The Humanity and Power of Jesus

Theme: The Earthly and the Spiritual

 

 

Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them:“Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” And he said,“He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

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Christ’s humanity, though not fallen, was very real. As this story opens, He is asleep in the boat. He had a body that would grow tired, and no doubt His heart and mind were weary too. He had been preaching and healing, as we saw in the last chapter, only to face the blasphemous accusations of angry religious leaders and the attempts of His own family to remove Him because they thought Him insane. He then left them, going on to teach the crowd in a series of parables (4:1-33), though His heart was full of loneliness and sorrow at the falling away of weak friends. Jesus is just the Saviour needed by tired bodies and weary minds. He understands the sorrow of disappointment and deception. As we read in Hebrews, we have a high priest who can be touched with the feeling of our infirmities (Hebrews 4:15). Every day He is with us, so that we may secure the comfort and refreshment we need from Him.

 

We may do so because this compassionate Jesus is also the mighty God who calms the storm. The Sea of Galilee (a lake, actually) is 680 feet below the level of the Mediterranean Sea, and heavy winds swirl down with cyclonic force. The result was a storm with the force of an earthquake, and fishermen who had spent their lives on that sea were afraid.

 

I believe that in this storm there was something devilish. Just as the devil had raised the storms that destroyed job’s property and children, I believe Satan tried again and again to destroy Christ before He could go to the cross. The simple fact that Christ “rebuked” the wind and waves (v. 39) shows that there were supernatural forces at work. The Greek verb comes from the word phimos or “muzzle.” Satan is quickly muzzled in his attempts to destroy the Saviour, and the disciples are filled with awe that their Master is Master also over wind and sea.

 

But more amazing things lay ahead on the eastern shore, the country of the Gadarenes. There Jesus met the man possessed by so many demons that he “lived among the tombs; and no one could bind him any more, even with a chain; for he had often been bound with fetters and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the fetters he broke in pieces; and no one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always crying out, and bruising himself with stones” (5:3-5).

 

People ask me, “Do you believe in demon possession?” Yes, I do. Not all insanity is caused by that; there are organic diseases that can afflict a Christian or a non–Christian mentally, just as one might suffer a broken leg. But no born–again person can suffer demon possession. Such a person’s body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and no unclean spirit can dwell where the Holy Spirit is. Just as Satan required God’s permission to touch Job and his family, so God has severely limited Satan’s actions toward the believer. And as we see the interchange between Jesus and the man and his demons, we discover that the demons even need Jesus’ permission to touch an animal (5:10-13). Yet we find in 2 Timothy 2:26 that Satan can touch an unregenerate person any time he wants to.

 

Jesus gives the demons permission and they enter into the swine and rush into the sea. The man who had been possessed is now quietly, “sitting there, clothed and in his right mind” (v. 15). It is an amazing display of spiritual power at every point, and what is the townspeople’s response? “They were afraid... And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their neighborhood” (vv.15, 17).

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