No, this is not breaking news, folks, but it did happen a long, long time ago in Jesus’ day, in a place called Gadarenes country. The Gadarenes, or Gerasenes, was a region east of the Sea of Galilee and the River Jordan. There were two cities there, Gerasa and Gadara, which were inhabited by people who were culturally more Greek than Semitic, which probably accounts for the existence of pig farmers in the biblical accounts – which I’ll get to presently. Today Gerasa and Gadara are the modern towns of Jerash and Umm Qais.
In Jesus’ day, the Gadarenes were not Israeli territory. In the Gospel of Mark (and Matthew and Luke, as well), it is recorded that Jesus and His disciples sailed across Lake Galilee and landed in Gadarene territory. It is here that Jesus encounters the man with an impure spirit, or a gatekeeper demon in charge of many other evil spirits, afflicting the poor man. This man sees Jesus in the distance and runs toward him, falls at His feet and shouts at the top of his voice:
Mark 5:7 (NIV) "What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? In God's name don't torture me!"
What happened next is astonishing for several reasons. Here is just some of the detail …
Mark 5:9-17 (NIV) Then Jesus asked him, "What is your name?" "My name is Legion," he replied, "for we are many." 10 And he begged Jesus again and again not to send them out of the area. 11 A large herd of pigs was feeding on the nearby hillside. 12 The demons begged Jesus, "Send us among the pigs; allow us to go into them." 13 He gave them permission, and the impure spirits came out and went into the pigs. The herd, about two thousand in number, rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.”
Of course, those tending the pigs are totally shocked and they run into town to report the event. The townsfolk came running back to where Jesus was and, seeing what had happened – they probably saw dozens and dozens dead pig bodies bobbing about in the water! – they are a mix of fear and anger. Both Matthew’s and Luke’s account of the incident include the same response of the townsfolk as does Mark …
Mark 5:17 (NIV). “Then the people began to plead with Jesus to leave their region.”
I was reading this the other day and it struck me that although it was unsaved Gentile people who were asking Jesus to leave their area (because He had just destroyed their pig farming operation), believers ask Jesus to go away for not dissimilar reasons when He “interferes” with their lives – all the time. To the pig farmers Jesus was a costly nuisance – and it wasn’t because of strict kosher food rules, either, that Jesus did what He did, as some scholars have argued over the years. No! Jesus was ushering in the kingdom God – God’s sovereign, holy rule and activity – and that was necessarily going to upset the prevailing patterns and systems that human beings have put in place. So the coming of Jesus onto Gadarenes turf was never about pigs and all things kosher, it was about the displacement and the eviction of all things demonic and impure. Yes, there has been endless conjecture about why Jesus allowed the demons to go into the pigs, and we don’t have space here to fully canvas all that.
The thought that struck me was that when Jesus comes near, demons and humans, too, soon begin to realise His Lordship – His total Lordship over all things, including creation, life and death – and that this holy Lordship will inevitably force change in any unclean situation. And many of these changes are not welcomed, even in those of is born again who claim to love the Lord – and, in not so many words, Jesus is asked to please leave.
What areas of our lives still exist that are not under the Lordship of Jesus? What secret places or bits and pieces of territory are in us that we do not want Jesus to come anywhere near, because He is going to spoil some unclean or unholy thing we want to tend and keep?
We may not realise it, but in all kinds of ways we ask Jesus to leave when He wants the kingdom of God to lay claim to an area of our lives. But we resist. We won’t yield to His Lordship then and there. And so, we may, in some unconscious or self-deceiving ways, plead that Jesus would just go away from those areas of our lives we don’t want interfered with. And leave He will. For now. But there will come a time when we will give a complete and detailed account of our lives at the judgement – and no amount of pleading will dissuade Jesus from His righteous accounting. We will have no choice.
When Jesus makes claim to the areas of our lives we have not yet surrendered to Him, it is because at that very place we are incredibly vulnerable to a worsening of our condition, and eventually demonic bondage. Right there we can plead with Jesus to away, or we can plead with Him in genuine repentance to set us free.
For now we can choose.
Think on these things.
Ps Milton