St. Matthew 15:21–28
Baptisms of Jamyson & Chloe Atkinson
Catechesis brings you low in order to lift you up
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In our Gospel reading today, Jesus casts out a demon from the woman’s daughter. We actually saw this very thing take place this morning. In their Baptisms, Jesus cast out the devil from Jamysn and Chloe. The Word of God teaches that we are all conceived and born sinful and are under the power of the devil until Christ claims us as His own. We would be lost forever unless delivered from sin, death, and everlasting condemnation. But Baptism rescues us by forgiving our sins and silencing the devil. Depart you unclean spirit and make room for the Holy Spirit. Do you renounce the devil and all his works and all his ways? Yes, I renounce him (Baptism Liturgy, LSB p.268–70). The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit claimed Jamysn and Chloe, covering them in the righteousness of Christ, bringing them into God’s Kingdom, and so they will be forever protected from the forces of evil so long as they remain living in their Baptisms, trusting in the promises God made to them today.
Baptism heals you and rescues you from the devil, just like Jesus did for that little girl. But Baptism also tears you yourself down. Through this saving flood all sin in them, which has been inherited from Adam and which they themselves have committed since, is drowned and dies (Flood Prayer, LSB p.269). See, we are not innocent victims, and neither are Jamysn and Chloe. We are sinners, active participants in the rebellion against God. And that means, not only must we be rescued from the devil’s power, but we must also be killed. Or more accurately, Baptism drowns the Old Adam in us. Our sinful hearts and minds, our sinful flesh, that must be put to death. All so that a New Man can arise and live in righteousness. The children sang it today: Let us daily die to sin, Let us daily rise with Him (LSB 605:3). Baptism brings you low in order to lift you up. The Old Adam in us is put to death with Christ, so that the New Man in us can rise and live with Christ.
This dying and rising, this brining low and lifting up, happens in Baptism, but it doesn’t stop with the drops of water. This dying and rising, this bringing low and lifting up goes on throughout life as we continue to live in our Baptisms. And that’s why we have catechesis, hearing and learning the faith. Like Baptism, catechesis brings you low in order to lift you up. Catechesis continues the work of Baptism in your daily life going forward. Or to put it a better way, Baptism keeps doing its work daily through catechesis.
This is seen most clearly with the Canaanite mother in our Gospel reading. It is shocking to us how Jesus responds to her cries for help. First, He ignores her: He did not answer her a word. Next, He refuses her: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (meaning, “I’m not going to help this Gentile sinner”). And then, He outright insults her: “It is not right to take the children's bread and throw it to the dogs.” Catechesis brings you low and Jesus absolutely brings this woman low. You might even naturally think, “How can Jesus seem so cruel?” But catechesis brings you low in order to lift you up, and that’s what Jesus does for this woman. With every harsh reply He brings her lower—less explanations about her difficulties, less reasons why He should help, and more clinging only to Him, only trusting that He will answer. Jesus takes her to the point where she is truly able to receive mercy. He brings her low so that she can only receive mercy. She has no other leg to stand on, nothing to be proud of, no way that she can earn or deserve anything good from Him. He brings her low. Spiritually speaking, He kills her.
And yet, she does not despair. The lower Jesus takes her, the more she trusts in Him. The lower He brings her, the more she acknowledges her lowliness, and all the more she claims His goodness. She calls on God’s promises. Ultimately, she uses His own Word and she gets what she asks for: “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table.”
That is how a Christian is to die. And I don’t just mean physical death. That’s how a Christian dies to self. That’s how you drown the old Adam, deny yourself, and are crucified with Christ. And then, you can be raised up again and live with Christ. All the while, through all the harsh words, Jesus has that woman’s salvation in mind. He brings her low in order to lift her up. If she had turned away earlier, offended, thinking that she didn’t have to stand for this kind of harsh treatment, if she had denied her sin, her lowliness, and denied Him, then she would go without His help. You can’t get a crumb from the Master’s table if you think you can insist on your rights or earn a spot by who you know or what you’ve done. Only when you admit that you are indeed a sinner deserving God’s anger, no better than a dog, only then can you rely on the Master’s generosity. You can’t hope to rise again if you aren’t willing to first die. You can’t hope to be forgiven if you don’t first admit your sin and your desperate need. As we sang earlier:
Baptized into Your name most holy,
O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,
I claim a place, though weak and lowly,
Among Your saints, Your chosen host.
Buried with Christ and dead to sin,
Your Spirit now shall live within. (LSB 590:1)
Baptism humbles you, it brings you low, it kills you. That’s the same goal in catechesis. The work of Baptism continues as often as that Old Adam rears his head in protest. We don’t have much trouble saying we believe this when it comes to Baptism itself. But we don’t like it so much when it happens later in life. When our sin is confronted by God’s Word then we get angry, we object, we refuse to listen. When we’re told that we need to listen and learn God’s Word we shrug it off, because we don’t think we’re so bad.
But that is precisely why you need catechesis, you need to be taught that you are wrong, and your Old Adam needs to be killed. A big part of both Baptism and catechesis is getting rebuked. A big part of being a Christian is getting corrected, even getting a harsh treatment from Jesus like the Canaanite woman. You are a sinner and you need God’s Word to silence your excuses, kill you, bring you low, so that your sinful pride doesn’t get in the way of your salvation. That means you have to leave your sin. In simple terms, it means you have to learn what your sin is and work at not doing it anymore. You need to trust the Lord’s teaching on what is good and conform yourself to what He says. And that does mean getting rebuked once in a while. It means dying to self and admitting you’re wrong. It means saying, “Yes, Lord. You are right. Yet, I will cling to Your mercy.” It is painful to be brought low and confess your sin. But only then will you be lifted up with the Word of forgiveness and life.
Baptism raises you and gives you new life and new power. It creates a New Man in Christ—someone who only loves God and what is good. And catechesis not only continues giving life to this New Man, but it teaches you how to live as the New Man. You are new in Christ but you still need to learn how to live this new life: how to bring your Old Adam low and kill him by the Word of God’s Law and by confessing your sins and resisting temptation; and how to lift up your New Man, how to strengthen him by trusting God’s forgiveness and taking advantage of everything He gives in the Word and the sacraments.
Living this new life means that you learn God’s Word so that you grow to love it more and more. Catechesis can be a humbling thing: the more you learn, the more you find out that you have more to learn. I imagine this is why so many people stay away from things like Bible study. They don’t want to be reminded of how little they know. But the Canaanite woman wasn’t ashamed to be a dog eating the crumbs from her Master’s table. That’s how much she loved her Lord. So, you don’t be ashamed to sit at your Master’s table and learn from Him. This is true for all of us, myself included. Maybe learning something new is humbling, but there is so much joy in learning something from God’s Word. There should be no embarrassment when Christians gather to learn God’s Word together, because God is bringing us all low so that He can lift us all up.
What’s more, catechesis trains you in being brought low, so that you learn how to suffer and receive some harsh treatment. This is so that suffering doesn’t turn you away from Christ, but brings you closer to Him. This was Paul’s point in our Epistle: Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ—we are baptized, so we can be confident that we are God’s children. Through Christ (and through Baptism) we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us (Romans 5:1–5).
Baptism brings you low in order to lift you up.Catechesis brings you low in order to lift you up. These two works of God train you to persist and endure and suffer, so that you do not give up, so that you do not turn away from Him when things get bad. Baptism and catechesis bring you low in order to lift you up so that you also might be like that faithful Canaanite woman, and have your cries for mercy answered by the Lord who gave Himself for you. The almighty God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has given you the new birth of water and of the Spirit and has forgiven you all your sins, strengthen you with His grace to life everlasting (Baptism Blessing, LSB p.271).
In the Holy + Name of Jesus. Amen.
