Let us turn in our Bibles today
to Luke chapter 8. Luke chapter 8 and beginning
with verse 26. And they, that is the Lord Jesus
Christ and his disciples, They arrived at the country of the
Gadarenes, which is over against Galilee. And when he went forth
to land, there met him out of the city a certain man, which
had devils long time, and wear no clothes, neither abode in
any house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out
and fell down before him, And with a loud voice said, what
have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou son of God most high? I
beseech thee, torment me not. For he had commanded the unclean
spirit to come out of the man. For oftentimes it had caught
him, and he was kept bound with chains and in fetters. And he
break the bands and was driven of the devil into the wilderness.
Jesus asked him, saying, what is thy name? And he said, Legion,
because many devils were entered into him. And they besought him
that he would not command them to go out into the deep. And
there was there an herd of many swine feeding on the mountain,
and they besought him that he would suffer them to enter into
them, and he suffered them. Then went the devils out of the
man and entered into the swine. And the herd ran violently down
a deep steep place into the lake and were choked. When they that
fed them saw what was done, they fled and went and told it in
the city and in the country. And they went out to see what
was done and came to Jesus and found the man out of whom the
devils were departed, sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed
and in his right mind, and they were afraid. They also which
saw it told them by what means he that was possessed of the
devil was healed. Now then the whole multitude
of the country of the Gadarenes round about besought him to depart
from them for they were taken with great fear and he went up
into the ship and returned back again. Mark and Matthew also
record this history in the earthly life of the Lord Jesus Christ. They all tell us, that is Matthew,
Mark, and Luke, they all tell us that this immediately took
place after he had stilled the storm and they put forth this
question, what manner of man is this? For he commandeth even
the winds and water, and they obey him. He commanded diseases
to depart, and they obeyed his voice. He commanded the wind
and waves to be still, and they obeyed his voice. And he commanded
devils to depart, and they obeyed his voice. I want you to keep
your place here, but turn back to the psalm. The psalm's with
me just a moment. Psalms 29. The scripture that we read at the
beginning of the service in Revelation chapter 1 spoke of His voice
as the sound of many waters. Here in Psalm 29 we read, given
to the Lord, O you mighty, given to the Lord glory and strength,
given to the Lord the glory due unto his name. Worship the Lord
in the beauty of holiness. The voice of the Lord is upon
the waters. The God of glory thundereth.
The Lord is upon many waters. The voice of the Lord is powerful.
The voice of the Lord is full of majesty. The voice of the
Lord breaketh the cedars. Yea, the Lord breaketh the cedars
of Lebanon. He maketh them also to skip like
a calf. Lebanon and Syrian like a young
unicorn. The voice of the Lord divided
the flames of fire. The voice of the Lord shaketh
the wilderness. The Lord shaketh the wilderness
of Kadesh. The voice of the Lord maketh
the hinds the calf, and discovereth the forest, and in his temple
doth everyone speak of his glory. Think about that, in his temple,
that is in creation. In creation doth everyone speak
of his glory. We see the Lord Jesus Christ,
as I have said, commanding sicknesses, devils, and all of nature. and all obey his voice. Now Matthew, if you turn back
with me to our text, Matthew tells us that there were two
men possessed of devils, where Mark and Luke only give the account
of this one. It's possible that this one had
such extreme rage that they only mention him. But I pray as we
look at this passage of scripture today that we will see more of
our Lord's power and more of His compassion and that we too
may hear the voice of the Lord as we read His word and study
His word that we may hear the voice of the Lord. First, The
description of the man possessed of the devil. I have four points
to the message. The first point, the description
of the man possessed of the devil. Four things I'd mention about
him. First of all, he is described as having this condition for
a long time. Notice that, if you will, in
verse 27. This wasn't something that had
just come upon him. No, the scripture here says,
for a long time, which had devils long time. Secondly, he is described
as having some relief from this condition because we read in
verse 29, oftentimes it had caught him. Well, that must mean that
there were some times that his condition was not as pronounced
as it was. when the devils caught him. And
third, he is described as having some try to help him. He was
kept bound with chains and fetters. Some, no doubt, tried to help
him out of love, tried to chain him up so he would not hurt himself.
Others tried to help him out of justice so that he would not
hurt others. And fourth, he is described as
having a powerful adversary, the devil. He was driven of the
devil into the wilderness, verse 29. Now, when you think of those
four things, just going through them very briefly, he's described
as having this condition for a long time, He's described as
having some relief from this condition. He's described as
having some try to help him. And he is described as having
a powerful adversary. Now take those four things. Those
four things that I've just mentioned in relation to every lost person. Every man, woman, boy, and girl
who is in this world who has never been saved by the grace
of God. Think of these four things in
relation to a lost person. First of all, he is described
as having this condition for a long time. Every lost person
we inherited when we came into this world, as old as you are,
so have you had this awful condition of being alienated from God by
wicked works in your mind. Secondly, He's described as having
some relief from this condition. And you know, every man at times
he finds some relief by reformation and things of that nature. And
remember this, you and I, those of us who worship here, we believe
in total depravity. We believe all the truths concerning
God's grace, total depravity. We begin with that. And when
we begin with that, when people begin in the beginning with total
depravity, realizing that something took place in the fall. And how
can you look around you? How can you look within and realize
that God created man in his own image and not see that something
has happened? Something took place somewhere
sometime, and we know what it was and when it was, but total
depravity does not mean that every person is as bad as he
possibly can be. It doesn't mean that at all.
There's some people that are moral, some people that are upright,
some people that we would say, and this is speaking relatively,
some are better than others. But all men are totally depraved,
which means that in the fall, we received a fallen nature. It couldn't be any worse. Why? Because we are dead in trespasses
and sins. Now, you can't get any worse
than being dead, can you? I read a sermon this past week
by Charles Spurgeon. He entitled, The Sermon for the
Worst Man on the Earth. The Sermon for the Worst Man
on the Earth. Well, that's a sermon for all
of us. We're all totally depraved. But that doesn't mean that there's
not times when people do better than other times. They reform,
they turn over a new leaf, they make a new start. But the problem
is still there. The problem. And a third thing,
some tried to help this man. And all men, we've all had people
try to help us. Some of us have had parents who
have tried to help us. Some of us have had pastors who've
tried to help us. We've had church families who've
tried to help us. They did what they could, but
the problem is so severe that only God can help us. Only God
can help us. And all men, just like this man,
I said lastly, he had a powerful adversary. All men have a powerful
adversary. All men, without exception. All men, as we come into this
world. So that's a brief description
of the man possessed of the devil. Now second, the actions of the
man possessed of the devil. Now, the devil acted in the man,
but it was the man who acted. It was his actions, even though
it was the devil acting in the man. And this explains some of
the things about this man. Do you think any mortal man has
the strength to break a chain? I mean, the strongest man, bodybuilders
and people that can press and lift and all of that stuff, you
know. Do you think that a man, a mere man, could have the power
to break a chain? I would say no more than a man
like Samson had the power to grab a hold of those two gates
of the city and take them away with him to slay a thousand men
with the jawbone of an ass. But he did it But why? Because
the Spirit of God was upon him. And this man, how do we explain
his ability to break these chains? Satan, the devil. That's how
we explain it. How do we explain that this man
chose to wear no clothes? You know nature teaches us to
put on clothes, doesn't it? As I thought about this, this
past week, I thought about the fact that When you bring your
baby home from the hospital, you bathe that baby, boy or girl,
mama bathes both and dad bathes both, but at a certain age, at
a certain age, they just don't want one or the other to see
them without any clothes. That's just natural, isn't it?
That's just something that all of us are born with. A certain
ashamedness of our nakedness. This man, he wore no clothes. And secondly, he lived among
the tombs. And of course, tombs is where
they put bodies, right? Dead people. Satan felt at home
there because he was a murderer from the beginning. And I thought about this too.
This man didn't live at home. Satan moved him to live out there
among the tombs. You know there was a time in
the history of the church, and I use that term in its largest
meaning, that men thought that if they moved out into the desert,
if they lived out like hermits out in a cave or something like
that, that somehow they would be more spiritual, more holy,
and nothing could be farther from the truth. Man is a social
being, and we need each other. We need to interact with one
another. But this man, he goes out and
lives among the tombs. How do we explain these things?
The fact that he had an arch enemy, the devil that possessed
him. Now, I want us to think about
three truths here. It was clearly, it was clearly
the devil who cried out, using the voice of the man, yes, but
it was clearly him who cried out, what have I to do with thee,
Jesus, thou son of God, most high? I beseech thee, torment
me not. Consider these three truths.
A few weeks ago, You will remember we looked at the temptation,
what is called the temptation of the Lord Jesus Christ, when
he was alone in the wilderness with Satan. And in that passage
of scripture, we saw the devil then saying, if he came to our
Lord, his first testing was, if thou be the Son of God, command
that these stones to be made bread. But now, now we see Him,
Jesus, thou Son of God. And in that temptation, it was
the devil who said, To our Lord all these things, that is the
kingdoms of this world, all these things will I give thee. But
now it is Satan, it is the devil who is at the feet of the Lord
Jesus Christ. But what a change, right? We see who truly is Lord and
who was only a pretend Lord. Second, notice the devil's question. Jesus, thou Son of God, what
have I to do with thee? He had, let me say this, he had
nothing to do with Jesus, the Son of God. His name Jesus, he didn't just
say Son of God, he said Jesus. You know, that name means Savior. He was given that name by the
angel. Of course, ultimately by His
Father. Thou shalt call His name Jesus. Why? Because He shall save His
people from their sins. Now, Satan says, Jesus. What have I to do with it? Nothing. You say, what do you mean by
that? I mean this, that God provided no Savior for the fallen spirits. In Hebrews chapter 2, we are
told this, For verily, he took, that is the Son of God, he took
not on him the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of
Abraham. He didn't come to save angels.
He came to save His people from their sins. He came to save each
and every one of those that the Father had given unto Him in
that eternal covenant of grace. What have I, I, a fallen spirit,
what have I to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of God? Nothing. Nothing. As a Savior, but as
a judge, Oh, yes. What have I to do with thee,
Jesus, Son of God? Because all judgment is committed
unto the Son, unto the Lord Jesus Christ. And He does have Him
to be His judge. Aren't you thankful today that
He took upon Him the nature of man? That He might identify with
us and become bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. That
in the same nature that sinned against God, God would be satisfied. He took on Him the nature of
man, but not the nature of angels. All of the fallen angels. And
from what I can gather in studying other men and the scriptures, We cannot even begin, I don't
believe, to fully comprehend how many angels that there are. How many people have lived on
the face of God's earth so far? How many people are alive right
now? We don't know how many. I know a third, we believe a
third of the angels fell. So that would be a great many,
but not for one of them has God provided a Savior. That ought
to cause us right now in our hearts to thank God. Thank God that you thought upon
us, men and women, boys and girls, that you would provide a Savior
for us. The third truth I see here is
And Luke has the devil saying, Torment me not. Now in Matthew's
account, and I always encourage us as we study the Gospels, when
an episode is recorded in all three, look at all three. Because
we learn from all of them. But in Matthew's account, where
Luke says, he said, Torment me not. The devil said, Art thou
come hither to torment us before the time? The devils know, let
me say this, the devils know that there is a time. There's
a time, it was future when our Lord was here upon the earth,
there was a time coming when they would experience special
torment. Now both Peter and Jude in their
letters tell us this. That when the angels sinned,
they were delivered into chains of darkness, reserved to be reserved
under judgment. Now you say, how can you chain
an angel? An angel is a spirit. They're
reserved in chains of darkness. They will always be in darkness. But they are reserved, the scripture
says, to be reserved under judgment. In Revelation chapter 20 and
verse 10 we read, The devil that deceived them was cast into the
lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet
are, and shall be tormented day and night forever and ever. Art thou come to torment me before
the time? They knew. There was a time coming
when they would be tormented, especially day and night. Now the third thing I want us
to see, the Lord overcoming the strong man. Keep your place here
in Luke chapter 8, but turn over just a page or two to chapter
11. In Luke chapter 11, our Lord
cast out a devil. It was called a dumb devil. This
man couldn't speak. And the Lord cast this devil
out, and he spoke, began to speak. And the people wondered, and
the religious leaders, they accused the Lord of casting out the devil
by the power of the devil. Casting out devils through the
Beelzebub, the chief of the devils. But I want you to notice in verse
20, the Lord said, but if I with the finger of God cast out devils,
no doubt the kingdom of God has come upon you. Now notice, when
a strong man, now who is this strong man? It is this powerful
adversary that all men have, the devil. When a strong man
armed keepeth His palace, His goods are in peace. In other
words, He's got His under His authority, His rule, and what
He desires to do is keep everybody happy, everybody satisfied. Don't
ever hear the gospel. Don't ever listen to that crazy
preacher talk to you about sin and death and hell and judgment
and needing a Savior. Don't listen to that. On up. He keeps his in peace. The scripture says, peace, peace. But there is no peace to the
wicked. The wicked are like the troubled
sea, which casteth up dirt and mire, never any rest. Our Lord
says, but when a stronger than he, now someone has to be stronger
than this armed man, that is Satan, must come upon him and
must overcome him, he taketh from him all his armor wherein
he trusted and divided his foes. And that's what we see here in
this passage of Scripture. We see one, even though this
adversary, the devil, was strong, A strong man, an armed man, but
there's one stronger. There's one mightier. The stronger
coming upon Him and overcoming Him. Now notice these two things
in this case that show the power of the Lord Jesus Christ, the
Son of God, in overcoming the strong man. And let me say this,
He is the only one who can. He is the only one who can free
one of Satan's captives. The preacher can't do it. The
church can't do it. Baptism cannot do it. The Lord's
Supper cannot do it. All kinds of rites and rituals
and ceremonies cannot do it. There's only one who is able
to do it, and that is this one, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord
commanded the devil to come out of the man. in verse 29, for
he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of him. Our Lord, when you stop and think
about this, our Lord crossed this lake at that time on purpose. Think about it. Here's this man
possessed of the devil over here in Gadara. The Lord Jesus Christ
is ministering on the other side of the lake, and there were plenty
of people to minister to, but there was one who was given to
him in that covenant of grace over on the other side. So he
goes. He didn't come into this world
with a maybe-so. He didn't come into this world
on a fool's errand. The Lord God Almighty, the eternal
Son of God, came here on purpose. He had a work to do. He had a
people to save, just like this man. He needed help. And the
Lord Jesus Christ came and commanded, commanded him to leave. This
is the reason he came into this world. You know, he came into
the world to free the devil's captives. In I John chapter 3
and verse 8, the apostle said, For this purpose, here it is,
for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that is revealed. For this purpose He came into
this world to destroy the works of the devil. What a picture,
what a display of His power do we see in this case. He commanded
the devil to come out of this man. And notice the second thing,
the Lord commanded the devil to give his name. Now you know
the Lord never asked a question for information. He knows everything. What is your name? He didn't
ask for information. If he had not asked his name,
Think about this. If he had not asked his name,
if he had only commanded the devil as he had to leave him,
then we would have read this story and we would have assumed
there was only one devil. We would have assumed that. No. The Lord asked his question,
what is your name? So he confessed, Legion. Legion. He spoke as one. But yet, it was a legion of demons. And that tells us that while
there's one prince of the devils, there are many, many demons. Now, the word legion is a word
that's used in reference to an army. Some believe that a Roman legion
had 6,000 in it. Some say 1,000. There's all kinds
of speculation. I don't know, but there were
many. I know that. There were many in a legion.
And this tells us how very many demons there are. But yet they
make up one army. It's a term that's used with
armies. They make up one army, and they
all have one objective. And that one objective is to
rob God of His glory and to take as many into hell with them as
it is possible. You see this objective here in
this instance. Why would they ask, think about
it, why would they ask the Lord to be sent into the swine? in
verse 32. You say they all have one objective,
that is to rob God of His glory, to take as many into hell with
them as they can. Why then would they ask to be
taken, or be given permission to enter into these swine, and
then they immediately destroy themselves? Well, notice verse 33. They asked him for permission
in verse 32. There was there an herd of many
swine feeding on the mountain, and they besought him that he
would suffer them to enter into them. And he suffered them. Then
went the devils out of the man and entered into the swine. And
notice this, and immediately, just as soon as they entered
into the swine, the swine take off running. and go over a cliff
into the Sea of Galilee and drown. What was the intention? Well,
notice what happened. I said they all have the same
objective. Look in verse 37. Then the whole multitude of the
country of the Gadarenes round about besought him to depart
from them. You see their objective? Their
objective was that these people in their area would not hear
Christ. They would not hear the gospel. That's the reason they asked
to be allowed to go into the swine and then immediately run
the swine off the cliff and destroy them. Because it resulted in
all the people in that area, they were filled with fear, the
scripture says, great fear. But it wasn't a reverential fear. It was a servile fear they had. And so they asked the Lord to
depart. And when they asked Him to depart,
they're asking Him to leave and take the gospel with Him. That's serious, isn't it? That's
serious business. When God leaves a city or a country,
leaves, takes the gospel with him. You know, there's countries,
you read about the Great Reformation and God's work in the countries
in Europe. I don't know of any of them where
God did not do a great work. But you go to those countries
today, and we love Great Britain. Great Britain especially was
blessed with the gospel. You would be hard hard to find
a place where the true gospel is preached. You'll find the
monuments, the big cathedrals, you'll find all of that, but
you won't find the gospel of God's grace taught in very many
places. Now let me close with this. The
Lord commissioning the man that he had delivered in verse 39,
The man, he wanted to go with the Lord, didn't he? The Lord
and His disciples got in that ship to cross back over. The
man decided, I want to go with you. And isn't that an evidence
of experience in the grace of God? to them who believe He's precious. The Lord was precious to this
man. But I want you to notice especially what He said. If you
want to know, you go home. Verse 39. Return to thine own
house, and show how great things God hath done unto thee. Someone said one time, if you
want to know a man, then go home with him. If you want to know
a man, speak to those who live with him. Speak to his wife. Or if you want to know a woman,
speak to her husband. You go home to your house, to
your own house, and you show yourself, by your
life, to be a believer, to love your wife as Christ loved the
church. If you're a woman, to reverence
your husband and be obedient. if you're parents, to train your
children in the way that they should go. And that way is Christ. That's the way they should go.
Train them in Christ. Have them under the gospel. Teach
them. Show them. You go home to your
own house. Don't be a foreign missionary,
in other words, until you are, first of all, a home missionary. This man, the scripture says,
he went his way and published throughout the whole city, the
whole city, how great things Jesus had done unto him. Let
me close with these two lessons. Only Christ has the power to
set a captive of the devil free. And it was at his cross that
he spoiled principalities and powers, made a show of them openly,
triumphing over them. Has He delivered you? Has He
delivered you from the power of Satan? You say, well, I don't
know. I don't know that I would. Has
He delivered you? All men, all men are in a kingdom
of darkness when we come into this world. Giving thanks unto
the Father, which hath translated us from the kingdom of darkness
into the kingdom of God's dear Son. as he delivered you. And number two, the devil and
demons are real enemies. I mean they're real and they
are real enemies and God has given us weapons. He's given
us weapons to defend ourselves and we'd better learn to use
them. One weapon is prayer, isn't it? Lead us not into temptation. Deliver us from the evil one.
Another weapon is the Word of God, for we are not ignorant
of Satan's devices. Where do we learn about his devices? In the Word of God. Satan is a real being, and we
have real enemies if we are God's children today. Now Satan cannot
possess a child of God, but he can harass a child. And He can,
and this is His desire, He can cause us to do things that bring
reproach upon our Savior, upon our Lord. He sure can. We must walk circumspectly. I had a teacher in school. He told us what it means to walk
circumspectly. He said, just imagine a cat on
a clothesline. Some of you don't know what a
clothesline is. walking on that clothesline,
and on one side is a Doberman pincher, and on the other side
is a German shepherd. And that cat is walking circumspectly. Amen. Let's sing this hymn. 201.