There are real spiritual powers that are demonic, unclean, and God has come – now in you and me – to send them reeling into the abyss.
Pr. Joseph G. Crippen
The Fourth Sunday after Epiphany, Lect. 4 B
Text: Mark 1:21-28
Beloved in Christ, grace to you, and peace in the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
Maybe we’re too smart for our own good, too enlightened.
See, maybe you hear a story like today’s and it sounds quaint, archaic. Whatever this man suffered from, you think, he probably wasn’t possessed by unclean spirits.
Or maybe you don’t. If you thought this was a moving story of the power of God entering into our lives in the flesh, driving out a demonic strength that inhabited another human being, you’re on the right track.
Too often we dismiss these ancient writers and their “superstitions.” We don’t imagine there really are demons running around possessing people. We can think of several different mental or physical illnesses that fit the symptoms described. No need to bring the devil into all of this.
But this told Capernaum that God had come to them with power and authority.
This is a local synagogue in a small town. Maybe this man just wandered in on a Sabbath. Or maybe he was their friend and neighbor who’d come down with this possession to their great sorrow. And frustration – no one could help him, even though he came every week.
Either way, he came today, and there was someone new there. Jesus from Nazareth. That day Jesus had been teaching them so differently than what they were used to hearing the people saw deep authority in him. Then their possessed firend shouted at him, called him the Holy One of God, claimed Jesus came to destroy him.
You know the ending. Jesus tells the unclean spirit to be silent and get out of the man. And the spirit obeys. And the good people of Capernaum said, “what is this? Even the unclean spirits obey him.”
Jesus’ authority over unseen things showed he was from God.
He could drive away invisible, evil things that plagued people’s lives, could heal not just legs and backs and eyes but minds and spirits. People flocked to him – his fame spread all over Galilee.
We live in this time of amazing science and medicine where the brains and imaginations God gave us have taught so much and brought great healing, even healing of our minds. If you’re clinically depressed, suffer from debilitating anxiety, are bipolar or schizophrenic, there are medicines to help, to heal. Therapists can help with so many diseases of the mind and spirit, too. God has always used human wisdom and skill to bring healing, not just today.
But what if this story says God has more healing to do than that?
There’s a lot of suffering these days that doesn’t have neat explanations.
People today can describe their being “caught up in something” beyond their control, beyond whatever intentions they might have had. A group of people becomes a destructive mob seemingly in a moment. A political movement based on hatred and destruction is supported by millions of people calling themselves Christian. It’s more than bad choices, bad people.
Or there’s this: I’m not solely responsible for climate change. I recycle, I compost, I even walk around the church moving paper towels people have thrown into the garbage into the green compost bins. But I, and billions like me, together are destroying our planet’s ecosystem, changing the climate for the ill of all living things here. I’m part of that. What power or spirit moves such a reality that seems beyond one person’s control?
One commentator on today’s Gospel says: “We may or may not call addiction or racism or the sexual objectification of women “demons,” but they are most certainly demonic. They move through the world as though by a kind of cunning. They resist, sidestep, or co-opt our best attempts to overcome them. . . . The experience [is] like wrestling with a beast.” 1
And the good folks at Capernaum call to you and me from over the centuries and say, “what if God is doing something about that, too?”
They see an authority in Jesus, God-with-us, that faces even those beasts that roam in our world and speaks God’s power against them.
Even breaks them. And we’ve seen it. We’ve seen evil systems fall in South Africa and East Germany through the power of prayer and the strength of people peacefully, non-violently, resisting those powers. Surely the people of South Africa saw little hope in ending something like apartheid, and yet, it was broken. The Berlin Wall was taken down by ordinary people. Great, invisible powers were dismantled.
“There are more things in heaven and earth,” Hamlet says to his friend Horatio, “Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” 2 Recognizing demonic powers as true and dangerous opens us to a very real hope: maybe they can be stopped.
If you’ve ever looked at any one of the massive problems in our society and despaired that you, just one person, couldn’t make a difference anyway, this is good news for you. If you ever thought “what’s the point of hoping, things are just getting worse and worse,” this is good news for you. If you’ve ever felt trapped, oppressed, targeted by evil greater than one person or thing, this is good news for you.
If you’ve ever dared hope that this world could be healed, this is good news for you.
Jesus stands in the way of the demonic and says, “no further. Be silent. Get out.”
And then turns to the people around him and says, “follow me.” Follow me to the cross. Come with me into the shadows, into the evil, with the love and grace of God that will break these things apart. Put your lives and hearts on the line. These are powers beyond you, and it’s like wrestling a beast. But I am with you, and will empower you to stand in the heart of the storm and make a difference.
If millions of people are so called and shaped by the Spirit, and stand together, a whole different power emerges. A power of love that cannot be stopped, that breaks down walls, deconstructs systems of oppression and evil, brings life and wholeness to the world.
You’re not the only one Jesus needs. But you are the one Jesus needs.
Maybe you can find hope in those first disciples.
Last week four decided to follow Jesus, leaving their boats and families behind. And in Mark’s Gospel, these four, along with lots more, struggle with what it means to follow, to be anointed as God’s power in an evil world. By the end of the Gospel, most of these disciples seem to have failed.
But Mark knows that these disciples, these men and women who stumbled mightily at first, all ended up faithful. By the time he documented their failure in this Gospel, they’d all gone out into the world as part of the Christ mission against evil and oppression. Some had already died for their witness.
Maybe Mark tells their faulty beginnings to give you hope. These women and men weren’t heroes or special in any way. But filled with the Spirit they told of the coming of God in Christ into the world, and embodied that coming, signaling the end of all demonic powers and evil.
And so can you. So will you, with God’s help.
In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen
1 https://www.saltproject.org/progressive-christian-blog/lectionary-commentary-epiphany-week-4
2 William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act I, scene 5.
