TEXT: Romans 11:1-2, 29-32; Mt. 15:10-28

Romans 11:1-2, 29-321 I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin.2 God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew. Do you not know what the scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?29 for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.30 Just as you were once disobedient to God but have now received mercy because of their disobedience,31 so they have now been disobedient in order that, by the mercy shown to you, they too may now receive mercy.32 For God has imprisoned all in disobedience so that he may be merciful to all. Matthew 15:10-2810 Then he called the crowd to him and said to them, "Listen and understand:11 it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles."12 Then the disciples approached and said to him, "Do you know that the Pharisees took offense when they heard what you said?"13 He answered, "Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be uprooted.14 Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind. And if one blind person guides another, both will fall into a pit."15 But Peter said to him, "Explain this parable to us."16 Then he said, "Are you also still without understanding?17 Do you not see that whatever goes into the mouth enters the stomach, and goes out into the sewer?18 But what comes out of the mouth proceeds from the heart, and this is what defiles.19 For out of the heart come evil intentions, murder, adultery, fornication, theft, false witness, slander.20 These are what defile a person, but to eat with unwashed hands does not defile."21 Jesus left that place and went away to the district of Tyre and Sidon.22 Just then a Canaanite woman from that region came out and started shouting, "Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David; my daughter is tormented by a demon."23 But he did not answer her at all. And his disciples came and urged him, saying, "Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us."24 He answered, "I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."25 But she came and knelt before him, saying, "Lord, help me."26 He answered, "It is not fair to take the children's food and throw it to the dogs."27 She said, "Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters' table."28 Then Jesus answered her, "Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish." And her daughter was healed instantly.

"AN EVANGELICAL'S DILEMMA"

TEXT: Romans 11:1-2, 29-32; Mt. 15:10-28

Grace! Not the quickly mumbled "Thank you Lord for the food we are about to eat…" prayer said before one eats, but God's grace, poses what is perhaps a greater dilemma for evangelical Christians than all the other attributes of God.
Over the summer months, with a frightening degree of regularity, news accounts have told us of children kidnapped, sexually abused and murdered. Public outrage is justifiably high. So I was caught off guard by the response of the woman whose infant daughter had been snatched by a kidnapper last week upon that babies recovery. When asked for a comment, the mother expressed how grateful to God she was for the safe return of her child. She then added that she prayed for the kidnapper and forgave her. The police captain in charge of the case commented on one of the news channels that he had been moved by the mother's profound faith and marveled at the grace which she exhibited toward the abductor. "Her faith in a God of grace was reflected in her attitude toward the abductor.(not a direct quote)"
Grace. It's a tough one. Who is included? Or as we more often than not phrase that question, who is excluded?
On the one hand grace describes the magnanimous gift of God to those who confess that Jesus, as the only begotten of God, has made available to all who believe the gift of eternal shalom, eternal life. This gift of wholeness is made available to anyone who in faith, and not by any form of personal merit, willingly professes Jesus as their savior and follows Jesus as Lord. The grace of God is the greatest gift of love that anyone can receive. And together with the revelation of God as a God of Love, grace is the most attractive aspect of the Christian faith that the evangelical has to offer to the non-Christian. It is the spark which ignites the Christian passion for missions. The evangelical's heart's desire is that everyone know this wonderful grace of God found through faith in Jesus Christ whereby they may be saved from the separation from God which has resulted from personal and societal sin. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved!" is our declaration, and we sincerely want everyone to have the opportunity to make that decision.
The problem lies, however, in the very nature of this grace which we proclaim. If God is such a gracious God, if this grace is an out-working of God's love, then is it limited only to those who have made such a profession and live as faithful disciples? Are all those who have died and never heard and/or professed faith in Jesus as Savior and Lord condemned to some form of hell or separation from God? And what about the Jew? Or the Moslem for that matter? Those whose religious understanding of God is rooted in the soil. Or what of the Mormon, Christian Scientist, Jehovah's Witness, whose religious understanding of God has branched off of our own? Or the followers of Rev. Moon? Are all those who have followed those religions outside of the Grace of God? Personally speaking, I want to say so, but God doesn't abide by my say so, or yours, or that of any who would set themselves up as religious authorities.
Or let's take another approach outside of religion. Aren't there just some folk who are so plain cursed that they are outside of the scope of God's grace? Like the terrorist bomber, the corporate executive who loots the company, or the child kidnapper. After all, there are times when I believe that any one of us would like to see some folk burn, really burn. And as unpopular as the topic of hell might be in our pulpits, most of us would like to be assured that a select few end up there.
A story central to Jewish and Christian understanding of God is that of Joseph's forgiveness of his brother's treachery. As perhaps you recall, Joseph was a brash braggart and pampered son of his father Jacob. Now this was not the most ideal of family environment. Dad had four wives and children by each of them. Over the course of Joseph's growing up years, Dinah, the only sister, had been raped. His brothers in rage had murdered every male in the village near where they had settled to raise their flocks, taken all their property and raped all their women. One of the brothers, to get back at Jacob, sleeps with the youngest of Jacob's wives, the mother of one of his brothers. Jacob tells tales about his future grandeur. The brothers plot Joseph's murder and then at the last minute sell him into slavery telling Jacob that he had been killed by wild beasts. In slavery he is sexually harassed without a lawyer in sight, and then jailed, and then betrayed.
Joseph and his brothers - they in no way reflect story of those deserving grace/mercy. And yet that is just what Joseph extends to the brothers when they come seeking help not knowing who held the power of life and death over them. Joseph looked back and saw God at work.
Syrophonecian woman - not someone whom even Jesus wanted to spend any time with, much less help.
Prince of Grace, not offering any grace here. That's our kind of guy. Grace for folk who fit within the parameters of our understanding.
Prince of Grace got a lesson. God extends grace to even those to whom we would only reluctantly offer the crumbs.
Paul's case was with those who wanted to exclude the Jews from the circle of God's grace because they had not embraced Jesus as the Messiah.
Paul argues that grace is up to God, and God who had offered grace to the Jews through covenant would not break that covenant with them and basically they could do nothing to exclude themselves from God's ultimate redemptive grace.

He goes so far as to imply that the very denial by the Jewish religious authorities of the grace of God through the Messiah ship of Jesus would in some way be used by God to embrace those persons with redemption
So what is an evangelical to do? If God's grace is just for those who believe (and behave) as we do then we had better get to work. How else will the vast non-Christian population of the world ever receive the Grace of God?

The role of the Christian community is not to determine who will be the receptors of God's grace but to rather be faithful witnesses to that grace in the way in which we live our lives and share the gospel of God's inclusive love.
Our Baptist heritage has many strange twists and turns, bed-fellows and cooperative associations. We come out of a line which itself came out of a union of various Baptist traditions or cousins. One was that of the particular Baptists, and the other was the separate Baptists. One believed that grace was for a chosen few and the other believed that salvation was entirely a matter of free will. One believed that you could loose your salvation, if you ever had it, and the other believed that once you were a Christian you could never lose your salvation. Neither initially paid much attention to evangelism. Out of those unions we came to life and that life preached grace.