The man who wasn't worth a herd of pigs
Reading for Saturday, March l8
scripture section: Mark 5:1-20
Why was the man in this story chained? He didn’t appear to be hurting anyone other than himself. He was able, ultimately to break any chain that was put on him, but by whom and how, was he restrained long enough to put them on?
He wondered in the tombs and feared torture; is that an indication of what evil had overpowered him? He said his name was legion, because the evil activity in him was legion; there was a legion of Roman soldiers converting the local town into a centre of Roman culture. Was there a connection?
Was he Jewish? The neighborhood was not predominately Jewish. Was he Arab or Greek, a fugitive from compulsory service to the world power, or even Roman, a drop-out, horrified by some military act of brutality. We do not know.
What we do know is that when he was clothed and in his right mind and sitting peacefully listening to Jesus the local people begged Jesus to leave right away. There was no celebration of the man’s recovery, no thanksgiving to God. No pushing pleading crowd of people asking for healing.
Instead they asked Jesus to leave, quickly! Some evil force had left the man and entered a herd of pigs and the herd had rushed into the water and been drowned. Pigs were valuable, this man was not. Jesus got back into the boat and he and his companions returned the way they came. It would seem that he had made the journey across the lake to for the sake of this one man.
Some things can be said with certainty; no evil is too strong for Jesus, he can heal the most possessed persons. One despised and broken man is so important to Jesus that in his incarnate life on earth he went searching for that one person.
The rest is wide open to personal application; so that people who are destroyed by evil can put themselves in the place of the man who was totally healed. People who suffer a mental agony that has made them unable to live in society can know that a mind occupied with knowledge of Jesus will become a peaceful mind. The lonely teen age girl cutting herself in secret can know for sure that there is a healer who understands her unexpressed need to be free from her compulsion.
What happened to the town that abandoned their citizen to his self-mutilation and tried to chain him so that he would not disturb their sleep by giving loud voice to his unspeakable agony? Did they recognize the greater power of good that had entered their country that day? Possibly not, most people prefer self reliance to divine rescue, most people will always imagine themselves stronger than the power of evil. What about the other people? They individually and corporately, pray fervently to be delivered from evil and forgiven from sin. Their confidence is that their prayer has been and is being granted.
Philippians 4:6-9
scripture section: Mark 5:1-20
Why was the man in this story chained? He didn’t appear to be hurting anyone other than himself. He was able, ultimately to break any chain that was put on him, but by whom and how, was he restrained long enough to put them on?
He wondered in the tombs and feared torture; is that an indication of what evil had overpowered him? He said his name was legion, because the evil activity in him was legion; there was a legion of Roman soldiers converting the local town into a centre of Roman culture. Was there a connection?
Was he Jewish? The neighborhood was not predominately Jewish. Was he Arab or Greek, a fugitive from compulsory service to the world power, or even Roman, a drop-out, horrified by some military act of brutality. We do not know.
What we do know is that when he was clothed and in his right mind and sitting peacefully listening to Jesus the local people begged Jesus to leave right away. There was no celebration of the man’s recovery, no thanksgiving to God. No pushing pleading crowd of people asking for healing.
Instead they asked Jesus to leave, quickly! Some evil force had left the man and entered a herd of pigs and the herd had rushed into the water and been drowned. Pigs were valuable, this man was not. Jesus got back into the boat and he and his companions returned the way they came. It would seem that he had made the journey across the lake to for the sake of this one man.
Some things can be said with certainty; no evil is too strong for Jesus, he can heal the most possessed persons. One despised and broken man is so important to Jesus that in his incarnate life on earth he went searching for that one person.
The rest is wide open to personal application; so that people who are destroyed by evil can put themselves in the place of the man who was totally healed. People who suffer a mental agony that has made them unable to live in society can know that a mind occupied with knowledge of Jesus will become a peaceful mind. The lonely teen age girl cutting herself in secret can know for sure that there is a healer who understands her unexpressed need to be free from her compulsion.
What happened to the town that abandoned their citizen to his self-mutilation and tried to chain him so that he would not disturb their sleep by giving loud voice to his unspeakable agony? Did they recognize the greater power of good that had entered their country that day? Possibly not, most people prefer self reliance to divine rescue, most people will always imagine themselves stronger than the power of evil. What about the other people? They individually and corporately, pray fervently to be delivered from evil and forgiven from sin. Their confidence is that their prayer has been and is being granted.
Philippians 4:6-9
posted by Jessie Coates at 11:38 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home