One belated thought: Matthew 15:10-28

This is a belated thought because it didn't fully occur to me until our closing hymn on Sunday. The lesson was so strong for me at the time that I took time between the hymn and the benediction to expound upon it briefly.

We closed our service by singing "Marvelous Grace," which contains the words, "marvelous, infinite, matchless grace."

During the message, I had worked both with the parenthetical pairing of the two feeding miracles, and also with the matchup between the Pharisees of little faith and the Canaanite woman of great faith. I tend to share the perspective of those who see the feeding of the five thousand as demonstrating Jesus as the abundant Bread of Life to the 12 tribes of Israel, and the feeding of the four thousand as demonstrating Jesus as the abundant Bread of Life to the 7 pagan nations of the Decapolis.

I think that it was vitally important for first century Jewish readers to understand that the Gentiles had not robbed them of their national salvation birth-right. By Matthew placing this narrative within the parentheses of the feedings and next to a narrative where Jesus called the Pharisees "blind guides," he helps his readers understand that the Gentiles are receiving "leftovers" and "crumbs" because they have faith with surpasses that of the Pharisees.

With that background in mind, here's my belated thought:

If you take a loaf of "marvelous, infinite grace" and break off a crumb, what do you have? "Marvelous, infinite grace!"

In other words, what good is a mustard seed or yeast? It is of infinite worth. A crumb of the Bread of Life is more than enough for me, for it is infinite.

May we feast upon the infinite crumbs of God's grace and be eternally satisfied.

Grace and Peace,

PastorJon