SPIRITUAL BLINDNESS AND TRUE BLESSEDNESS.
Luke 11:14-28.
The spiritual blindness of the people opposed to Jesus is demonstrated in their reaction to His good works. Their refusal to hear His message is echoed in their speaking out against Him.
LUKE 11:14. A demon-possessed man, who was physically dumb, was brought to Jesus: and He healed him. The positive impression which our Lord was making upon the ordinary people of Israel was growing, as was the negative reaction of the religious leaders.
LUKE 11:15. Religious unbelief accused Jesus of being in league with the devil. “This fellow does not cast out demons except by Beelzebub, the ruler of demons.” The name Beelzebub translates, ‘Master of flies.’
No doubt the religious leaders were concerned about this country Rabbi, who was causing such a commotion. ‘What right had He?’ they reasoned. ‘He did not come from any of our schools. He must be casting out devils in league with the devils!’
In accusing Jesus, these people were in fact condemning themselves. They did not doubt that a miracle had truly happened, that the demons were cast out. But by calling the work of God by the name of the work of the devil, they were blaspheming the Holy Spirit.
LUKE 11:16. Others asked Him for a “sign from heaven.” What had the religious leaders just seen if not a sign, both of Jesus’ authority, and of the presence of the kingdom of God amongst them?
LUKE 11:17-18. “How can Satan cast out Satan?” asked Jesus in His first little parable. It is quite evident that a kingdom or a house that rises up against itself will ultimately fall. So if Satan is divided against himself, then he is at his end.
LUKE 11:19-20. Jesus explained that even their own exorcists would agree that demons are not cast out by demons, but by the power of God. This was the “finger of God,” the Spirit of God at work amongst them. The kingdom of God had come to them, yet they could not recognise it because it challenged their own religious authority.
LUKE 11:21-22. The second little parable looks at things from another angle. Jesus illustrates Satan as a strong man guarding his house. Now a stronger than he has come, and is in process of binding Satan, and spoiling his house.
LUKE 11:23. Jesus had come to bind Satan before destroying the evil one’s hold upon the kingdoms of the world. And whoever is not in favour of Jesus is His enemy!
LUKE 11:24-26. A person might not think themselves to be possessed of an evil spirit, but to be living our lives without Christ puts us in a similar plight. It is the very height of madness to rush into eternity without having found peace with God through the Lord Jesus Christ. All have sinned, and all sinners need repentance.
Repentance is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it is a turning away from sin. On the other, it is turning to good. It is out with the old, in with the new.
Yet this is not just turning over a new leaf, amending our lives. To ‘cease to do evil’ and to ‘do good’ is impossible unless there is also a spiritual change: a spiritual emptying, and a spiritual infilling.
It is well that the demon is cast out: but when the demon goes, there is no native goodness to rebuild life, there is only a void. Unless that void is filled with God Himself, the demon will return with seven others worse than itself, and the patient will be rendered worse than before. Thankfully, in His mercy, the Lord not only casts out the evil, but gives us His Holy Spirit.
LUKE 11:27. A certain unnamed woman now pronounced a blessing upon the one who bore Jesus. Of course, when rightly understood, she was not wrong. After all, the angel Gabriel had told Mary, ‘blessed art thou among women’ (cf. Luke 1:28); and Mary herself humbly acknowledged, ‘henceforth all generations shall call me blessed’ (cf. Luke 1:48).
LUKE 11:28. However, Jesus’ response to this woman’s enthusiastic outburst was to announce that true blessedness rested not in a material relationship with Him, but in “hearing the word of God, and keeping it.” Which, incidentally, His mother Mary did.
