Crumbs/Matthew 15: 27-28
The Word of God Matthew 15: 27-2821 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 suffering terribly from demon-possession." 23Jesus did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him, "Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us." 24He answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel." 25The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord, help me!" she said. 26He replied, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to their dogs." 27"Yes, Lord," she said, "but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table." 28Then Jesus answered, "Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour. 29He left there and went along the Sea of Galilee. Then he went up on a mountainside and sat down.
Message: Crumbs Matthew 15: 27-28
I wish to lift up this morning the following verses: 25The woman came and knelt before him. "Lord, help me!" she said. 26He replied, "It is not right to take the children's bread and toss it to their dogs." 27"Yes, Lord," she said, "but even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table." 28Then Jesus answered, "Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour.
Have you ever felt yourself praying for a blessing? Any kind of blessing will do, even a small itsy…bitsy one! Those are the times when you're simply not choosy about the size and type of blessing. Any blessing will do!
Not a million dollars, just $20 will do! Not a new car, but you'd be happy if the one you have would just start! Not a high paying job, just a few less hassles on the one you have would be fine! If you've ever had those kind of moments then you know what it's like to experience the spiritual trauma that creates the illusion of a "blessing drought!"
That's when things get so bad that you stop troubling God about the big things and would be happy just to get a little something from heaven. Sometimes, even the best of us get pretty selective in what we ask God for. Not shoes, but designer shoes! Not food, but expensive cuisine! Not just an automobile, but a new Roll Royce! Not our daily bread, but the entire bakery!
As God provides our daily needs, believers must be careful not to be too specific and demanding in what we request of God. Sometimes our blessing is not in a new car, but on the city bus. Our blessing may not be in the job we seek, but in the job we have. Our blessing may not be in the fact that we received a "Gold Card" in the mail, but the real blessing may be in the letter that turned us down!
Consider the homeless woman who came into millions by what appeared to be the grandest stroke of luck. Her house was filled with fine furniture and her closets were filled with the best that money could buy. However, people were puzzled that an obviously wealthy woman would continue to wear a pair of run down old shoes one her feet daily. No matter what the occasion or the style of dress, she wore the same pair of old shoes. Finally a friend asked why she continued to wear the old tattered shoes. She was inspired by the woman’s answer.
"I was poor and homeless." She began. "I was tired of searching the alleys and trash barrels for food every day. I was cold and had no shoes on my feet. One day, I sat quivering and talked to God saying, "Lord, I ain't never asked you for much, but right now I need a big one!" Later that evening she found an old pair of tattered shoes in a trash barrel. She shouted "Thank you Lord" as she put the shoes on her feet. She tipped toed into a church prayer service that night and sat in the back row. After the service she was met by a kind wealthy woman who gave her a job in her home. She attended the woman for many years and they became friends.
Upon the woman's death she left all her fortune to her former homeless maid and friend. "Now even though I have dozens of dresses and can buy anything I want to put on my feet I wear these old shoes; because one day I asked God for a big blessing, but all I got was these old shoes!
They walked me to the house of God and put me in his care. Ever since that day, I hardly ever take them off my feet because I've been walking on my blessing every day!” How many of us are walking on our blessings and without realizing it? We didn't get the big one we asked for but God sent us just what we needed! How many can testify that when we asked God for our daily bread we were disturbed when we all we received were crumbs! How many of us have lived to see how God worked with the crumbs and made them into something grand?
As Christians, we have witnessed the power of God. We know he is able to bless us with just a touch of his garment, a word from his lips, or with a scrap from his table to provide for our need! Our prayer daily is, "Give us this day our daily bread!" But if not the whole loaf a scrap will do!
This text focuses upon a Gentile woman whose faith in Christ demonstrated that even a small blessing from him would be sufficient. The woman upon which this text focuses was not of the people of Israel, from whom came the patriarchs, and prophets, and the parents of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The text makes special note that as the Lord, "departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon, and behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts,"(v22) and with the greatest earnestness begged of Him the mercy to heal her daughter, "who was grievously vexed with a devil." Tyre and Sidon were not cities of the people of Israel, but of the Gentiles; though they bordered on that people.
Though she was not a Jew, she cried out, and boldly knocked. God's original plan of Salvation was for Christ to come and offer the great blessing of redemption only to Jewish people, referred to as the "lost sheep of Israel." Though he contained himself mostly in the Jewish community giving blessings of healing and hope to all that would hear, word of his mighty works spread outside of the Jewish community. Outsiders, those who were not Jews, were called a variety of names by the Jews. They were sometimes called "swine" and often called "dogs" because they were idol worshipers or ate foodstuffs from swine.
Most of Jesus' personal ministry was focused on the House of Israel. After they rejected him and crucified him, he commissioned his disciples to reach out to the entire world. When the woman of Canaan came to him asking for a blessing Jesus' reply was, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel." In verse 26 Jesus said, "It is not meet to take the children's bread, and cast it to dogs." A full understanding of the text requires us to focus on three words, "children", "bread" and "dogs."
Children: People who were Jews considered themselves the children of God. Jews and Jews alone considered God as their father and the people as his humble offspring.
They also considered themselves the descendants of Israel and thus his "children". The reference to children was not a reference to a single child, but a reference to their race as being special before God. Bread: In his discussions with the Jews he often compared himself to the bread that was rained down from heaven by God upon Israel when it wandered in the wilderness for 40 years. That bread was called "manna." He characterized himself as the new bread from heaven. His was a blessing of salvation and hope to the people. Dogs: Anyone who was not a Jew was considered a dog or an outsider. At the least, he is a non-believer. At the most he is prohibited from enjoying the full blessings of a benevolent God.
Thus Jesus’s response to the woman meant, "It is not good to take the blessings of healing and hope that are intended for the people of Israel and give them to outsiders." The woman was not intimidated by the reference to 'dogs" she quickly used the same statement in an illustration, "yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table."
Her faith was so intense that she believed that just a small portion of God's grace would be sufficient to resolve her need. It was the same attitude that a woman who had been afflicted by an issue of blood for 12 years assumed. She felt that if she could just touch the hem of his garment, it would be sufficient. The woman of Canaan didn't want a lot, just a scrap! Not a whole dispensation, a scrap would be sufficient! Her faith in the power of God resulted in the healing of her daughter. It was achieved not by asking for something big, but just from a crumb from the master's table.
The Power of Crumbs
Today there are millions of people who are overwhelmed by the fact that all life seems to have given them are crumbs. They have assumed the attitude of Paul Lawrence Dunbar that life is a "crust of bread and a corner to sleep in, a minute of joy and an hour to weep in." Many have made themselves miserable lamenting the fact that all they ever seem to get in life is crumbs! Initially, when we think of crumbs, we usually think of small particles of food left on a plate, scattered on a table or dropped on the floor. We think of crumbs as a useless by product, more of a nuisance than a resource.
There Is Power In The Crumbs
The power of God is unimaginable. What we enjoy today are only crumbs of what he is able to do. We have learned how splitting a single Plutonium or Uranium atom can cause a chain reaction that can kill millions of people and with fallout that lasts for years. That's from splitting one atom. But each human body contains millions of atoms. There are many atoms in the world that they cannot be counted. This indicates the immense power of God. God's power is so great and intense that if he actually gave us all he was capable of giving, we couldn't stand it! For our sake, we have been given crumbs! If we received much more we would injure ourselves.
Our Blessings Are But Crumbs
Whatever we have accumulated in this life are just crumbs! Take an inventory, whatever is found is just crumbs, when compared to the storehouse of God. In Psalm 50:10-12 God reminds believers that the whole world is his including, " every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills. I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field are mine. If I were hungry, I would not tell thee: for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof." Everything we have is but a small scrap from the great storehouse of God's goodness.
Don't Take Your Crumbs Lightly
Perhaps you have noticed that some homemakers are studious about collecting your bread crumbs. The reason is those crumbs and crumbs have value. They take the old bread crumbs and crush and season them and turn them into dressings and puddings and scores of other uses. An entire industry has evolved among those who don't take crumbs lightly.
They sell bagged crumbs for dressings and salads and other epicurean uses and make millions. All they sell are crumbs! What crumbs have fallen into your life from God's immense storehouse? What are you doing with them? Are you leaving them on your plate, waiting for a whole slice instead? Perhaps your scrap is a special talent or ability. Perhaps your scrap is an attractive personality.Perhaps your scrap is to inspire people. Maybe your scrap is a quiet comforting manner.
Whether your scrap is genius or ingenuity, don't take your scrap lightly! Gather up the idle crumbs of skill, personality, talent, faith and hope and prepare to use them. There is a whole world waiting for someone like you who can take their crumbs and turn them into dressing!
Just a few Crumbs
Finally, brothers and sisters, we must consider who can expect to receive crumbs from the master's table. If this text does anything, it makes it abundantly clear that anyone who has faith in the Lord can get a blessing.
The woman of this text was a Canaanite. She was a direct descendant of Ham, the son of Noah, most notably identified with the African people. The woman in effect said, "Lord I'm not a Jew, but all I want is just a small blessing; a scrap from the table!" When the Lord looked upon her he didn't see a woman of African descent. He didn't see a woman buried under a sea of stereotypes and racial nicknames! What he saw was a human being with a believing heart!
The Lord doesn't care about your ethnic origins, the way you dress or the type of car you drive. What counts most is whether you have a believing heart! That's why Jesus told the woman of Canaan, "O woman, great is thy faith!" Faith can show us how to take the crumbs that life gives us and turn them into delicious dressings!
Faith can take the bread crumbs of life and turn them into bread pudding! Faith can take the lemons that make life so sour and turn them into lemonade! There is more power in the crumbs that fall from the master's table than the whole loaf in the devil's bread box!
Consider the man who was taken as a prisoner during the great war! As the soldiers broke into his house he grabbed a piece of bread and stuffed into his pocket. Blindfolded, they marched him all night long to a secret camp. As he walked along the road, he crumbled the bread and punched a hole in his pocket. Every so often he dropped a few bread crumbs along the way.
That night he and several comrades managed to escape but didn't know how to get home. He ran boldly in the right direction and never missed a turn. Once they were safe, they asked him how he was able to find his way back and he answered, "I just followed the trail of the crumbs!" When someone wants to know the source of your blessings, tell them to "follow the trail of the crumbs!" I may be wearing a decent looking suit, but it's just a crumb from the master's table! I may be driving a brand new car, but it's just a crumb from the master's table!
If you want to know where the blessings come from, follow the trail of the crumbs! Follow that trail to a little town in Bethlehem! Follow that trail to a carpenter's shop in Nazareth! Follow that trail through the winding streets of Jerusalem! Follow that trail to a cross sitting on a hill!
When you get to the end of the trail say, Bread of Heaven, Bread of Heaven, feed me till I want no more! He died out on Calvary, but Early Sunday morning he arose from the dead with all power! All power in his hands!
