Lent 2—Reminiscere
Beloved. Our Sunday has the Latin name “Reminiscere”, which means “remember”. Perhaps you can see the word “reminisce” in it. Today is called Reminiscere, or “Remember Sunday” because of the first word of the Introit for today from Psalm 25: Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old. Perhaps the idea for many is that to “remember”/ to “reminisce” conjures up the image of a bunch of old people sitting on the porch or in the front room talking about the days gone past, the “good ole days.” But that’s not what Scripture is talking about when it talks about God remembering or when we ask God, as David did, Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old. The simple fact is that to remember is an action with God; when God remembers things happens / He does something. When we call upon God to “remember”, we are asking Him to take action.
And why is it that we can ask God to remember His tender mercies and [His] lovingkindnesses? –Because He gave us His word and promise; because He acted in the past, He will act in mercy in the future. We see a beautiful example of this in words of the father of St. John the Baptizer, St. Zacharias. St. Zacharias praises God for the birth of his son, St. John the Baptizer, the forerunner of the Messiah, because if John, the one who was to prepare the way for the Savior had come, that means that the Savior, Christ Jesus, was coming as well! St. Zacharias’ hymn of praise is called the Benedictus and begins [Lk 1.68 ff.]: Blessed is the Lord God of Israel, for He has visited and redeemed His people, and has raised up a horn of salvation for us… As He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets, who have been since the world began, that we should be saved from our enemies…To perform the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember His holy covenant. The point? St. Zacharias praises God because God remembered; He acted; He was faithful to His promise and His mercy and sent the long awaited Savior into the world. So whenever we ask God for His help, we are asking Him to remember—to remember His word and promise, to remember Jesus and His saving work—and to act for us.
We see another beautiful example of this in the words of Institution of the Blessed Sacrament. Jesus says [1 Cor.11. 25, 26]: do this in remembrance of Me. We celebrate the Holy Sacrament of the Altar not just so that don’t forget about Jesus, or think of some long past event. Instead, by celebrating the holy Sacrament we are asking God to remember the suffering and death of His Son for our Salvation—and God wants to be reminded of it—and so act in our behalf, that is, grant us the forgiveness of sin and eternal life Jesus won for us by His life, suffering and death and proclaimed by His resurrection and ascension.
Of course, we see another beautiful example of “remembering” in today’s Gospel. There we meet a Canaanite woman who in effect says to Jesus: Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old, when she says: “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! A demon is severely tormenting my daughter!” And even when Jesus seemingly “forgets” and does not act for her and even seems to snub her, she came and knelt in front of him, saying, “Lord, help me.” Praying, pleading is asking God to remember, to act for us. This is nothing but faith in action. And we have great reason to always be in prayer asking, pleading, begging: Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old. And why do we have such great need? –Because we too in this world suffer under the devil’s tyranny; we suffer under sin and its effects. But as we learn as we examine our text briefly this morning that the devil and his tyranny, all of the worst that he can throw at us must ultimately serve Jesus’ glorification and our spiritual good.
The thing is—it seems that the devil is having his way in the world. That’s also what it looked like in our text. After all, it begins: Jesus left that place and withdrew into the region of Tyre and Sidon. Why did He leave? He was leaving the land of Israel, heading toward the non-Jewish area of the region of Tyre and Sidon. He was leaving to get away from the faithless religious leaders of the Jews. Shortly before our text, after Jesus is preaching, we read [Mt. 15.12,14]: His disciples came and said to Him, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard [what You were preaching]? But He answered and said, “…Let them alone. They are blind leaders of the blind. And if the blind leads the blind, both will into a ditch.” The point? –The religious leaders of the Jews and their followers were “safely” within the devil’s kingdom. They rejected and continued to reject Jesus and His preaching—His call to repent and His call to believe that He is the promised Messiah—the Son of God and only Savior of the world. So it looks like the devil is having his way—not only is Jesus’ preaching being met with rejection and opposition, but now by leaving His gracious presence is being withdrawn from those who were tired of the word and promise of God and despised its blessings. The devil had seemingly ruled the day.
Then, as Jesus leaves, He is met by another evidence of the devil’s seemingly having his way. There a Canaanite woman from that territory came and kept crying out, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! A demon is severely tormenting my daughter!” There we see the devil’s great power and torment—even to the point of taking over/ possessing a girl. It seems as if the devil is ruling the show—claiming and seemingly taking possession of people at will, certainly with the intention of leading them and others to destruction. We see the anguish and torment of the mother who, too, suffered along with her daughter, as she identified with the sufferings of her daughter, as if they were her own: Have mercy on me… A demon is severely tormenting my daughter. Obviously there was nothing the mother could do and the pagan religion around her would/ could do nothing, being in league with the devil anyway.
A look around our world today does not yield any different view. We see that the devil is seemingly having his way. We see wars among nations, and conflict among people and in families. We see greed and wealth ruling. We see all sorts of sexual immorality and deviancy. We see the destruction of families. We see politicians erupt in joy as they make it more easily possible to kill the unborn. We see many getting sucked into drug use. We see many turning away from our Lord and His Church. And of course the list could go on and on. But the point is clear: it truly looks like the devil is the prince of the world and is having his way with nothing stopping him. And as much as we Christians pray: Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old, the more it seems like what happened to the Canaanite woman is happening to us: But he did not answer her a word. Are our prayers futile? Is it perhaps that the devil cannot be stopped, that his power is unlimited? Will his tyranny continue? The short and clear answer is: absolutely not! What does our text say at the end? Jesus answered her, “Woman, your faith is great! It will be done for you, just as you desire.” And her daughter was healed at that very hour. By just His word, by just Jesus willing it, the devil was routed and had to depart from that girl. So the simple fact is and remains: Jesus is the victor; He is always victorious—even when it looks like He isn’t or can’t be. That is vital for us to keep in mind as we see the various evils in the world, as we feel and experience the various evils in us and suffer from the evils in the world. Jesus—not the devil—is still the one true almighty God—even though it looks like the devil is having his way and running the show. As our text makes clear and as we will see in full glory and beauty on Easter is that the devil’s tyranny must ultimately serve to glorify Jesus.
Jesus left that place and withdrew into the region of Tyre and Sidon. There a Canaanite woman from that territory came and kept crying out, “Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! A demon is severely tormenting my daughter!” What would have happened had the demon not severely tormented this girl? Would this mother have even bothered to pay attention when someone told her about Jesus and His casting out demons? Would she even then have come to faith in Jesus and confess Him as the Lord, that is, the God, the God of the OT Israelites who had become also true man—Son of David— and had come to this world to bring blessing? Would this mother have remained with her heathen, soul-destroying religion, had the demon not possessed her daughter which drove her to Jesus? Or would Jesus have even withdrew out of Israel had Satan not instigated the Jews to reject Him and His word—withdrawn to go near where this woman was? You see, dear Christian, yes, it may look like the devil is in control, ruling the show but not only is Jesus still the king and ruler over all—the almighty God of heaven and earth and our Savior—but whatever evil the devil works, whatever his great tyranny, it must all serve ultimately to glorify Jesus.
But he did not answer her a word. His disciples came and pleaded, “Send her away, because she keeps crying out after us.” She wouldn’t give up. Why? Confessing Him as Lord and Son of David, she, in simple Spirit worked faith—as Scripture says [1 Cor 12.3]: no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit—she knew who Jesus was and all her trust was in Him. By the work of the Holy Spirit she saw both the emptiness of her heathen religion and the devil’s power. She went to Jesus in the certainty of that faith that He and He alone could destroy and overturn the devil’s work.
And He did! With His will and that simple word He rescued her daughter from that demon possession, from the devil’s tyranny. And what happened through all this and in the end—by Jesus working with her by His seeming refusal of her request—is that this Canaanite’s woman was strengthened and purified. And in that strengthened and purified faith she glorified Jesus all the more.
Jesus’ work here that day of healing this girl from that demon is a wonderful foretaste of what Jesus would do on the cross—defeat and destroy the devil’s tyranny and that of his allies sin, death and hell. As public and as horrific as Jesus’ death was, it made all the glorious and public His resurrection victory. The devil’s most shameful work had to serve to glorify Jesus.
Jesus’ defeat of the devil and all his hellish allies on the cross brings Jesus’ victory to all people. With this non-Jewish woman coming to faith and coming to Jesus, we get a further glimpse that Jesus’ work is for all people. Just as He entered that Gentile area, so too now do His word and His Church go into all the world bringing His saving work and blessing to all people. It came to us; it came to you and me; and it continues to go to others. The most glorious thing is that just as Jesus cast out that demon from the girl, so too, He came to us in the waters of holy baptism, rescued us from the devil’s kingdom, from the tyranny of sin, death and hell. He has given us His victory over the devil and his allies and brought us into His holy family. And by His Holy Spirit, He leads us into a life of faith and good works—by which we show that in/by Jesus the devil is conquered in us.
As we see the devil seemingly having his way in the world today, remember that Jesus is still the victor. And even/ especially if we don’t understand it, we know in faith that this tyranny of the devil we see or experience must somehow/ some way glorify Jesus. He is the Victor; the devil a defeated power. As we live certain of Jesus’ victory—and His victory is through faith our victory/ as we still suffer under the devil’s tyranny in this life, we cry out to our victorious Lord Jesus certain of His help and grace: Remember, O Lord, Your tender mercies and Your lovingkindnesses, for they have been of old. INJ Amen