me, Lord help me”. It seems like she’s begging.
The in-depth meaning of the words spoken by the woman could be explained as follows:
The Greek word for Lord means Kurios , means Master, that is, in other words, “Master have mercy on me.”
Today, we are going to look at 5 keys of Greater Faith from the story of Canaanite woman however, Benny Ho mentions 7.
The first key which the woman demonstrates is Faith focused on Christ.
If we want to grow in Faith this year 2019, our faith must be focused on Christ.
Three times the woman calls Jesus, ‘Master (Lord)’. Her soul focus was on Jesus, rather than her own faith. She was not focused on her great faith, all that she was focused on was the Great God. There is no such thing as great faith, apart from the object, on which it is focused on. Faith is like our eye sight, eyesight is meaningless apart from the object on which we are looking at. If we are watching television, our focus is not on our eyesight, our focus is on the television (Movie). No one ever watching a television will ever say that my eyesight is really interesting. In the same way when we believe God for something, our focus is not on our faith, But our focus is in the one, whom we are trusting. Faith is therefore our invisible link towards God. It is the contact point for the power of God.
Hebrews 12 :1-2
12 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, 2 fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.
To summarize the above passage in one sentence, “He is the author”
In Hebrews 11, the author was painting all the heroes of faith. It was like climbing the mountain, when we reach the Pinnacle it was Jesus on top. Even though we have all the heroes of faith, but we look onto Jesus. He is the author and finisher of faith. Look at Jesus, He must be our focus of faith. It is all about Jesus. We always ask ourselves, that have I done enough? Do I have enough faith? Am I worthy to be blessed? It is all about Jesus. Greater faith is always focused on Jesus.
- Faith is founded on Grace: True faith is always founded on Grace. What was the basis of this Canaanite woman’s appeal? She knew that she did not deserve anything. She can’t earn the favour of God, she can’t work for it. She only has to believe. She was not dependent on Works, but she was dependent on Grace. Grace is unmerited favour, freely given, we don’t deserve. Her faith was based on Grace.
Galatians 5:4-5
4 You who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope.
Christ has no effect on us , if we believe that there is something that we have done and we deserve it, then we have nullified Christ.
In faith, we wait for the good to happen. We ought to wait confidently for it to happen. We also have this question, ‘what if it does not happen?’, there are so many instances friends, where nothing happened? I would say by the authority of the Scriptures , wait confidently. Hope does not disappoint us. It is a biblical Hope, not the terminology which we use in our routine communication. In our regular communication, we use it for a Wish (I Hope , I get the train).Here it is uncertain . But in biblical terminology, it is not uncertain , it is being sure of something in the future.
God wants to do it for me, in me, and through me. So I am active in everything I do because it is not my strength but by Gods strength.
- Faith is followed by Action : This woman not only had faith on Jesus , but she also acted upon it . So she came to meet Jesus. Many of us say that we have faith, but we never come to Jesus and seek Him. We need to act upon it.
If we were to imagine the following situation: Suppose your Car broke down? Would you just say that I have faith and not act upon it?
James 2: 14 – 17
14 What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? 15 Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. 16 If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
Faith in Action will result in something. The Canaanite woman not only had faith, but she acted on her faith by coming to Jesus.
- Faith is accomplished through Patience: When we read the conversation between Jesus and the Canaanite woman, it sounds very rude.
Jesus did not answer a word to her, completely ignored her. She may have felt rejected. Even the disciples came to Jesus and told Jesus to send her away. Now, the Lord ignored the Disciples and said as follows to the woman:
24 He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”
It is like saying, that she is not Jesus’ priority. Why did Jesus say that? There are other portions in the bible, where Jesus reaches to the Gentiles? So why is there a difference here?
There will be times in our lives where our faith will be tested. At times we pray and nothing seems to happen. We don’t receive any response from God.
It is the test of waiting / patience. During 19th century, there was a man named William Wilberforce. He was leading the charge to abolish slavery in England. He fought and fought, but without any breakthrough. At one point, he decided to move on to another issue, John Wesley who was also alive then, and had heard about William Wilberforce’s decision. It was also during the time of John Wesley’s last days, he was about to die and was in his death bed. He heard that Wilberforce is going to give up his fight, he sat on his bed and wrote a personal letter to William Wilberforce to encourage him , and not to give up. Two days before he died, he wrote this letter. A part of the letter read like this “My dear William , unless God has raised you up for this very thing , You may be worn out because of the opposition and the devil , if God is for You, who will be against you? God is stronger than all this, do not be weary, go on in the name of God, even the American slavery shall vanish away before it”. With this letter William Wilberforce fought for another 45 years to abolish slavery. William Wilberforce died on 29th July 1833, one month after which, the British parliament passed a bill to abolish slavery. 45 Years later, he didn’t even see the results, that is faith endured through Patience.
We have some more scripture portions that mentions the same Hebrews 6:12 , Hebrews 10:23 , Hebrews 10:34,35
This Women waited in patience, refused to let it go with silence, and enduring the rejection
- Faith must fight off offence:
26 He replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss it to the dogs.”
27 “Yes it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
Why did Jesus tell her something like this? According to Exodus 14 -15 God makes a covenant of healing with the Israelites and it was not for Gentiles.
Even the author Matthew does not hide this fact. It is written plainly, that the Messiah called her a Dog. It was a test of offence. Many of us fail in this test of offence. Even the early followers of Christ could not withstand it.
Many of the disciples turned away from Jesus’ teaching and walked away because they were offended and saw his teaching was difficult to follow.
We may have also seen this, majority of Christians leave their faith because they are offended in the Church. They walk away from God, walk away from Church, because they were hurt by some words or some action, reason being offense. They build an emotional wall around them so that they may not get offended again. They go from one church to another so that they may not get offended and will only relate to people of their same type. Surprisingly, other people are also being offended by someone. So we have a group of people who are wounded coming together, and it becomes cancerous, which affects the Body of Christ, that is, the Church.
If you are nursing an offense with the church people, or church leadership, allow the Holy Spirit speak to you. Because it becomes a hindrance for you, in developing Greater faith.
We have seen many believers who are doing well in God and then they get offended, they walk out of the Church. This morning I encourage you to break free from this trap of the devil. Surrender your offenses to the Lord and let God deal with it.
This is how the Canaanite woman refused to be trapped by the offense and passed the test of offense. She turned the offense for good, that is, greater faith.
Hebrews 11 :6
6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
Faith focused on Christ, Founded on Grace, followed by Action, finished through Patience, Faith that will fight off offense .
Lets grow in Faith this year 2019, Start with a faith which we already have. Take responsibility for your own growth. The church can only supply the infrastructure . We can set the chairs and prepare messages but, if you don’t come nothing happens , We are responsible for our own growth. Get in the life of our Church , Come up with Ideas , Get active for God, Get involved in ministry , Study the word of God, Do what we need to do , revive the prayer life. Take responsibility of your own growth. Nobody can rear you, you have to grow by yourself. This is our Time , This is our Day.
Virjil Selvan is Pastoring the New Hope Community.
The New Hope Community is situated in the heart of the city between Old and New Panvel. We can confidently share that New Hope Community is a Church in Kamothe, Church in Khandeshwar, Church in Khanda Colony, Church in Panvel, Church in New Panvel because we are centrally located and these places surround our church Venue
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