In Jesus Holy Name June 22, 2025
Text; Luke 8:27,32 Redeemer
“A Naked Man and a Bunch of Crazy Pigs”
Our Gospel lesson today is a powerful story of Jesus confronting evil. It is an event in the ongoing education of the disciples. It’s a great story full of surprises and a dramatic ending. There are several truths: The first truth is that evil is real. The second truth: When Jesus changes your life…. You will not be able to keep Him a secret.
Years ago growing up in Missouri my father as did many other farmers raise pigs. One day a neighbor called and asked for help because his pigs got out on the road. We ent to help but when we arrived they were already running in the ditch along the side of the road. It was my job to run ahead and cut them off. As I was running I heard a car coming. You could heard the tires on the road. I tried to run faster, my heart was pounding but I could not run faster. That’s when panic set in. you begin to shake but can not stop the panic.. Have you ever had a similar experience?
Well this is what is happening to the man in front of Jesus. His body is shaking. The demons inside the man are in a panic. The man is shaking uncontrollably. They know who Jesus is.
Luke tells us that Jesus and his disciples have just survived a terrible storm in a small fishing boat. The boat was being swamped. They could not bail water fast enough. They were about to drown. Jesus speaks to the raging wind and waves… “Be still.” And the sea became smooth as glass.
Luke records the response of the disciples. “In awe and amazement they asked: “Who is this? Even the wind and water obey him?” It’s a fair question…and demands that those in the boat….reassess their opinion of who they think Jesus really is. It’s one thing to heal a few people, quite another to control nature….with a few words.
The day would not end without another miracle taking place. As soon as the boat touches the shore, and Jesus steps out of the boat, he is met by a demon possessed man. Luke writes: “for a long time this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice…’what do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High!’?” This is not an act of falling to his knees as act of worship. The demon acknowledges that Jesus is God in flesh…They are in a panic They think the end of the world has arrived along with final judgment.
Luke tells us this man was demon possessed. Merrill Unger in his book “Demons in the World Today” writes: Demon possession is a condition in which one or more evil spirits or demons inhabit the body of a human being and can take complete control of their victim at will. By temporarily blotting out consciousness, they can speak and act through the person as their slave or tool. The inhibiting demon can come and go as he pleases.”
This man was under the influence, under the control of evil spirits. This man had been this way a long time. The villagers had tried to control him with chains. They placed him under guard… all to no avail.
The temptation for us who live in a modern world is that our educated culture provides ways to explain away evil. “Oh, obviously this man was psychotic.” They just didn’t know about things like dissociative identity disorders, or bipolar conditions and anti social behavior. We live in a world where we have been conditioned to have scientific or psychological theory’s to explain evil behavior and dismiss the possibility of a real Satan.
Immediately after the Columbine school shootings our culture was trying to analyze Eric Harris and Dylan Kleboil, Even though their tee shirts proclaimed “survival of the fittest.
“If Satan and demons are merely the creation of superstition and imagination, the whole field of demonism belongs to the world of fairy tale and folklore. Jesus was not confronting imaginary evil, it was real. When evil is dismissed as unreal, good becomes irrelevant. Good is only understood in relation to evil. If nothing is evil, then nothing is good.
The Word of God tells us that Satan reigns over a kingdom of darkness that is organized in opposition to God and His creation. (Matt. 12:26) Ever since the fall of Adam the human race has been subject to the oppression, and temptations of Satan and his demons who oppose the work of Jesus. Jesus has come to earth to set humanity free from the curse of sin and the enslavement of mind and body, and the fear of death. (Heb. 2:14)
William Bennett wrote a little book a few years ago which was entitled: “The Death of Outrage”. He writes: “There was a time when society showed outrage at people’s misconduct. But no more. We accept the flaws of others so easily, that we accept their misconduct without hesitation. It’s not that we forgive these people….we simply excuse their behavior. We have forgotten how to blush. We have no shame.”
The haunting reality is that the people in the village of the Gerasenes had become comfortable with evil. During WWII and the Cold War there was a word for this behavior… appeasement. Appeasement describes the efforts of peace at any cost and the acceptance of evil. In 1938 Britain and France, still trying to recover from WWI, signed the Munich Pact, which basically said they would accept Hitler Germany’s take over of Czechoslovakia as long as Germany agreed not to take any other territory. It didn’t work. Germany later swept into Poland.
The apostle Paul reminds us that we are involved in spiritual warfare against the forces of darkness. We do not win by appeasement. We win by standing firm in our faith.
C.S. Lewis in his Screwtape Letters wrote about the confusion about demon possession. “There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about demons. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They themselves are equally pleased with both errors with the same delight.”
The situation facing Jesus in our text is that this is a case of demon possession. The demons, evil spirits, are residing in this person. They exert direct control over his mind and body. Jesus commands the demons to leave the man and they entered into a herd of pigs. The pigs became crazy and ran off the edge of the cliff into the lake. Now, what do you think the reaction of the disciples might be the next time they got into the boat?
Clarification. There is a difference between demon possession and demon or satanic influence, which we often call ‘temptation.’ It is possible for a believer in Jesus to experience suggestions and pressure from Satan. James the brother of Jesus wrote: “When tempted no one should say God is tempting me. For God can not be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone, but each one is tempted when by his own evil desire he is dragged away and enticed….. After desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin…” James 1:13-15) His advice: “Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” James 4:7
The Bible clearly reveals that as a result of Adam’s fall into sin, the human race has been exposed to the power and influence of Satan and his demons. Every human being is subject to Satanic influence. Paul reminds that God…”has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of (his) Son…”
Here’s the process that a believer must be aware of: For a variety of reasons, whether a mis-spoken harsh word, or an unkind act against you, or if you feel there has been an unjust death in your family, Satan can cause that event to produce antagonism toward God and one slowly hardens the heart to the word of God.
If people believe that God is “dead” then they do not owe their Creator supreme love and loyalty, then there is no deterrent to keep them from dabbling in the occult. Setting aside love for God…. Will find people also abandoning any concern for their fellow human beings. Failure to keep the 1st three commandments will lead to a failure to keep the next seven. Crime will sky rocket and social evils will abound.
When laws of moral purity are ignored Satan and his demons can drag men down lower into moral depravity. FoxNew.com June 20th 2007 by Mark Kriegel
“Adam ‘pacman’ Jones was drafted by the Tennessee Titans in 2005. Since then he has been involved in 11 separate police investigations and two shootings at strip clubs in Las Vegas and Atlanta.
First it was cocaine. Then it was steroids, now it’s clear that ball players have another insidious epidemic. Strip clubs have become the drug of choice. (the article continues) How stupid can one guy be? He’s been suspended for 10 games and if convicted he’ll loose his 1.5 million salary. At 4:15 a.m. he and a few friends, acting gentlemanly…. Got into a dispute over a dancer… next thing you know shots are fired. It’s happened twice. Nothing good happens in strip joints. No matter how much money you have, how upscale the establishment, eventually you reach a state of spiritual poverty….you find yourself showering strippers with $81,020 dollars in cash….”That’s a small temptation that became enslavement!
Evil destroys us. Sin is always self destructive. The alcoholic, the drug dependant, the promiscuous are all in degrees drawing people into slavery. Sin puts people in terrible bondage and Satan becomes our master. The demons in our gospel lesson had this man in bondage. They took away his dignity and sense of identity. He was naked and living in tombs. He was an outcast of society.
Jesus never leaves people the same. Real and permanent change happened to this man. Real and permanent change happened to Peter, to Mary Magdalene who also had seven demons driven out of her by Jesus. (Mark 16:9) Zacchaeus was a changed man.
The apostle Paul wrote in II Corinthians 5:17 “if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come.”
Word spread fast when those attending the pigs run back to town and tell what happened. When the villagers came out they found the same man, dressed and in his right mind sitting at the feet of Jesus. The man who had been demon possessed was cured.
Luke writes: “..the people of the region asked Jesus to leave because they were overcome with fear.” The people were afraid of Jesus. Amazing. They had grown comfortable with evil behavior. What frightens them is that the man has become good. What frightens them is not the unholy, but the holy.
The second truth of the story: When Jesus changes your life… you can not keep him a secret. Following Jesus is now and always has been a choice. The townspeople chose to ask Jesus to leave. Jesus left. He got into the boat and departed. The man wanted to go with Jesus and his disciples. He begged to go along, but Jesus asked him to stay and to tell the story.
You have a story to tell about Jesus. Let others see the story in your lifestyle. Let them hear the “great things God has done for you.”
