Mark
1:21-28
The
Fourth Sunday after Epiphany,
Pastor
Troy Slater, Our
Martin Luther once said that where
Christ builds His church, there Satan builds a chapel. That quote is
often used to say how even in churches - congregations of God's people - Satan
is still at work. In fact he's probably
working harder amongst God's people than he is anywhere. After all, Satan knows that the church is the
Lord's instrument in this fallen world for bringing sinners to repentance and
to the knowledge of the truth. He knows
that the message of the church - the victory of Christ Jesus - is his only
defeat, and so Satan attacks.
I know we often feel as if those
times that we come together - say Sunday morning - are times of great
refreshment as we take a break from our struggles of life and hear God's Word
of life and of hope. And hopefully that
is the case for all of us. Hopefully we
all can feel as if this place and this time is a place and time wholly different
than what we are confronted with elsewhere. But truth is only if we ignore
today's Gospel text with the demon possessed man who disrupts the synagogue,
only if we ignore that, will we think that this is an oasis, a safe fortress free
from sinful interruption. Truth is, as Jesus once said, "In this
world you will have trouble." And while in this holy house we do receive a
foretaste of heaven on earth, this building and this place along with we who
gather here, are still IN this world of trouble. We are a gathering of
God's saints - yes - but also a gathering of fallen sinners. And so here is more like a MASH unit maybe we
could say, a hospital close to the warfront.
Here our joy is not yet complete.
Here the devil and his demons still intrude and interrupt, even saving their
greatest mischief for inside the Church.
Yes wherever Christ builds his church, there Satan builds a chapel. …
Already in Mark chapter one Mark
has proclaimed to us how Jesus successfully overcame Satan's very direct temptations
in the wilderness. Satan doesn't give up easily though. In fact he will never give up until that day
he is forever cast into the darkness of hell.
So here in our reading Satan tries the indirect approach to opposing
Christ and His Kingdom. The Lord of Life desires to enter the hearts of
men, and so the lord of death sends out his demonic servants to take control of
those hearts - including the heart of this man in
Now apparently no one in town
suspected he had an evil spirit, otherwise they would have been nowhere near
him. Perhaps he had been in the synagogue previously, but that did not
mean he had heard the Word of God previously. The synagogue was to be the
place of worship for the Jews away from the
But all of that changes with the
arrival of Jesus. The congregation heard the message of His holy kingdom -
they heard the fullness of God's Word of life.
And our text tells us that
"the people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who
had authority, not as the teachers of the law." They were amazed, for finally someone was
standing before them who was preaching not man's word,
but God's Word.
But "just then a man in their synagogue who was possessed by an evil
spirit cried out, 'What do you want with us, Jesus of
Certainly the demon could have been
asking about himself and all other evil spirits.
Yet there was only one demon in this particular man. So again, who's the
"us"? Well, when we remember
that Satan and his cohorts are trying to separate Christ and all people, it
becomes more likely that the demon is referring to himself and the
people he is gathered with there. "Have you come to destroy me,
little old demon that I am, and these people who do what is sinful, and
therefore are of the devil, O Holy One of God?
For You know the unholy cannot come in contact
with the Holy without being destroyed.
And these people, they do not Hallow Thy name, nor let Thy kingdom
come. You would not come to try to save
these lost human souls, they are not worth Your
time." In other words, it's like
the demon's trying to convince the people of
When you think about it, can anything
be more evil, more diabolical than to picture Jesus as our enemy? As the destroyer of mankind? ..
But how opposite that is from the Truth of God's Word. The younger ones in our mid-week classes have
been learning John 3:16 - which most of us probably know - but also John
3:17. "For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the
world" - no, Jesus did not come to be the destroyer of mankind, John
says - "but to save the world
through Him." … Jesus "came
to seek and to save the lost." "Jesus came not for the righteous, but sinners." Jesus has not come to destroy you, me, the
people of
Although we do deserve it as we
confessed at the beginning of our service this morning. For truth is the
demonic forces barely have to lift a finger and we
constantly fail the Lord on our own. We let our devotion to the Lord be
disrupted. We pack our schedules running aimlessly from this to that but
yet we despise God's Word. We think
nothing of letting our minds wander while the Scriptures are read, yet our ears
attentively listen to Satanic gossip. We
foolishly think Jesus dying on the Cross is boring because we've heard it all before.
We have cherished the demonic temptations dancing in front of our eyes and
failed to look away. And in doing so, you and I have hated the Lord who
hates sin. We have offended the Holy One
and thereby justly deserve His present and eternal punishment. Therefore if God had come to destroy us and
all mankind, He would have been in the right.
He would have been in the right.
Yet the miracle of it all is that God
loves us anyway. Amazing grace, abundant
mercy we call it. The miracle of it all
is that He loves us in this way: He "sent
His one and only Son so that whoever believes in Him may not perish, but have
eternal life." Jesus came - was
born, lived, died, rose again - so that you might believe in Him and have
eternal life. Our God does not stand
idly by while Satan and his cohorts have their way with us. No, the Lord intervenes. He rescues you;
saves you from sin and all evil. …
Of course, if you will not believe
the good news about Jesus as your Savior, then you remain in your
condemnation. He will be the Judge and Destroyer of those who reject
Him. Jesus Christ went through death to prepare a place for you in
Heaven. Yet if you reject Him, you will not go to the place prepared for
you. You will depart to the place of "the eternal fire prepared for
the devil and his angels." That's
what God's holy Word declares.
But it also declares to you here in
this place, here at this time, it also declares that this Jesus is your
Savior. God's Word declares that "now
is the time of God's favor. Now is the day of salvation." For
God's Son has not come to condemn the world, but to save the world, including
YOU by being himself condemned upon
In our reading Jesus cast out the
demon by saying, "Be quiet! Come out of him!" And "the
evil spirit shook the man violently and came out of him with a shriek."
Jesus did not destroy the man with the demon but saved the man from the
clutches of the evil one. And He has
saved you; giving His life in your place.
The Holy Spirit has granted you that gift of faith - casting out the
evil one and His work from you.
Of course the evil one still does not
give up, does he? He still aims his flaming arrows of temptation at us -
even here - even in this place - even in this time. And truth is, we
have no power of our own that can sustain us against that old evil foe. But Christ Jesus does. We are weak, but He is strong. His power knows no limits. His power and authority knows know limits. …
And so don't let the demons drag you
down. And certainly don't fool yourself, Satan and his demons are
real. They create unrest in the world,
destroy marriages, make mischief in our churches - and even in our own
heads. In fact before you dive into sin, the Devil can convince you that
sin is lighter than a feather - no big deal. But just as soon as your
evil swallows you up, those feathers become lead weights, weighing you down
until you think that your guilt is greater than the Lord's mercy. The
shouts of your guilt can echo through your soul and drive you to despair. "There's no possible way God could ever
love me." And that's the work of
the devil.
And so into that guilt, into that
despair, into our hearts comes a greater Word - God's Word. Jesus casts
out your evil, casts out your sin as He says, "Be quiet! Be still.
For your sins are forgiven in my name." As Jesus spoke and the evil was cast away from
that man in
Yes it's true. The Lord who gives orders to evil spirits,
and even they must obey, He uses the power of His Word not just in