So you can once again, the help
of God, I'd like us to turn together to the chapter that we read together.
Mark chapter one and the text you'll find in verse 24. Saying, let us alone. What have we to do with thee?
Thou Jesus of Nazareth, art thou come to destroy us? I know thee
who thou art. the Holy One of God. Those of you who have been with
us over the past couple of weeks have been looking at the miracles
of the Lord Jesus Christ and the reasons why he did those
miracles to testify who he was, that he was the son of God, he
was or is God revealed to us in the flesh, he is the one whom
God anointed, the Messiah, the chosen one of God to come to
this world to live under the law of God, to obey the law of
God and to die as that perfect sacrifice for sinners upon the
cross at Calvary and then to rise again on the third day signifying
that God was well pleased with his sacrifice, that all those
in Christ Jesus have been justified, have been cleansed from all of
their sin. There is no condemnation to those
that are in Christ Jesus who walk not after the flesh, who
walk in the spirit. And as the Lord Jesus Christ
lived upon earth, his life is recorded in these four gospels. And John tells us that even if
everything was written down about the Lord Jesus Christ, not even
all the books of the earth could contain the information about
the Lord Jesus, about the things that he did. But what we have
on record is enough for us to see that the way the Lord Jesus
Christ lived and had authority over the elements of the earth,
over sickness and death and over the satanic world, the dark world,
is to be proved to us that he is the son of God. John writes
that these things are written that ye may believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ, that you may believe that he is the son of God and
have life in his name. And so we saw that as Christ
changed the water into wine, he didn't command, he didn't
do any magical thing. He just told the servants to
go and fill the water pots with water. And as they emptied those
water pots that were filled with water, that water had become
wine. And so that miracle was to testify
that Christ has the authority over the natural world, the elements
of this world. He is the creator. All things
were created by him and for him and without him was nothing made. And we saw last week that he
healed the nobleman's son. Again, no words were said that
his son, the man is told to go back and that his son lived and
was well. so that shows us that Christ
had the authority over sickness and we saw that the scripture
tells us it is God who makes sick. It is God who makes well. It is God who gives life and
God who takes life. And it is God who can bring the
dead even back to life. It is God who can restore people
who are unwell, who are sick. It is Him. We notice that in
today's world, especially in our Western world, that the Lord
uses many means by which to restore people to health and even to
life. We live in a prosperous country
where there is much medication, there is much wisdom that has
been given to men that they're able to operate, put people under
anesthetic, they're able to take people's hearts out, lungs out
and give people those new new organs, as it were, to make
them well, triple bypasses, bypasses, cancer removed and all things
like that. And in other parts of the world,
these things are unaccessible to millions and millions of people. And I said that there are some
even here today and some in our own families that would not be
alive should they be living in a third world country. It's only
by the grace of God that we are able to have the advantages that
we have in this land but how sad it is that all the advantages
that we have all the blessings the physical blessings that we
have do not draw people to the one who has given the wisdom
rather they draw people to the ones with the wisdom they don't
drive people to God They drive people into a greater humanistic
mindset. And so as Christ went about walking
upon the face of this earth, he was proving, stamping his
authority or stamping the authority of the message that he was preaching
to the people, that he is the Christ, the Son of God, who has
come to save his people from their sin. And so today is the
third miracle of the Lord Jesus as he declares his power over
the satanic world, as he declares his authority over the demons
that had possessed this man. they were all amazed. In verse
27 they were all amazed in so much as they questioned among
themselves saying what is this? What new doctrine is this? For
with authority he commanded even the unclean spirits and they
obey him. I don't know if you've ever considered
as you read through the gospels how it is that these demons all
knew about the Lord Jesus Christ. How is it that as he approaches
these demon-possessed people, those demons inside begin to
tremble and to declare, we know who you are. The Jesus of Nazareth,
we know who you are. Are you come to destroy us? We
know that you are the Holy One of God. And if you go through
those other accounts of Christ casting out demons, the demons
all knew who Jesus was. And how is it that they knew? Jesus was there at the foundation
of the world. Jesus has ever been. He's the eternal Son of God.
He's the creator of all things. We read the scriptures. The scriptures
tell us that the angels were the created beings of God. They
are ministering spirits who minister to God. They go from heaven to
earth. They serve and worship God. And
the Bible tells us that at one time there was an uprising in
that spiritual bliss. Satan and a third of the angels
of heaven rebelled against God. Although this may seem far-fetched
at the scripture it is clear that there is a demonic side
to this world. The Bible is very, very clear
that demons and Satan exist. There is a kingdom of darkness.
There is a God, a dark God of this world, little g God of this
world. And that God is Satan. Satan
was once in the presence of Almighty God. Satan and his angels once
worshipped God. Yet the scripture tells us they
were cast out. of heaven and they were thrown
to this earth in which they now have a vast influence upon the
nations of this world, upon the unbelievers of this world and
even upon the believers of this world. And so in Revelation chapter
12 the scriptures tell us that about this dragon, which is Satan. And his tale drew, obviously
in figurative language, his tale drew a third part of the stars
of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before
the woman, which was ready to deliver, to devour her, her son,
as soon as it was born. And she brought forth a man-child,
who was to rule all nations with a rod of iron. And to her, child
was caught up unto God and to his throne. And so the scripture
says that Satan and his minions, his demons, were cast to the
earth. And so Satan knew who Jesus was
because Satan would have worshipped the Lord Jesus Christ in heaven. And not only did Satan know the
Lord Jesus Christ in heaven, yet Satan knew the Lord Jesus
Christ on earth. As Adam and Eve were in the Garden
of Eden in their perfect state, as they walked with God, as they
fellowshiped with God, as they walked under the light of God, they rebelled against God. The
scripture tells us Satan disguised or influenced a serpent to deceive
Eve, to tempt her to eat from the tree that God had told them
not to eat. After they eat of that tree,
the scripture tells us that sin entered into the world, rebellion
entered into the world. Adam and Eve were sinners in
the sight of God and their bodies began to die. And they spiritually
died at that moment as they were separated from God. But Satan is told, the seed of
the woman. is going to crush your head. Satan had been waiting for the
coming of the Lord Jesus Christ for maybe 4,000 years. He knew that his kingdom was
going to suffer a great attack. God had preserved himself a remnant,
the people of Israel, for the whole of the Old Testament time. The whole of the world had been
held in darkness by Satan. The whole of the world. There
are only very few people that are brought into that covenant. from outside of Israel at that
time. And so the whole of the world
was in darkness, worshipping all manner of gods, doing all
manner of evil, burning and sacrificing their children, worshipping gods
of stone, worshipping the creation, the sun, the moon, the stars,
worshipping trees and animal They were held in darkness by
Satan himself. But Satan knew that his time
was limited. There was going to come one who
was going to crush him and bruise him and begin to devour his kingdom. You think how much the gospel
has changed the whole world. Reading recently of John Payton,
the missionary in the 1800s, how he went to the New Hebrides
and there they were savages. Just killed each other, boiled
and cooked each other until the gospel came. Yes for maybe 20 years they fought
and they fought against the missionaries and so much so he was driven
from the island yet the seed of the word of God had been sown
in their hearts and in God's time he brought it, he germinated
that seed and the gospel came. they were born again of the Spirit
of God and no more did they kill each other, no more did they
cook each other, no more did they kill the wives of those
that had died in battle. They'd changed completely. Why? Because Satan's darkness had
been lifted. Satan's darkness, the light of
the gospel had shone and penetrated into their hard hearts and they
were born again. It is only the gospel that changes
nations. When the gospel is removed, there
is a degeneration. People spiral down into sin. And you have to look at our own
country and the way in which a suppression of Christianity,
and then it's a spiral downward, a hatred of anything to do with
God and life. in my life, even as we're discussing
recently of the euthanasia, killing, self-suicide. Satan's kingdom is to do with
death and not life. And so Satan waited for 4,000
years before the coming of the one who was going to crush him.
And so he knew very well who the Lord Jesus Christ was because
he'd been waiting for him for so long. And when Jesus comes,
he comes to tempt him in the wilderness. No one else had that privilege of a one-to-one with Satan. 40 days the Lord Jesus Christ
spent in the wilderness without food and without water and he
was tempted by Satan. What does he say? If. If. Satan knew that if Christ could
fail at his course if he could cause him to doubt if he could
cause him to fall down and worship him if he could cause him to
stray from the will of God then his mission would fail and so
he tries to sow the seeds of doubt when Christ's flesh is
at its weakest he comes and says if you are the son of God do
this and do that and how it is even in our own lives when we
are brought down that Satan comes to us and he says, if. He wants
us to doubt. He wants us to cast a doubt in
our mind about the love of God, the greatness of God, the ability
of God, Christ, our union with Christ. He comes and he says,
if. And so Satan knew exactly who
the Lord Jesus Christ was and he wanted to destroy the work
that he was going to do because he knew He knew in a few years'
time, if Christ completed his work, then his kingdom was going
to suffer an attack that would destroy the power and the influence
that he had over the whole world. He knew that Christ, if he died
upon the cross and was the perfect lamb of God, then Satan's work
would be limited and Christ would redeem a people from every nation,
every kindred, every tongue for himself. And so these demons,
they knew very well who Jesus was and they knew that their
time was limited. Leave us alone, they said. What
do we have to do with you, Jesus of Nazareth? Are you come to
destroy us? They knew the work that Jesus
was coming to do. They knew that their time was
limited. They knew that he had authority
and power over them. And so they were afraid of him. And he cast them out. Hold thy
peace. Come out of him. So I said, Jesus
didn't speak to the wine or to the water. Jesus didn't speak
to the young man that was sick, but he speaks to these demons. Why does he speak to them? He
speaks to them because they are real. They're not figures of
imagination. They're not things that we just
read about in stories or you watch about on films. These demons
are real beings that are bent on destroying the kingdom of
God, that are bent on destroying the human race that God created
for his honor and for his glory. They are, we can say, hell-bent
on filling hell with people. So he speaks to them because
they are real spiritual beings. And the Bible is clear right
from the very beginning to the very end that there is a dark
spiritual kingdom but that kingdom it is a limited kingdom. Christ's
kingdom is an eternal kingdom. The spiritual dark kingdom will
be destroyed one day by the Lord Jesus Christ. And so Satan is
spoken about from beginning to end. In our Western society we do
not hear much about spiritual or demonic possession. But it doesn't mean that it doesn't
happen. If you go to other countries, India, Africa, where they still
dabble in black magic, even in the Muslim world, they have genies,
they have things that they pray to, to help them other than their
God. and there is demon possession.
If you read about those who are demon possessed it doesn't necessarily
mean that they have mental health but they are taken over by a
demon. If you read missionary stories
and those who have met those who are demon possessed the demon
speaks through the person. They desire to be worshipped.
and they hate the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's only
by those praying in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ that
often those who are possessed can be delivered. But in our
own land, Satan is worshipped. We have those who worship Satan, the
Druids, those who worship and look to the stars. But Satan's
influence is all around. Just because we don't see people
being physically or visibly possessed does not mean that it doesn't
happen. All unsaved people have the ability
to be possessed by a demon. All unsaved people have no resistance
to the temptations of Satan. We see it in our world round
about us. People are not following the
ways of God. And so if they're not following
the ways of God and they're following the ways of darkness, they're
not following the Lord Jesus Christ and they are following
the ways of Satan. And we see it in our government
with the pushing for legislations that go against the scriptures.
It is anti-Christ. It is an anti-Christ agenda,
a humanistic agenda that goes against the Lord Jesus. It is
satanic. See, in the music. the rap music,
the popular music. They don't sing about the Lord
Jesus Christ. They don't sing about the love
of God. They sing about the flesh, their bodies, their relationships,
their cars, their money, their fans. You see it in the films. Hollywood has an agenda. Even in Disney has an agenda. They're pushing that woke ideology. The things that they deem right
and proper is that what they push. And behind it is a dark
mind. Those walking in the darkness.
Behind it is Satan and his kingdom. False religions. The Bible tells us that even
if an angel of God comes and speaks not the same gospel
as this but he gives another gospel he is to be accursed. There are those who testify that
an angel of God has come to them and told them that the word of
God is not sufficient we need to add more to this book. The
man who started the Mormons, James somebody, said an angel
came, told him that the scripture tells us that even if an angel
of God comes and goes against this book, it is to be accursed. He's an antichrist. And so these angels, these demons,
Although they're not quite so visible as they were in Jesus's
day, although they weren't quite so visible as in other countries,
yet the influence of Satan is seen in our land more than it
has ever been seen before. And as believers, what does the
Bible tell us? It tells us we wrestle not against
flesh and blood, but against the spiritual darkness of this
world. We wrestle not against flesh
and blood but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers
of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness
in high places and because of this take the whole armour of
God. And so there is a satanic influence
that is pressed upon every single believer. And as Satan tried
to destroy the Lord Jesus Christ and to cause him to deviate from
the will of God and to deviate from being the perfect sacrifice
for sinners, so Satan and his demons seek to cause believers
to deviate from following the Lord Jesus Christ. Yes they cannot
enter into them because they are indwelt by the Spirit of
God but they can be tempted. He can dangle a carrot on a stick
and cause you to deviate and to go away from the ways of truth. And so the demons are as active
as they were in the days of the Lord Jesus Christ if not more
active but it may be less seen. Let us alone. What have we to
do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us?
I know thee, who thou art, the Holy One of God. Hold thy peace. Come out of him. What also we see is a pre-enactment
of the binding work of the Lord Jesus Christ upon
Satan and his kingdom. Mark chapter 3 tells us in verse 24 when they were accusing
Jesus of being the chief of the devils and that Jesus was casting out
demons because he was the prince of the devils, Jesus said to
them, how can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided
against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. And if a house
is divided against itself, the house cannot stand. If Satan
rise up against himself and be divided, he cannot stand but
hath an end. No man can enter into a strong
man's house and spoil his goods. except he will first bind the
strong man and then will spoil his house. Verily I say unto
you all sin shall be forgiven unto the sons of men and blasphemies
wherewith soever they shall blaspheme. But he that shall blaspheme against
the Holy Ghost shall never have never forgiveness but is in danger
of eternal damnation. And so Jesus says Satan is a
strong man. He is a very strong man. yet
are stronger than he has come the Lord Jesus Christ and he
has come to bind this strong man and to cast out this strong
man. In Revelation chapter 20 it tells
us there of the Lord Jesus Christ in verse 1. So if you think Satan
is being described in Mark as a man, a strong man who has a
house and he's holding that house securely yet stronger than he
comes, that stronger than he is the Lord Jesus Christ and
he has come to spoil that house to receive all that is his And
I saw an angel, Revelation 20 verse 1, and I saw an angel come
down from heaven having the key to the bottomless pit and a great
chain in his hand. And he laid hold of the dragon,
that old serpent which is the devil and Satan, and bound him
a thousand years and cast him into the bottomless pit and shut
him up. and set seals upon him that he should deceive the nations
no more till a thousand years should be fulfilled and after
that he must be loose a little season. And so as Christ is seen
as this angel coming down from heaven having a chain to lay
hold of the dragon and Satan is bound Yet his influence is
still seen. He's not as terrifying as he
was or as he could be because now the gospel is able to penetrate
into all the world. Yet it's only for a season. Then
he will be released. But Christ is the strong man
who has bound Satan and who has come to deliver and to spoil
the house of Satan. And so Christ's, Satan's kingdom,
it is a limited kingdom. He only has a limited amount
of time. But Christ's kingdom is an eternal kingdom. Also it
demonstrates to us the new birth. You see the new birth is Christ
spoiling the strong man's house. We know that outside of Christ
we're in the darkness. Outside of Christ we are a slave
to sin and to Satan. But Jesus comes by the power
of his spirit and he spoils that strong man's house. He turfs
out the uncleanness, he turfs out Satan and any demon that
may be possessing there and he enters in. And he dwells there. The Bible
tells us, do you not know that your body is a temple of the
Holy Spirit who is in you? And so Christ enters by his spirit. and influences that person from
the inside. Satan can no longer enter in. There is no true born again Christian
that can ever be possessed by a demon because greater is he
that is in you than he who is in the world. There is no Christian
that can ever be possessed. Yes, we can be tempted. Yes,
we can be influenced from the outside, but we can never be
influenced by Satan from the inside. Christ has bound the
strong man and he dwells in the presence, in the throne of the
heart of the believer. And that void is filled with
the Spirit of God. We think of Peter. Jesus says
to Peter, Simon, Simon, Satan has desired to have you. He has
desired to have you and to sieve you as wheat. But I have prayed
for you. That is the word that is declared
to every single Christian. I have prayed for you. Satan
desires to have you. But he can't. Why? Because you
are mine. You belong to me. Judas Iscariot. The Bible says Satan entered
into him. Why is that? Because Christ was
not there. So that's the, that is the difference between
a believer and a non-believer. Christ sits on the throne of
the heart by his spirit in the body of the Christian. Satan
desires to have them, to tempt them and to destroy them, but
they will never fall. But the unbeliever has a void,
a void that they try to fill with all manner of entertainment
and pleasure. Satan can enter, he can come
and go as Judas. So as we continue on in our life,
how do these things affect us? Are we possessed with Christ
or are we possessed with darkness? Leave us alone. What do we have
to do with this? Is that what we say? Leave me
alone, Jesus. I don't want anything to do with
you. I know who you are. May it be then that Jesus speaks
to us this day. Hold your peace. Come out of
him. May Christ live and dwell in
our hearts. May we be influenced by the Spirit
of God from within. May he take control of our lives,
guide us and lead us and direct us in the ways of righteousness.
Enable us to see and witness the way in which he restrains
the evil from within and help us to walk rightly and correctly
in this world which is the kingdom of darkness bringing us the one
day, that eternal place, the place of light with the Lord
Jesus Christ for forever. May the Lord add his blessing.
Amen. Our closing hymn is from Gadsby's
hymn number 736. Show me some token, Lord, for
good. Show me the token of thy special
love. Show me that I am born of God
and that my treasure is above. Hymn number 736 to tune 310. Show me that I am born of Thee. of June, and all thy precious
promises is within. Thus make thy good
day, O Shazam, and earth will be full of good to thee. In thy good spirit, O my heart, and waves, let grace abound in
every part, and teach my daughter to sing. Then shall I know that Thou art
with me. Almighty God, we do thank thee
for the power of God that is stronger than the work and the
power of Satan. We thank thee that greater is
he that is in us as believers than he that is in the world.
We pray then that we may know the strength and power of thy
Holy Spirit, that we may know that strength and ability to
resist the devil, that he may flee from us. And we pray, Lord,
that thou reign in our hearts Do dismiss us, we pray, with
thy blessing. And may the grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father, with the fellowship
and communion of the Holy Spirit, rest and abide with us each now
and forevermore. Amen.