SermonStudio

A Man Possessed By An Evil Spirit

Henry David Thoreau made the profound observation that most people lead lives of quiet desperation. This miracle story centers about a man who shocked a synagogue congregation one Sabbath morning with his noisy desperation.

Jesus had come to Capernaum with his disciples and on the next day, which was the Sabbath, he went as was his custom to the synagogue to speak.

What he said that day impressed the people. It was fresh, plain, and practical -- so different from the formal and musty teachings of the local scribes. Both the substance of what he said and the manner in which he said it had a ring of authority. The people were amazed at his teachings. They sensed that something new was happening and that it had something to do with the coming of the Kingdom.

Then it happened. A shriek split the holy atmosphere of the synagogue. Jesus stopped speaking. The man who had screamed was hurled as if by unseen hands into the midst of the astonished congregation. He tossed about upon the floor in a violent fit. The people were dumbfounded. They could not believe what they were witnessing.

"What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Are you here to destroy us? I know who you are: you are God's holy messenger!"

The stunned congregation looked about to see who was shouting forth these words. The voice seemed to come from the convulsing figure on the floor; yet it sounded more like a chorus of demons shouting forth from hell.

Jesus scorned this weird profession of faith. "Be quiet!" he shouted. "Come out of that man!" With that, the frenzied figure on the floor shook and quivered all the more and uttered another ear-piercing scream. Then a silence like the hush of death. The evil spirit had come out of the man and the whole ghastly incident was over as suddenly as it had begun.

At first the congregation was speechless; then, still too overcome with shock to speak out loud, they whispered to one another, "What is this? This man gives orders to the evil spirits and they obey him."

What a story! Alfred Hitchcock at his best could hardly create so suspenseful and spine-tingling a drama as that which was enacted on a quiet Sabbath morning in a little town tucked away on the shores of the Sea of Galilee.

So Jesus began his Galilean ministry. Despite the melodramatic aspects of its beginning, the incident most appropriately symbolizes his entire earthly ministry. He has shown himself Lord of both the synagogue and the Sabbath. Here, word and action, deed and doctrine, were dramatically forged together. He had taught with authority, and he had cast out evil spirits with power.

But most important of all, here our Lord had encountered the enemy he had come to destroy and he had held the day. Christ had won this initial battle against an advance guard, but the war had just begun. Therefore, our miracle story stands as sign and symbol of the exciting campaign our Lord is about to embark upon, and it entices us to a more detailed examination.

The Synagogue

Since the setting of the story is the synagogue at Capernaum, perhaps a brief word concerning the place and practices of the synagogue in Jewish life might be helpful before we examine the details of the miracle.

The origin of the synagogue is obscured in history. The only fact known for certain is that, as an institution, it became firmly established in the period of exile when it was impossible for devout Jews to attend the sacrifices of the Temple. The synagogue was a place for prayer, praising God by chanting the Psalms, and reading the Holy Scriptures; but most of all, it was a place for religious instruction.

In many ways what happened in the synagogue could be compared to what happens in modern Protestant worship services on Sunday morning, if we include the Sunday school instructional period. However, unlike in the average church today, there was no ordained clergy as we think of ordained ministers. There were leaders responsible for the administrative activities, the support and upkeep of the building, and the proper program for worship and instruction. There were also rulers of the synagogue, who served when necessary as leaders of the worship service.

Any male Israelite who was qualified to do so could lead the worship, read the Scriptures, and afterwards, if he desired, comment on the passage read. When the scribes were present they would generally teach, but in the small villages, particularly those a great distance from Jerusalem, the scribes were seldom residents.

In the early history of Christianity, the synagogue played a vital role, as it provided an established congregation and therefore a unique opportunity for Jesus, and later for Paul and his fellow missionaries, to teach. However, when the Gentiles began to join the church in numbers, more neutral places had to be found for presenting Christian teachings.

In this miracle story, Jesus had been asked by the leaders of the synagogue to teach. Today we might compare this to inviting in a guest preacher to deliver the Sunday morning sermon.

Amazed At The Way He Taught

Mark reports that when Jesus began to speak, the people who heard him were amazed at the way he taught.

There is not within our text, or within any of the New Testament, a description of the way Jesus taught, except that he taught with authority. We know nothing about the personal appearance of our Lord, his use of gestures, the timbre of his voice, or his facial expression as he spoke his words. Lowries says, "When it is a question of personal authority, it is just these things that count."1

From the total lack of information concerning the personal appearance of our Lord, it seems obvious the Gospel writers felt the secret of Jesus' authority was to be found elsewhere.

In our miracle story there is not even an account of the text or the content of the message Jesus spoke that day in the synagogue at Capernaum. This, according to Nineham, is typical of Mark, for he is always, "more interested in the effect of Jesus' teaching than in what was taught."2

On the basis of the total evidence of the Gospels, however, we can speculate concerning the manner of Jesus' teaching and get some insight into why the people were impressed and amazed at the way he taught.

In Luke 4:14-21, we have a record in more detail of Jesus teaching in the synagogue at Nazareth. On the basis of this and the other evidences in the New Testament of Jesus' teaching, we can create a picture reflecting some idea of his speaking style.

Scriptural

In Luke 4:17, we see that Jesus' teaching in the synagogue at Nazareth was scriptural. Luke records that he was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah. Jesus unrolled it and read. When he had finished reading, he sat down, taking the proper position for teaching or preaching in the synagogue, and began speaking to the people on the basis of the passage he had just read.

In Mark's account of Jesus' speaking in the synagogue at Capernaum, the reaction of the congregation was that "he wasn't like the teachers of the Law." By this they meant the scribes.

Lowrie is helpful here in pointing out that the scribes at the time of Jesus seldom spoke directly from the Scriptures, giving their own interpretations; rather, "The scribes recognized only authorities who were dead, or who based their decisions upon the opinion of ancient rabbis which ultimately appealed to the dead letter of Scripture. Here at least was a living and quickening authority."3

Practical

Jesus' teaching was personal, pointed, and practical. We can surmise this from the text he chose in the synagogue at Nazareth, which speaks of proclaiming good news to the poor, liberty to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom for the oppressed, and salvation for the people.

This spoke to where the people were. These were matters of great significance to the average person.

Lowrie says, "The key to Jesus' new teaching is that he came directly to the point, he personalized and made practical the Holy Scriptures."4

Great teaching and preaching is always bifocal, concerned both with the deeds of God and the needs of people. It is always a word directed toward the invasion of the common life to restore the broken relationship between the creator and the created, to establish a new option for human dignity and freedom, and to bring all creation to the fulfillment of its intended destiny.

So Jesus taught. And his penetrating insights into the practical concerns of the people amazed his listeners.

Prophetic

The teaching of Jesus was also prophetic. This means in the truest sense of the word "prophetic," that is, describing not the ability to predict the future but rather to interpret the present. For example, he concluded his sermon at the synagogue in Nazareth with the words, "This passage of scripture has come true today, as you heard it read."

Lane, referring to this aspect of Jesus' speaking style, writes that Jesus "confronted the congregation with the absolute claim of God upon their whole person. Jesus' teaching recalled the categorical demand of the prophets rather than scribal tradition."5

In another sense, however, Jesus did not speak like the prophets. There was a profound difference. As Sherman Johnson reminds us, "There is no record that Jesus ever said 'thus saith the Lord,' "6 the phrase so characteristic of the prophets. These were men bidden by God to proclaim his message to the people. Often the prophets were reluctant to assume such a responsible task. They felt unworthy to be voices used by God to speak his sacred words.

Not so with Jesus. He spoke of what the people had been told in the past and then he added, "But, I say unto you." He did not speak as one sent from God; he spoke as God, directly and spontaneously. Is it any wonder that the people who heard him were amazed that he taught and spoke with such absolute authority?

Fearlessly

One of the marks of gospel preaching is that it is seldom congenial with the thought and cultural habits of the times; rather it is in collision with them. It comes to question, to challenge things as they are, in an attempt to show people how God intended them to be. Therefore, preaching is met with resistance and counterattack.

This was true of Jesus' sermon in Luke 4:16-30, for he ended his sermon in the synagogue at Nazareth with a warning. He reminded his listeners how Israel had mistreated God's prophets in the past. Because of this God had turned his back upon his own people. He said, "And there were many lepers in Israel during the time of the prophet Elisha; yet not one of these was made clean, but one Naaman the Syrian."

That antagonized the congregation, for "Syrian" meant "Gentile," and that was a dirty word to the people of Israel. It was taken as a direct insult. Jesus implied that God had passed over the Jews and blessed the hated Gentile. So Luke says that the people were so angered, "They rose up, dragged Jesus out of town, and took him to the top of the hill ... to throw him over the cliff. But he walked through the middle of the crowd and went his way" (Luke 4:29, 30).

Jesus spoke in a way that was challenging. With courage he spoke of the change that must now occur because the Kingdom of God had come.

Picturesque

We can be certain that when he spoke, Jesus' ideas were well illustrated. He was a master craftsman at creating pictures in the minds of people that penetrated their memories, never to be forgotten. We know this by the many parables he told which so dominate the content of his remembered teachings recorded in the New Testament.

He was a great storyteller. One of the reasons given by the narrative theologians for his preference for fishermen among his disciples is the fact that men of the sea have been in every age and culture commonly characterized as tellers of tales.

Whenever Jesus spoke, his style was picturesque, never abstract, involved, or complex. Perhaps that is why people were amazed when they heard him speak -- they could understand him. Even when he talked of the profound issues of faith, he never presented them as mysterious truths to be thought through and then accepted; rather he presented them as penetrating pictures that once seen could not be rejected.

On the basis of these special passages recording his speaking in the synagogues at Nazareth and Capernaum, and of the total evidence of the Gospels, we can assume that the way he taught was scriptural, practical, prophetic, fearless, and picturesque. This should say something to all of us who face, in Joseph Sittler's words, The Anguish of the Pulpit. And for those of us who teach, it might present some interesting guidelines to our task.

Something Happened

Edward Schweizer gives perhaps the most profound interpretation of the way Jesus taught. He writes, "Jesus was distinguished from others not because he taught something completely different, but because he taught with such authority that things happened. Men were moved to action and sick persons were healed."7

Jesus spoke and something happened! That is the key to understanding the way Jesus taught, and that is the key to understanding how his teaching in the synagogue and his driving out of the evil spirit are related to form a single story. They both testify to the central, dominating factor of Christ's authority. He spoke. He acted. And something happened.

Man With An Evil Spirit

The man with an "evil spirit in him" causes great difficulty for many who read and study this passage.

A generation ago the popularity of W. P. Blatty's book, The Exorcist, and the movie based on it, helped make the idea of demons and possession by evil spirits seem less "outdated" to the sophisticated churchgoer than it had previously.

One newspaper, in referring to the movie, commented that it "created a national epidemic of hysteria and morbid curiosity unprecedented in modern times."8 This is perhaps an overstatement; yet the word "curiosity" is to the point. Few today believe in demons and possession, but just about everybody is curious about the devil, demons, spirits, witchcraft, and the whole world of the occult. The persistence of Halloween over the years and its appeal to grownups as well as youngsters suggests in us all a certain natural fascination with the supernatural.

Demons

Interest in demons is as old as humankind. In fact, it is impossible for scholars to identify the origin of demons with any semblance of agreement.

Van der Loos says that "even the word demon (daimon) is uncertain." It is generally connected with the Greek verb meaning to "tear apart" or "divide."9

In some cultures demons are positive creatures. Minor gods are often referred to as demons even when they are considered to be friendly with humanity. People have also commonly believed demons to be the spirits of the dead, which have become ghosts and now come back to inhabit the earth for good as well as evil purposes.

In Judaism, however, where the gulf between deity and demons was at an early date widened, there was the accepted belief that demons were fallen angels. Van der Loos writes, "Just as the angel, as a good spirit, belonged to the realm of light, the Kingdom of God, so the demon belonged to the realm of darkness, the Kingdom of Satan."10

Alan Richardson observes that the Jewish world of the first century A.D. firmly believed in demons. And then he adds, "The Jews were well known as exorcists of demons throughout the ancient world and amongst themselves the power of exorcism was taken for granted."11

Richardson goes on to say, "Christianity conquered the other religions of the ancient world partly because of its success in casting out the fear of demons, and the Christians rapidly ousted the Jewish exorcists from their position of supremacy."12

Josephus, the Jewish historian, believed that Solomon received directly from God the secret of exorcism which gave the Jewish race its particular expertise in the art of driving out demons from the possessed. It was God's gift to his people in order that they might, in their covenant relationship to him, aid and heal humankind.

This was a gigantic task, for people lived in a haunted environment where no area was safe from demonic invasion and domination. The demons inhabited the dry sands of the desert, as well as the depths of the sea. They were feared most at night, but demons were known to attack a man at midday. No place -- no time -- no condition provided shelter or escape from the intense terror people experienced in the presence of the demonic loose in their world.

William Barclay comments that people in the time of Jesus "believed that the air was so full of them (demons) that it was not possible to insert the point of a needle into the air without touching one."13

Periods Of Concentration

History recounts certain periods of intensified interest and belief in the demonic. Just as The Exorcist created curiosity about the demonic, the fail of Jerusalem increased Jewish interest in the problem of personal possession by evil spirits.

Some scholars suggest that the intensity of belief in the demonic is in direct relationship to certain social, economic, and political conditions. When times are tough and tragedy follows greater tragedy, when life tumbles in and there are more questions than answers, belief in the demonic is increased. In periods of personal depression, when groups are persecuted or held down by economic or political forces, belief in demons becomes an opiate for the oppressed.

In the Middle Ages, for example, belief in the demonic ran rampant among the uneducated masses who were caught in a web of fear for their very existence. It was not only a time of appalling ignorance and plagues, but life was cheap and there was a complete disregard for the dignity of common humanity.

Even some of the great minds that helped ordinary people emerge from the darkness of the Middle Ages, like Luther for example, did not fully rise above a belief in the demonic. When flies flew over his books and distracted his attention, and rats disturbed his sleep at night, he accused demons of such deviltry.

Conclusions

Little is gained in arguing the reality of the demonic in the world, then or now. One thing is certain: Many people in all ages have believed in demons with terrified intensity.

For our understanding of the miracle story before us, it is important to note two things: First, in the days of Jesus there was a particularly strong wave of demonism within Palestine; and secondly, as H. Loewe points out, "Belief in demons was particularly strong in Galilee at the time of Jesus."14 Therefore the setting and the time are right for an account of our Lord's casting out an evil spirit from a possessed man.

Relationship Of The Demonic To Disease

The view is commonly held that the writers of the New Testament were men of their age and therefore ascribed all physical illnesses and abnormalities to possession by evil spirits. Demon-possession thus is considered by many the term in the New Testament to describe insanity and extreme nervous disorders.

Today scholars are beginning to question this unqualified identification and see instead a distinction between the sick and the possessed. Lane, for example, takes the position that there is "a striking difference between the forms of address employed by the demoniacs and the titles used by ordinary sick individuals."15

This distinction between sickness and demonic possession is important so far as our miracle story is concerned, in that since this man is identified as one being possessed by an evil spirit, we have here not just another "healing" miracle by Jesus but a power encounter of our Lord with an agent of Satan, his declared adversary and enemy.

The concept of encounter does not deny the possibility that "possession" was involved in all the healing miracles, but it clarifies the intent and the interest of Mark as he relates this story. He is not calling our attention to the ability of our Lord to heal a mentally disturbed man -- even one suffering from severe insanity. Rather, Mark is presenting in this miracle account a sign that the battle begun in our Lord's temptation experience with Satan continues now as he opens his Galilean ministry.

Jesus Of Nazareth

The first words of the evil spirit are, "What do you want with us, Jesus of Nazareth?" In most cases, Jesus' being called "the Nazarene" simply reflects his humble origins. Occasionally the term is derogatory, as when Nathanael asks, "Out of Nazareth can any good come?"

Most scholars conclude that when the demon addressed our Lord "Jesus of Nazareth," he did not imply disdain but was simply using the title by which Jesus was generally known, particularly at this early stage of his ministry.

Are You Here To Destroy Us?

The question of the demon, "Are you here to destroy us?" sets the stage for the militant aspect of this miracle.

This is to be more than a mere exorcism, the drawing out of an unclean spirit. No customary equipment of the exorcists is used here; no magic formula, no sign of the cross, no prayers to God, just the sheer military command, "Be quiet, and come out of that man!" The words are used as a warrior would use his sword to pierce the enemy to the heart and destroy him.

Jesus envisioned his mission here on earth as a battle with the Evil One, Satan, the rebellious leader against God! Perhaps, to our sophisticated minds, belief in Satan smacks of "superstitious medievalism" and the "backward element" of religious belief in primitive societies. But before we completely reject belief in a personal devil and the existence of the demonic, let us examine what the New Testament is witnessing to in this image of a personal devil, the Evil One, who invaded our world and holds us captive.

Origin Of Evil

The writers of Scripture assumed certain facts, a certain mind-set and view of the universe in which they lived. From these derived a basic theology of the conflict between good and evil.

Briefly, this theology held that God had created the universe and that the earth was but a part of that total creation. In heaven there occurred a rebellion. One of the chief angels of God turned against him and was driven from heaven. This fallen angel assumed many names: Satan, the devil, Beelzebul, the Evil One.

The earth was created good. When man and woman were disobedient to God's will and also fell from their intended relationship to the Creator, the earth became vulnerable to the Evil One. It was as if a crack occurred in a protective sphere between earth and hell, and through this opening Satan slipped in to claim the earth for his domain. He invaded the entire realm of the earth; with the help of his demons, which were also fallen angels he had enticed to follow him, he held everything within his captive power.

The answer to the question of the origin of evil is to be found in the word "rebellion." Evil was born when the good which God created rebelled against him, defied him with willful disobedience, and turned back against God the goodness he had so freely given. Therefore, the power of evil comes, not from some original source built into the structure of existence, but from God's grace and goodness perverted to evil purposes. Evil takes what God gives as good and makes of it evil.

There is an ancient Chinese legend which tells of an army headed by two generals, Chon-Yu and Liang. At one decisive point in a war they were fighting, they ran out of arrows. They were certain they could defeat the enemy if only they could get a fresh supply of arrows.

So they devised a clever plan. They filled boats with straw soldiers, including a few real drummers and buglers, and sent the boats downstream toward the enemy. Hearing the sounds of drums and bugles, the enemy thought it was an attack and showered the straw figures and boats with arrows.

Chon-Yu and Liang, further down the river beyond the enemy, waited for the boats loaded with arrows and gathered the weapons for their own use.

This illustration breaks down at one important point: the arrows of God were not shot in anger at straw figures of the enemy; they were cupid-like arrows of love. They were not weapons, but gifts of grace. The main point of the comparative illustration does hold, however. Evil gets its power to do battle against God from God himself. Evil takes the goodness of God, perverts it into an evil force, and uses it against God. Therefore, the greater and more generous the grace of God, the greater the potential power of evil.

Apocalyptic

The great question dealt with in Holy Scripture is how long God will tolerate the existence of evil in his world and the dominant power the Evil One exercises over all the earth and humanity.

One answer was the apocalyptic view, which literally means "uncovered" or "revealed" view. It was a revelation of the future in which God would intervene by direct action, eliminate the hold of evil, and destroy sin, death, and the devil.

There were many theories of how God would bring about this action. Would he destroy the earth and create a new one? Would he give the whole thing up and destroy the earth with a mighty flood? Or would he establish his Kingdom rule on the earth? The most commonly held view was the latter. He would drive evil out, destroy the Evil One, and re-establish himself as ruler over all the land and over all the people. The kingdoms of this world would become the Kingdom of our God. The emphasis here was on the sovereign action of God in which he would assert his authority and bring everything into conformity with his will forever.

All the Gospel writers accepted that the powers of evil would not give up their hold over the world without a struggle. A bitter battle would therefore mark the coming of God's Kingdom here on earth, and people and nature would suffer, caught in the middle of the struggle.

Mark, in particular, viewed the ministry of Christ largely in terms of this battle between God and the evil powers of this world. Behind the evil powers stood the leader, often known to us as the devil, but mostly referred to by Mark as Satan or Beelzebul.

Hendriksen, when commenting on the question asked by the evil spirit, "Have you come to destroy us?" says that this "is best taken to mean 'have you come from heaven into the world ...' The demon, accordingly, is asking whether the very One who had come to seek and to save the lost had also come to destroy the demons...."16

Mark's answer is, "Yes." Salvation and the destruction of evil are one and the same act. The means by which Christ will save humanity is cross-shaped where God does battle against the forces of evil, where life defeats death, and where God emerges to reign victoriously.

The Holy One Of God

The confession made by the evil spirit, "you are the Holy One of God," or as some translations have it, "God's holy messenger" has been interpreted by scholars from two points of view.

Some, like Lane, see it not as a confession but as a weapon of attack. "This recognition-formula is not a confession," writes Lane, "but a defensive attempt to gain control of Jesus in accordance with the common concept of that day, that the use of the precise name of an individual or spirit would secure mastery over him."17

It was like the plot of the Grimm Brother's famous classic Rumpelstiltskin, in which the miller's daughter had to spin straw into gold to marry the king. Faced with this impossible task, she was about to give up when a little man appeared before her and said that he would spin the straw into gold, but she would have to promise to give him her firstborn son. She agreed.

When all the straw was spun into gold, the miller's daughter married her beloved, the king. Soon after the birth of their first son, the little man suddenly appeared and demanded what they had agreed upon, her firstborn son. She begged him to take instead all her riches and jewels, but he refused.

Seeing her desperate sorrow, the spinner of gold said, "I will give you one last chance to save your child. Guess my name, and if you do, then you may keep your baby."

For three days she searched the royal library, but to no avail. Then a messenger she had sent into the kingdom returned and said he had seen a strange sight. On a high hill where foxes and hares bid each other goodnight there was a little man dancing around a fire singing:

Oh, little thinks my royal dame,
That Rumpelstiltskin is my name.


The next day when the little man returned, she told him his name, Rumpelstiltskin. "The devil it is, the devil it is!" he screamed, and stamped his foot into the ground with such a fury that he split in two.

So in the days of our Lord, to know the name of a person gave strange powers over that person. With it one could control and even destroy the owner.

The most common interpretation of the demon's use of the name "the Holy One of God" is that the evil spirit is actually making a confession and therefore knows the "secret" of who Jesus is.

Van der Loos asks the obvious question, "How do demons know this secret?"18 He reviews the various answers, such as that evil forces possessed supernatural knowledge which God himself had given them, or that demoniacs possessed clairvoyant and telepathic powers.

Van der Loos comes to the conclusion that "the various terms used by the demoniacs need not point to their having been equipped with supernatural knowledge."19 His reason is that "the Holy One of God" was not synonymous with the title of Messiah. If the evil spirit had intended to confess Jesus before the synagogue congregation, he would have used the term "Messiah" which was at that time the title most associated with the "secret" of who Jesus was.

An important fact is that the title "the Holy One of God" is a rarely used one. As Moule points out, "In the New Testament it occurs, besides this place, only at Luke 4:34, parallel to this passage, and at John 6:69."20 This would seem to indicate that its use does have a special significance, at least in the mind of Mark who records that detail of the story.

For our approach to the meaning of this miracle we will follow the interpretation represented by Lane. It supports the fact that the evil spirit did know who Jesus was and was therefore making a direct attack against the one God had sent to destroy the stronghold of Satan on earth. The title-name "the Holy One of God" was for the demon his "Rumpelstiltskin" to turn back the destruction.

This is not a confession of a believer ready to give up all and follow Jesus. This is not a supernatural being revealing a hidden secret. This is a demonic declaration -- a declaration of war! The spirit is literally saying, "I know who you are! I know your name! And with it I will destroy you who desire to destroy us!"

Thus Mark records this miracle as a sign pointing to the cross where the final battle with the Evil One will be fought; he prepares the reader for the decisive victory of Christ who on the cross becomes the Christ of Glory, King of kings, and Lord of lords.

The Gordian Knot

What does the message of this miracle story mean for us today? It does not necessarily mean that we must believe in devils and demons, but it does demand that we recognize and confess the reality of evil both in our world and in ourselves.

We are a people possessed, possessed with desires that force us into deeds of disobedience against our God. We do not want to be what we are, and we are daily sorry for what we do. But our stubborn pride often prohibits us from falling down on our knees and humbly and completely surrendering ourselves unto the Lord. We hesitate to trust him all the way. We are afraid to place ourselves and our lives totally within his merciful hands.

So, again and again, like the possessed man in the miracle story, we fall to the floor of desperation, silently screaming within ourselves, struggling aimlessly and suffering endlessly from an enemy we refuse to recognize and have no strength to conquer.

Theologians of the Christian Church have long recognized the name of this enemy within us. Freudian psychology has analyzed and categorized the enemy within human personality.

Dostoyevski goes deeper perhaps than any when he apprehends with his artistic sensitivity the demonic in the human tragedy. He puts it most dramatically into the mouth of the demon who controls one of the Karamazov brothers: "Satan am I, and nothing human is foreign to me."

All these witnesses proclaim the single truth that the enemy who possesses us is our self. We are our own worst enemy. Self-centeredness, self-concern, self-preservation, self-pride, self, self, self; this is the enemy who possesses us and from which we can in no way set ourselves free.

We are like swimmers caught in a whirlpool; the harder we swim the more we are drawn into the center of the problem which is our selves!

Life waits all about us to give us new and good things. But we must search out, seek after, chase nothing! What we need is to surrender to our God who searches, seeks, and chases after us.

Every central story of the New Testament contains the same plot. It is the same account told again and again about the God who seeks out, reaches out, calls out to us, "I love you! I want you for my own! I have done all things for your salvation, for your freedom from all that possesses you."

Our Lord cries out to our demon-possessed self, "Be quiet! Come out of that man!" And the glorious good news of the gospel is that on the cross of Calvary the evil which is within us darkens the noonday sun, shakes the very earth in its death struggle, and comes out of us all.

One of the classic tales told around countless campfires during the fantastic rise and reign of Alexander the Great, conqueror of the world, was called "The Tale of the Gordian Knot."

The story begins: There existed a tiny Asian kingdom known as Phrygia. Its sole claim to fame rested on a special wagon in one of the courtyards of the capital city. The wagon was fastened to a yoke by an astonishing knot called the Gordian Knot. The wise men of the country prophesied that whoever untied the knot would conquer the world.

For a hundred years, the Gordian Knot had defied the herculean efforts of the cleverness of kings and the might of the strongest warriors. Then one day Alexander, the young king of Macedonia, journeyed to Phrygia to try his hand. When he arrived, the courtyard swarmed with curious spectators, everyone waiting in eager anticipation to see if this promising young ruler were equal to the task.

Alexander walked confidently into the courtyard. He carefully examined the knot. The suspense was electrifying. Then suddenly, to the surprise of all, Alexander swiftly withdrew his sword and with one mighty swinging blow cleanly sliced the knot in two!

For many of us life is a Gordian Knot. Troubles and problems entangle us, tying our lives into a snarled, meaningless mess. In quiet desperation we search for a solution. We try one suggested path after another; we willingly accept any theory if it promises some small hope. We follow any hero who promises help. But always the same quiet desperation and despair descends upon us as one defeat follows after another. Life is still just one great, unsolvable Gordian Knot.

When will we learn there is but one solution -- that to be found in our complete surrender to the young man, Jesus of Nazareth, who in our miracle story proclaims himself to be our champion, the conquering warrior sent from God to overcome the world, even our own little worlds where helpless we lie tangled up within ourselves -- our Gordian Knot!

On Calvary's hill 2,000 years ago, in a strange darkness at noonday, while people jeered and mocked his kingly crown of thorns, our hero took into his blood-stained hands a wooden cross. With the strength of God he swung that cross like a mighty sword and cut cleanly through the knot that binds us all. By that single severing slice of his sword-like cross, he has set us free.

Rejoice, therefore, and be glad, for our Gordian knot-like life has been transformed by a single blow into a new life. We are free from self. We are free for an abundant life in him.

____________

1. Walter Lowrie, Jesus According to St. Mark (New York: Longmans, Green and Company, 1929), p. 73.

2. D. E. Nineham, The Gospel of St. Mark (New York: The Seabury Press, 1963), p. 75.

3. Lowrie, op. cit., p. 72.

4. Ibid.

5. William L. Lane, The Gospel According to Mark (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1974), p. 72.

6. Sherman E. Johnson, A Commentary on the Gospel According to St. Mark (New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1960), p. 47.

7. Edward Schweizer, The Good News According to Mark (Atlanta, Georgia: John Knox Press, 1976), p. 50.

8. Barbara Stoops, Religious Editor, The State, Impact Section, February 10, 1974, Columbia, South Carolina, p. 1.

9. H. Van der Loos, The Miracles of Jesus (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1968), p. 340.

10. Ibid., p. 241.

11. Alan Richardson, The Miracle Stories of the Gospels (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1959), p. 68.

12. Ibid.

13. William Barclay, And He Had Compassion (Valley Forge: Judson Press, 1975), p. 23.

14. H. Lowe quoted by Van der Loos, op. cit., p. 362.

15. Lane, op. cit., p. 74.

16. William Hendriksen, Exposition of the Gospel According to Mark, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1975), p. 65.

17. Lane, op. cit., p. 74.

18. Van der Loos, op. cit., p. 363.

19. Ibid., p. 366.

20. C. F. D. Moule, The Gospel According to Mark, The Cambridge Bible Commentary (London: Cambridge University Press, 1965), p. 18.