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The Second Sunday after Pentecost, 06/23/2019
Sermon on Luke 8:26-39, by Paul C. Sizemore
“An Unusual Departure”
Departure: Everyone must know what a “departure” is. A departure signifies an “act of leaving.” There is, of course, a physical departure. People, who are catching a flight out of town at the airport, certainly want to know their “Scheduled Time of Departure” beforehand.
But the word “departure” can also signify a deviation from an established norm. Take, for example, that man who has never eaten “spicy” foods before in his whole life, but who greatly surprises his wife on their wedding anniversary by driving them to a restaurant featuring only Indian Cuisine; food, endemic to the nation of India.
He greatly surprises her when he orders CURRY as a “departure” from his unusually bland diet. There are some “normal” departures, as a matter of routine, but then again there are also some very “unusual” departures that signify a complete break with the routine of one’s past.
The Gospel lesson we read is just packed full of some very unusual departures.
First, there is the unusual departure of Jesus into Gentile territory.
That this was an unusual itinerary for Jesus and his disciples becomes clearly evident to us in the use of that word “opposite” in verse 26: “Then they sailed to the country of the Gerasenes which is ‘opposite’ Galilee!”
The city of Gerasa was located about 30 miles southeast of the Sea of Galilee. Another city much closer to the sea, only five miles away, was named Gadara. These various names all refer to that same general region, so that this story takes place very close to the Sea of Galilee.
That this is an area in which many Gentiles are living, becomes abundantly clear to us with the revelation that large herds of pigs were being tended there.
Jesus departs into what would have no doubt been considered by many of his contemporaries as “pagan” territory, far away from the synagogues of the Jews; far away from the people of Israel and their land.
Once again, as he did for the Roman Centurion’s servant (Luke 7:1-10), Jesus brings his healing power to bear upon a Gentile. And it is certainly significant that immediately before this story, on the way there, that Jesus has just silenced a terrible storm on the Sea of Galilee, bringing a great spirit of calm to the wind and waves!
These ancient peoples believed that demons were the cause of high winds, dark skies and troubled waters! But now, as part two, in this powerful sequence of events, Jesus is going to completely silence the demonic storm in the life of this Gerasene man!
Here, Jesus reveals himself to be “An Equal Opportunity God” for any who find themselves stuck in a storm. The man who welcomes Jesus to this foreign territory is in “terrible shape” in every respect of these words!
He is unclothed and has been living among the tombs. For all practical purposes, he’s a “dead” man walking around, only to be possessed by demons that drive him into the wild.
He’s a wild thing who breaks physical chains but cannot break the chains in his own life.
His demonic problems were “legion” meaning that they were hugely manifold!
“Legion” was the designation given to a Roman army of four to six thousand soldiers. Yet, in a moment of lucidity, this demoniac answers the question that the disciples raised for themselves just a short while before this, immediately after had Jesus calmed that horrific storm; a question they could not yet fully answer for themselves: “Who is this that even the wind and the waves obey him” (Luke 9:25b).
Surprisingly, however, the demoniac gives the right answer! He addresses our Lord as: “Jesus, Son of the Most-High God!”
This naked, homeless, dead, foreign, outsider clearly sees who Jesus is, who at this point makes his assessment superior to that of Jesus’ own disciples! Yet, this demon-possessed man is still unable to recognize his own sickness. He may have falsely believed that everyone wore chains and shackles as a vogue fashion statement. Ironically, he therefore, begs Jesus not to torment him when he is in already being tormented! When Jesus asks this man his name—the demons that possess him will not allow him to answer the question for himself! They assert their authority over the man once again and say “Legion.”
Secondly, there is the unusual departure of 4 to 6 thousand demons that have been exorcised from a demon-possessed man. In verse 31 we read, “And they begged him not to command them to depart into the abyss.”
These demons who had been temporarily privileged to depart from hell by Satan to harass this beleaguered man on earth, are now on the verge of being cast out of that man, by the Holy Son of God—but the last place they want to go – is straight to hell!
This word “abyss” signifies the depths or pit to which the dead or evil spirits are consigned (Romans 10:7; Revelation 9:1-21).
Since in the mindset of the Jewish people, who very well could have also been among the first recipients reading Luke’s Gospel: “Pigs” and “swine” were unclean animals!
Thirdly, therefore, it makes perfect sense to Luke’s readers that these demons would have requested an UNUSUAL DEPARTURE FOR THEMSELVES, AS WELL! “They begged our Lord that he might command them to enter into a large herd of pigs!” So, Jesus gave them permission. “Then the demons came out of the man and entered the pigs, and the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned” (Vv. 31-33)!
Fourthly, now, there is a remarkable departure that becomes evident in this whole man’s demeanor! For what a change has come about in every aspect of his public persona.
- The healed man put on clothes and he’s in his right mind. This is good news for him.
- He has now been given, by the grace of God, a new lease on life!
But unfortunately, what turned out to be good news for him, unfortunately had become bad news for others! While this man’s whole life is mightily blessed through Jesus’ healing, there was a great cost extracted from the local farmers associated with this man’s healing.
Surprisingly enough, the stock prices for the Hormel Meat Company placed within the region of Gadara there that day hugely plummeted—on that day when Jesus made “deviled ham.”
The owners of the swineherds may well have lost their livelihood. With the plunge of the pigs into the lake, their livelihood went down the drain, no doubt, too.
One storm had stopped but it started another storm in the lives of the swineherd owners!
THE HEALING OF ONE MAN CAUSED HURT TO ANOTHER. SO THAT THERE WAS A HIGH COST ASSOCIATED WITH THE HEALING THAT TOOK PLACE THERE THAT DAY—A HIGH COST THAT NO ONE COULD EVER HAVE POSSIBLY PREDICTED.
BUT ISN’T THE SAME THING TRUE FOR ALL OF US—BUT IN REVERSE?
IN THE SENDING OF HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON JESUS CHRIST INTO OUR WORLD—HE HAS MADE IT POSSIBLE FOR US TO BECOME HEALED TOO—TO BECOME NEW PEOPLE—TO BECOME PEOPLE IN OUR RIGHT MINDS, CLOTHED IN THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD’S OWN SON?
BUT SO THAT WE MIGHT BE HEALED AND MADE NEW, THE HOLY SON TOTALLY PAID THE HIGH COST OF GOD’S REDEMPTION FOR US!
“And when I think that God his Son not sparing, sent him to die, I scarce can take it in! That on the cross my burden gladly bearing, he bled and died to take away my sin; then sings my soul, my Savior God to thee, how great thou art! How great thou art! Then sings my soul my Savior God to thee, how great thou art, how great thou art!”
With our Lord’s having now cast out between 4000 and 6000 demons from this formerly demon-possessed man, this poor fellow was now turned into a committed disciple of Jesus Christ!
And so, doesn’t this, therefore, also sound forth a most high and holy hope for all of us?
At first, this demon-possessed man begged Jesus not to torment him but then eventually begged Jesus that he might continually live in his presence and remain close to him.
But Jesus would not have been satisfied with this man just being in his presence.
Jesus calls him to action. This whole person, healed and saved, was now given a responsibility to remain in his hometown to proclaim: “How much God had done” for him!”
Then there is, fifthly now, a great many people from the surrounding country of the Gerasenes, who make the strange unusual request, for Jesus to depart from them! There is probably only one other incident in Jesus’ whole ministry—as revealed to us in the Gospels—wherein a group of people asked Jesus to depart from them. And do you know where and when that was? It was in our Lord’s own hometown of Nazareth, when they had invited him back to become the guest preacher at his home synagogue one Sabbath Day; at the very outset of our Lord’s public ministry! The townspeople liked what Jesus had to say to them, initially, especially when he read from the Prophet Isaiah, “The Spirit of the Lord of is upon me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to the captives, the recovering of sight to the blind; to set at liberty those who are oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor!”
But when Jesus went on, in the true spirit of Isaiah, to point out to them that the words they were so easily willing to profess with their lips—were actually words, greatly at odds with the way they were living; well then their response to Jesus did a 180 degree about face!
They turned against Jesus that day the way a circus animal has been known, at times, to turn against its supposed trainer! I read something a long time ago, that overtime, unfortunately I had also forgotten. There is always a reason why lion-tamers use a three-legged stool in taming those lions! They hold up those three legs of the stool in the face of the lion, because it was impossible for the lion to focus on each of those three legs of the stool at one time—therefore, rendering the beast of the jungle—much less powerful that he otherwise be.
In causing that lion to become distracted, he also became less of a concentrated force against the lion tamer, if the lion became tempted to turn against him!
Jesus provided a powerful analogy between himself and his relationship to the people in his home congregation—to that of the prophets Elijah and Elisha—in the poor relationships they had also come to experience with the people of Israel in their day.
Jesus said, “But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up three years and six months, and a great famine came over all the land—and Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him headlong down the cliff!
“BUT PASSING THROUGH THEIR MIDST JESUS WENT AWAY!”
Friends, one day Jesus would die for the sins of the people of Israel and the sins of all other people, too (I John 2:2), but only at God the Father’s own appointed hour! No—it was not yet our Lord’s time to die, though that time would come!
Most of the time those who came to recognize Jesus for who he really was would never, ever, have ever asked him to depart from him, but many people did then and many people still do so today! You know how John wraps this whole reality when he says in John 3:19-20, “And this is the judgment. The Light has come into the world and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their deeds were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But whoever does what is true, comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God!” Shouldn’t our response to Jesus and his real presence among us, be instead, like that of the disciples on the Road to Emmaus that first Easter afternoon?
They did not realize for a great part of that very bright and sun-shiny day, that the Risen Savior was right there, among them, and next to. But later that evening they surely would when he would break the bread before their very eyes and share his Holy Supper with them once again!
“So, when they drew near to the village to which they were going. He acted as if he were going farther, but they urged him strongly, saying, ‘Stay with us, for it is toward evening and the day is now far spent!” So, he went in to stay with them.
When he was at the table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sigh.
They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?”
And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem. And they found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” Then they told what had happened on the road, and how he was known to them in the breaking of the bread” (Luke 24:28-35)!
Sixthly, and finally, there was an unusual departure of Jesus when he denies this changed man’s request to become a traveling disciple of our lord with Christ.
Jesus doesn’t necessarily mean that for all of us, to genuinely follow him, that we have to sell all we have and give our proceeds to the poor, thereby, leaving all our family members and all of our close friends behind us! Following him in this most unusual way doesn’t necessarily imply that we have to manifest our love for Jesus in a physical departure, but sometimes…like the man who drove his wife unexpectedly to that restaurant serving only INDIAN CUISINE where he ate spicy foods in her presence for the first time, we too are called to break with our routine, to deviate from our established norms!
To many of us, Jesus also still says to us today: “Return home and tell how much God has done for you!” So, the man went away and told all over town how much Jesus had done for him” (Luke 8:38-39)! AMEN