Luke 8:26–39 We can read about this account as well in Matthew
8:28–34 and Mark 5:1–20.
Luke
8:26 “Then they sailed to the country of the Gadarenes,” Matthew’s Gospel
tells us the name of this location as “Gergesa”
(country of
the Gergesenes-Matthew 8:28,
G1086 Γεργεσηνός Gĕrgĕsēnŏs[1]),
while Mark and Luke both give us the name as “Gadara” (country of the Gadarenes-Mark 5:1, Luke 8:26, G1046 Γαδαρηνός Gadarēnŏs[2]).
Dr. Thomson in
his book The Land and the Book writes:
From Origen down to the last critic who
has tried his skill upon the Greek text of the New Testament, the conflicting
and contradictory readings of manuscripts in regard to the place where the
miracle was performed have furnished a fruitful source of discussion. [3] He goes on to share his discovery
during his travels through Israel. He states that according to the topography
of the land, the name of the town is Gersa, or Kersa.[4]
Gersa (or Kersa) is about six miles southeast of Gergesa,[5]
and it is in the same district of the city of Gadara. The site of the miracle, therefore, was not at Gadara. This is
an important result. Nor was it in the country of the Gadarenes, because that
country lay south of the great river Jermuk; and, besides, if the territory of
that city did at any time reach to the south end of the lake, there is no
mountain there above it adapted to the conditions of the miracle; and further,
the city itself where it was wrought was evidently on the shore…It is within a
few rods of the shore, and an immense mountain rises directly above it, in
which are ancient tombs, out of some of which the two men possessed of the
devils may have issued to meet Jesus. The lake is so near the base of the
mountain, that the swine, rushing madly down it, could not stop, but would be
hurried on into the water and drowned. The place is one which our Lord would be
likely to visit-having Capernaum in full view to the north, and Galilee “over
against it” as Luke says it was.[6]
Dr. Thomson addresses the
discrepancies in the name of this place among the manuscripts: I have an abiding conviction, however, that
Matthew wrote the name correctly. He was from this region, and personally knew
the localities. His Gospel, also was written first of all, and mainly
circulated in the beginning, in these Oriental regions. John does not mention
the miracle, and Mark and Luke were strangers to this part of the country, and
may possibly have intended, by mentioning the country of the Gadarenes, to
point out to their distant Greek and Roman readers the mere vicinity of the
place where the miracle was wrought. Gergesa, or Gerasa, or Chersa, however
pronounced, was small and unknown; while Gadar was a Greek city, celebrated for
its temples and theatre, and for the warm baths on the Hieromax just
below it. They may, therefore, have written “country of the Gadarenes.” But I
think it far more probable that intermeddling scholiasts made the change from
Gergesa to Gadara, in order to indicate to the unlearned the spot where the
wonder took place. There is a certain resemblance between the names, and when
introduced into a leading manuscript, the basis for the controversy would be
fairly laid down.[7]
That would be akin for me to tell
people that I am from the Los Angeles area in Southern California, because
everyone knows about Los Angeles, not everyone knows the name of the city where
I grew up.
Luke
8:26 “which is opposite Galilee” After the storm at sea, Jesus and
the disciples make it safely across the Sea of Galilee, on the opposite shore
from the Galilee, into the portion of land that was predominately Gentile. Isaiah
prophesied that the coming Messiah would minister in “Galilee of the Gentiles” in Isaiah
9:1–2. This of course was fulfilled when Jesus began His ministry in
“The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali”,
which now was being occupied by the Gentiles “Galilee
of the Gentiles”. Matthew records for us the beginning of Jesus’
Galilean ministry in Matthew 4:13–16,
fulfilling Isaiah 9:1–2.
What we will study in The
Maniac Missionary…01. The
Destruction of Demons (Luke 8:27-29); 02. The Deliverance of the Saviour (Luke 8:29-36); and 03. The Fear of the Multitude (Luke 8:37-39).
01. The
Destruction of Demons (Luke
8:27–29) When we studied The Authority of Jesus in the
Capernaum synagogue in Luke 4:31-37,
we saw that there was a man possessed with a demon (Luke 4:33-34). Demon possession is real, not just something that
Hollywood made up. Though it is real, it is also something that seems to be misunderstood.
Demons were originally created as angels along with Satan. But when Satan
rebelled, he and the one third of the angels (Revelation 12:3-4) who followed
him were cast out of heaven (Luke 10:18), though Satan still seems to have
access (Job
1:6; Job
2:1) as “the accuser of…(the) brethren, who accused them before our God day and night,
has been cast down.” (Revelation 12:10; cf.
Job
1:9; Job
2:5; Zechariah
3:1-2; Luke 23:31) There are people who “see” a demon
behind every addiction and everything that goes wrong in their life. But then
there are those who will not even acknowledge it as something that is real even
today. Biblically, there is no clear-cut example of an occasion where a demon
ever inhabited or possessed a true believer in Jesus as their Saviour. Never in
the New Testament are we warned of the possibility of a believer being demon
possessed. Nowhere in the New Testament do we see anyone binding, rebuking or
casting out demons from a true believer. It is noteworthy as well that nowhere
in the epistles do we see that believers are instructed to cast out demons. Every
time in the New Testament that there is a recorded demon possession, it is
always of an unbeliever. The most clear-cut passage on this is found in 2 Corinthians
6:14-16 which says that light and darkness cannot mix. Paul says
that God “has delivered us from the power of darkness
and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love” (Colossians 1:13)
and John reminds us “He who is in you
is greater than he who is in the world.” (1 John 4:4).
There is much out there regarding the supernatural realm,
but the only true and accurate source of information on the supernatural is the
Bible. It is unwise and useless to seek knowledge about the supernatural
anywhere else (Isaiah 8:19–20). Isaiah
here is questioning the wisdom of people who go to the dead to find out
information about their future, instead of seeking the One true living God. The
place to look is in “the law and…the testimony”
(Isaiah 8:20; cf. Isaiah 8:16),
which has all the information that God’s people needed to know about their
future. When a person chooses not pay attention to the Word of God, it means
that they are someone who does not have the Light, meaning Jesus the Christ (John 3:19–20).
Jesus didn’t come to earth as a man to make everyday a
Friday, to give us our best life now. He didn’t come to make our marriages
better, get us out of monetary debt. He came to “save His people from their
sins” (Matthew 1:21) and
to “destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).
Luke
8:27 “And when He stepped out on the land” Jesus gets out of the
boat and immediately (Mark 5:2) “there met Him a certain man from the city who had demons
for a long time.” Matthew tells us that when Jesus and His disciples
came out of the boats (Matthew 4:36), “there
met Him two demon-possessed men” and he also described them as “exceedingly fierce, so that no one could pass that way.”
(Matthew 8:28) Some might
say that there is a discrepancy here, but more than likely the one that both
Mark and Luke only mention is the leader of the two, the one who does all the
talking.
Luke 8:27 “And he wore no
clothes, nor did he live in a house but in the tombs.” Dr. Luke
describes this demoniac as one who had no shame, for he went about without
clothes. Shame has been connected with nakedness ever since man fell in the
Garden (Genesis
3:7; cf. Revelation 3:18; Revelation 16:15). On the eastern
shore of the Sea of Galilee, there are steep cliffs with many caves, which were
used by the locals to bury their dead. At this time, tombs were considered the
place where demons hangout, so it was natural if you will that these
demon-possessed men would take up residence here, and many of the locals stayed
away from this area because of these two men. From the Jewish point of view,
contact with the dead was a source of impurity (Numbers 19:11-13), so you could
imagine what the disciples were thinking as they came ashore and seeing this
naked demoniac who lives with dead people! Mark tells us that this
demon-possessed man was constantly “cutting
himself with stones” (Mark 5:5).
This is something that we see many people in our society today finding relief by
destroying their bodies through cutting etc.
Luke 8:28 “When he saw Jesus, he
cried out, fell down before Him,” Mark tells us that when the
demon-possessed man saw Jesus, “he ran and
worshiped Him.” (Mark 5:6)
Luke 8:28 “and with a loud voice
said, “What have I to do with You, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You,
do not torment me!”” Matthew records for us that the two
demon-possessed men “…suddenly…cried out,
saying, “What have we to do with You, Jesus, You Son of God? Have You come here
to torment us before the time?”” (Matthew
8:29) “What have I to do with You, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You,
do not torment me!” (Luke 8:28)
is basically the same thing that the demon-possessed man in the Capernaum
Synagogue (Luke
4:33-34) cried out and spoke to Jesus.
Luke 8:28 “Son of the Most High God?”
Because these demons are in the supernatural realm, they are able to recognize
and know who Jesus really is, the “Son of the Most
High God” (cf. Matthew 4:3; Matthew 4:6; Luke 4:3; Luke 4:9).
“the Most High God”
is a divine title (cf. Genesis 14:18–20). Usually when it occurs in
the Old Testament, it is used to describe God’s authority over the Gentile
nations and their gods (Deuteronomy
32:8–9; Isaiah 14:12–15; Daniel 4:17). So it is
interesting that the demons used this title to describe Jesus, revealing that
He is God and not just His Son as the Arian (modern Jehovah’s Witnesses) heresy
teaches. The demons believe that Jesus is the Son of God, but their belief is
not a saving faith (James 2:19).
Luke 8:28 “I beg You, do not torment me!”
Not only do these demons believe that Jesus is the Son of God, who comes with
the authority to command them what to do, but they also believe in a future
judgment, the Lake of Fire (Matthew 25:41;
Revelation 9:2; Revelation 19:20; Revelation
20:2-3; Revelation 20:10; Revelation 20:14-15). Matthew writes that the
demons said, “What have we to do with You,
Jesus, You Son of God? Have You come here to torment us before the time?”
(Matthew 8:29) They are asking Jesus if
He is going to torture or torment them before the Day of Judgment. Mark records
that they said, “What have I to do with You,
Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I implore You by God that You do not torment
me.” (Mark 5:7)
Luke
8:29 Dr. Luke records what great
destruction the demons were doing to the man that they possessed. In Mark 9:22
and Luke
9:42 we read of a demon throwing a boy into the fire. The demons
would seize the man many times, and that he was such a great threat to the
people who lived nearby that they would do all that they could to control him
and his companion. But the demons would give them supernatural strength to
break every type of bonds that they attempted to put on him! Mark records that “no one could bind him, not even with chains, because he had often been bound with shackles
and chains. And the chains had been pulled apart by him, and the shackles
broken in pieces; neither could anyone tame him.” (Mark 5:3–4)
02. The
Deliverance of the Saviour (Luke
8:29–33)
Luke 8:29 Only Mark records the actual command of Jesus to
leave the man in Mark 5:8. The fact that Jesus was able to command the
demons to leave the man and that they obeyed is a mark of the deity of Jesus,
for what He did is only possible by God. Only God is more powerful than angels,
who Peter tells us that angels “are greater in
power and might” (2 Peter 2:11)
than mankind, and only God surpasses them.
Luke
8:30 The name of the man was not
Legion, but the demonic spokesmen said that was his name, which was appropriate
because there were many demons possessing the man. There were typically about
6,000 soldiers in a Roman Legion. This doesn’t mean that there was that many
demons, but it also cannot be ruled out, either way we know that there were a
lot of demons in this man!
Luke
8:31 The abyss, or in the Greek
it is G12 ἄβυσσος abussŏs[8] or
the bottomless pit that is mentioned in Revelation
9:1–2, which is a place where some demons are currently imprisoned
and who will be released for a brief time during the Tribulation. These
demons are freaking out because they know that Jesus has the authority as the
Son of God to cast them into the abyss where they will have to await their
final judgment.
Luke
8:32 “Now a herd of many swine was feeding there on the mountain. So they
begged Him that He would permit them to enter them.” Notice the word
“they”, as it shows that it was more
than one demon. This strange request by
the demons to be sent into a herd of swine reveals the demons desire to inhabit
living creatures. Being that there was a
herd of swine in that region again reaffirms that this region was not Jewish,
but Gentile, for the Law forbade the Jews from having anything to do with swine
(Leviticus
11:7; Deuteronomy 14:8).
Luke
8:32 “He permitted them.” This reinforces the idea that Jesus is the
Son of God, and foreshadowing when He will come back as the conquering Messiah,
Mashiach ben David! It is interesting to note that Dr. Luke refers to the man “who had demons”
(Luke 8:27)
and then he describes the man as having an “unclean spirit” (Luke 8:29). This gives the account
some symmetry when the “unclean spirit” (Luke 8:29) enters into the unclean
animals, the swine.
Luke
8:33 Matthew seems to allude to
the fact that both “demon-possessed men”
(Matthew 8:33) were delivered from their demons by Jesus. Mark
tells us that there were about 2,000 swine in the herd (Mark 5:13). Now that the demons leave the men,
they inhabit the swine and cause the swine to act much in the same way that the
man acted, in a maniacal, self-destructive way, leading to the death of the
herd. This stunning turn of events, where the swine were feeding on the
mountain (Luke
8:32) and then violently rushing down the steep place and drowning
in the Sea of Galilee are verifiable proof that these demons were cast out. We
are never told as to why Jesus permitted these demons to inhabit the pigs and
cause the herd to drown. But what we do know is that Jesus has authority over
the supernatural.
03. The Fear of
the Multitude (Luke 8:34–39)
Luke
8:34 The swine herdsmen, who
witnessed all of this, ran away and told everyone in the city and surrounding
area what just happened.
Luke
8:35 Matthew tells us that the
whole city came out in Matthew 8:34. When all of the people came out,
they all saw that the demon-possessed men were in their “right mind”. This reminds me of what Paul told
Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:7.
The demon-possessed man was
literally a maniac, running around naked, cutting himself and living among the
dead (Luke
8:27-29), now he is sitting at the feet of Jesus, no longer crazy
but with a sound mind.
Luke
8:36-37 One would expect that
the local inhabitants would be happy that Jesus delivered these men from the
demons, but instead they were fearful and asked Him to leave. It could because
they lost a great source of income with the pigs, or that they realized that
they were sinners in the presence of a Holy God, but whatever it was “they were seized with great fear”. The Greek
word for “fear” here is G5401 φόβος phŏbŏs, the root word of the
our English word phobia, an extreme fear
or terror.
Luke 8:38-39 While the inhabitants of area want Jesus to
leave, the demon-possessed man wanted to stay with Jesus. Mark tells us that
this took place when Jesus was just getting into the boat to leave (Mark 5:18). The demon-possessed man
then proclaimed Jesus to all of Galilee of the Gentiles, telling them what
great things God did for him. What
we see here in this account is the God-man displaying His power and authority
over the supernatural, and the obedience that the supernatural must pay to Him.
In dealing with the demons, we see the mercy of God, for He takes no pleasure
in tormenting and torturing the demons (cf. Ezekiel 18:32; John 3:17), even though they are beyond redemption, for they
made their choice to follow Satan when Satan chose to rebel against God. We
also see that Jesus was compassionate to the demons, fulfilling their request.
[1] Strong, J. (2009). A Concise Dictionary of the Words in the Greek Testament and The Hebrew
Bible (Vol. 1, p. 20). Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software.
[2] Strong, J. (2009). A Concise Dictionary of the Words in the Greek Testament and The Hebrew
Bible (Vol. 1, p. 20). Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software.
[3] Thomson, W.M. The
Land and the Book [London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1890], p375.
[4] Thomson, W.M. The
Land and the Book [London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1890], p375.
[5] Robertson, A. T. (1933). Word Pictures in the New Testament (Mk 5:1). Nashville, TN:
Broadman Press.
[6] Thomson,
W.M. The Land and the Book [London:
T. Nelson and Sons, 1890], p376.
[7] Thomson, W.M. The
Land and the Book [London: T. Nelson and Sons, 1890], p377.
[8] Strong, J. (2009). A Concise Dictionary of the Words in the Greek Testament and The Hebrew
Bible (Vol. 1, p. 7). Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software.
No comments:
Post a Comment