And so let's pick it up in verse
1 of Mark chapter 5. And they came over unto the other
side of the sea into the country of the Gadarenes. And when he
was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs
a man. with an unclean spirit, who had
his dwellings among the tombs. And no man could bind him, no,
not with chains, because that he had been often bound with
fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him,
and the fetters broken in pieces. Neither could any man tame him.
And always, night and day, He was in the mountains and in the
tombs, crying and cutting Himself with stones. And when He saw
Jesus afar off, He ran and worshipped Him, and cried with a loud voice
and said, What have I to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of the
Most High God? I adjure Thee by God that Thou
torment me not. For he said unto him, the Lord
Jesus said to him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit. And Jesus asked him, What is
thy name? And he answered, saying, My name
is Legion, for we are many. And He, that's the man, besought
Him, the Lord Jesus, much that He would not send them away out
of the country. That's the devils. This verse
is tricky. If you read it casually, you're
not sure who's referring to who. But it's He, the man, begged
Jesus much that He would not send them, the devils, out of
the country. Now, there was there Nigh unto
the mountains a great herd of swine feeding, swine or pigs. And all the devils besought him,
saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them.
And forthwith Jesus gave them leave, and the unclean spirits
went out, and entered into the swine, and the herd ran violently
down a steep place into the sea. They were about two thousand,
and were choked in the sea. And they that fed the swine fled,
and told it in the city, and in the country. And they went
out to see what it was that was done. And they came to Jesus,"
these people that were in the country, "...they came to Jesus,
and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion. And the man was sitting, and
clothed, and in his right mind, and they were afraid." The people
of the country were afraid. And they that saw it told them
how it befell to him that was possessed with the devil, and
also concerning the swine. And they began to pray him. The
people of the country began to beg Jesus to depart out of their
coasts. And when he was come, into the
ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that
he might be with him. Howbeit Jesus suffered him not,
but said to him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great
things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion
on thee. And he departed, and began to
publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him,
and all men did marvel. Just so you understand the setting,
here's a man who is possessed with devils. With the devils
in him, he was unclean, he was tormented by the devils, he was
in misery, but mostly, what people saw, he was fierce. He was opposed
to all men. It says in Matthew chapter 8,
he was fierce. He would attack people. And so
the people would try to tame him. They tried to control him
with chains and fetters. But he couldn't be controlled.
He would break the chains and smash the fetters. He was obviously
a very powerful man. He was powerful and opposing
every man. He was destroying others and
destroying himself. And he seemed like he was completely
out of control. To people who saw him, they knew
this man was insane. He was a crazy man. Possessed
by devils. And so no one came around him.
And he lived in tombs. He was unclean, living in the
tombs. And night and day he was crying,
yelling, howling. And then Jesus came, all the
way from one side of the Sea of Galilee to the other side.
And when He got there, the man saw Jesus when Jesus was afar
off, and the man ran to Jesus, fell down, and worshipped Him.
And then he said these words, "...what have I to do with thee,
Jesus, thou Son of the Most High God?" And he says, "...I adjure
thee by God that thou torment me not." Now clearly the devils
were in this man, and they were referring to Christ tormenting
them. But it's hard in this passage of scripture to separate the
man from the devils because they seem as if they're acting as
one. And that's the case. So when he says, I adjure thee,
he's speaking of himself possessed with the devils. I adjure thee
that thou torment me not. All he could think of was that
the Son of God would torment him. And then it says that Jesus
asked him his name, and he says, my name is Legion, because there
were many devils that possessed him. And then there was this
interaction between Christ and the devils, and the devils asked
Jesus to send them into this herd of swine that were feeding.
The swine were feeding peacefully. The devils entered the swine,
and then the herd of swine violently ran off the cliff and into the
sea, and they were choked. They were drowned in the sea. And at that, the people who took
care of the pigs, seeing what happened to the pigs, were afraid.
And they went and told the people in the country what happened.
And all the people in the country came to Jesus and they begged
Him, leave us, leave us. And then you see Jesus with the
man sitting, clothed in his right mind. And Jesus is about to leave in
the ship, going back to the other side, and he wants to go with
him. He says, he wants to be with Jesus, and Jesus says, no,
I want you to go home, and I want you to tell everyone in your
town, in your family, what God has done for you. And so he went
home, and he published throughout the whole city what Jesus had
done for him. That's a summary of what happened
here. And I want to go through this with you. And I'm not sure
if we'll be able to get through all of it today, because it's
a very detailed and lengthy account of a man who seems to be a very
extreme case. Don't you find his case to be
extreme? I think of all the people in
Scripture who were obviously out of control. They couldn't
control themselves. Other people couldn't control
them. This man, above all that I can think of in Scripture,
was completely out of control. So it's extreme in that sense.
And it's extreme, too, because Jesus came from one side of the
Sea of Galilee, all the way to the other side, just for this
one man. I find that amazing. And that's
the first thing I want to consider with you here, is that the Lord
Jesus Christ had a purpose. Remember when He said to His
disciples, which we went over last week, He said to His disciples,
let's go. After teaching the people, He
was in the ship, He said to His disciples, let's go to the other
side. He revealed His purpose to them
to go to the other side. He didn't tell them why He was
going, but He said, we want to go to the other side. And then
this storm arose. And in the storm, Jesus is sleeping
in the back of the boat. And the disciples, they think
they're about to drown. They really are in real danger.
The boat is full of water. And they cry out, Lord! Lord! Master! Master! We're perishing! Don't you even care?" And so
they cried to Jesus in the storm. And the Lord wakes up. And He
calms the sea. He commands the winds. And He
commands the waves. And they all hush at His command. He commands all of creation by
His Word. And all of creation obeys Him.
And now we have Him fulfilling His purpose, coming all the way
from one side to the other in order to save this man, this
one man. All the other people in the country
beg Him to leave, but this one man has changed. You see that?
And so the Lord Jesus Christ comes. Why did Jesus go to the
other side of the sea? Remember of the woman who had
a daughter who was troubled by a devil, and she came to Jesus,
and she asked the Lord, begging Him, and finally the Lord Jesus
says to her that he has taken care of the matter and sends
her away and she finds that her daughter has been relieved, delivered
of the devil. But he didn't go to the daughter,
he just sent his word. Why did the Lord Jesus Christ
go all the way through the storm to the other side of the sea
in order to find this man and deliver him from these devils?
Why did he do that? The Lord Jesus Christ came from
heaven to Bethlehem's manger, and then from Bethlehem's manger
to Calvary's cross, and then from Calvary's cross to heaven's
throne again. He came all that distance because
it was necessary for Him to come that way in order to save His
people from their sins. God purposed to save His people. But in order for God to save
His people from their sins, Christ had to take their sins. He Himself
was made sins. And with those sins, under the
law, He was found guilty and condemned. And God brought the
curse of His law on Him for our sins. And that's the way we are
redeemed from the curse of the laws. It says in Galatians 3.13.
The Lord Jesus Christ came all the way across the sea to show
us that it's necessary. Every step in our salvation is
necessary for us to know, to have. God had to choose us. Christ had to die to redeem us. The Spirit of God has to be sent
and make these things known to us. We have to believe The Lord
Jesus Christ, by His Spirit, has to give us a new nature,
His own Spirit to dwell within us, and then He has to preserve
us and bring us to glory. He has to do every step along
the way. And so we see that in this man.
First of all, Jesus came to this man because this man had to hear
the gospel himself. He had to hear the words of Christ
saying to him, commanding the devils to come out of him. That's
what caused him to sit and be clothed and in his right mind.
And then secondly, not only did the Lord Jesus do all this, what
we see in God's Word And this is what our hymn that we sang
a moment ago was about, But God. And this is very important. In
scripture, what we learn is that we, ourselves, are sinners. Sinners so much so that we are
opposed to God's law, to God Himself, and even to our own
salvation. We're opposed to all that's right.
And so the only way that we can have, the only hope that we have,
that God would save any of us, is if God does something entirely
of His own will, and by His own power, and actually fulfills
that will for saving His people according to His promises, according
to that will, and carries it out Himself. Many scriptures
bring this out. But if you wanted to make a note
of this, read through the chapter of Ezekiel 36, and what you'll
see there over and over again is these corresponding statements
of God. I will, and you shall. I will, and you shall. And there's
many of them in there, and I'm not going to take time to go
through all them with you. But it's a wonderful, it's a wonderful
promise of God. In the face of our rebellion,
in the face of our idolatry, in the face of our deliberate
sin against God, and our iniquity, God should and would cast us
off forever. But according to His eternal
purpose, His will, His love for His people, He takes an action. And so you see that. In Psalm
33 verse 9 it says, He spake, and it was done. He commanded,
and it stood fast. That's the Lord. He says, whatever
He said, it was done. He commanded and it stood fast. And then it says also in Isaiah
46 11, I have spoken it, God says, I will also bring it to
pass. I have purposed it, I will also
do it. Here we have in scripture the
blessed truth God promises, God works, and God fulfills His promise. This is the only hope we have
of being saved. Salvation requires the promise
of God, the will, the promise of God, and the work of God to
carry it out. Our salvation is dependent entirely
upon God. Jonas says this, salvation is
of the Lord. And when he says it's of the
Lord, it doesn't mean that he starts it and then we finish
it. Or that he offers it and we accept it. Or that he does
his part and we do our part. Salvation means that God does
the whole thing. Salvation is entirely of God
from the beginning to the end. He does the work. We are merely
the objects of His saving grace. And this is known by everyone
the Lord saves. Everyone that God saves say this. It's pictured in Revelation chapter
5, where those who surround the throne and the Lord Jesus Christ
is sitting on the throne, they take their crowns from off their
head and they cast their crowns at the feet of the Lord Jesus
Christ who sits on the throne. And that action of casting their
crowns at Christ's feet indicates that to these people, they're
absolutely convinced there's nothing to take notice about
us, but that God must take all the glory. He alone deserves
praise. He alone is honorable and worthy. We are the mere objects of His
mercy and His saving grace. We have nothing to claim. Are
you content? Think about this. Are you content
to be saved by the work of the Lord Jesus Christ alone, so that
all you can say, all that you contributed to it, is your sin? Or do you think that someday
God will have something He can take note of and say, Ah, there's
something we can highlight and recognize here before all of
the universe, something about you. No, salvation must all be
of grace, so that it's all of the Lord and all to His glory. And that's what, that's one of
the things that this, this particular account of this man teaches us
more than anything. Here's a helpless, obstinate,
out of control, and uncontrollable man. Vile, unclean, fierce, Destructive,
in misery, hateful, and hating one another. And when we look
at this man, we're appalled, aren't we? It's like, oh man,
he's so bad. We would want to just shoot him,
put him out of his misery, and keep us safe from him. Because
he's that fierce, he's that bad. And the people tried to put him
under control, and they couldn't do it. And so I think that one
of the things that this passage of Scripture teaches us here,
and I don't want to miss this, is that it shows us ourselves. This particular account God has
given in His Word shows us ourselves. in a way that is unclothed, naked,
exposed, unadorned, and unrestrained. Uncontrolled and uncontrollable.
This is what God is showing us here. This is what we are by
nature. We cannot control ourselves. We cannot be controlled by men. We're untameable. There's a lot
of things that people do to tame animals. Have you ever seen a
in the circus, maybe you haven't actually been there, but they
have these huge, strong, fierce animals doing things and they
train them. How they train them is pretty
amazing. They train them to do things
that are entirely opposed to their nature. You'll see a bear
riding a bicycle. And when you see a bear riding
a bicycle, it's almost embarrassing for the bear, isn't it? Poor
bear. They're humiliating him. Here's
a guy pushing a bicycle along. He's riding along, this huge
bear. Or many other things. Lions.
They'll put lions in a circle. And these lions who would naturally
be enemies not only of men, but themselves. All male lions on
these little things sitting around. They're growling and fierce and
snapping and ready at any moment. You don't know when they're just
going to jump on and kill the trainer or one another. That's
what this man was. Fierce and uncontrolled. Men
tried to tame him. But this is us by nature. Unless God restrains us, we would
be just like this man. Now that seems a little, a little
bit, aren't you stretching that a little bit? Doesn't that seem
a little more than the truth here, that you would find this
to be the case? Look at a few scriptures with
me. Look at Romans chapter 3. I want to take you to a few to
convince you from Scripture what God sees about us. And then we
should be thankful that God has not given us over to what we
are by nature. Look at Romans chapter 3. and
verse 9. I want to pick out verse 9 because
the verses that precede this detailed the sin and the ungodliness
and the unrighteousness of the Gentiles and then the Jews. And
then in the first eight verses of chapter 3, God shows the hardness
of the heart of the Jews that they would even turn an accusation
against God, saying that God's Word wasn't able to save them. And Paul has to, by the Spirit
of God, shuts that argument down in the first eight verses. And
then in verse nine, look at what Paul does. He says, what then? Are we better than they? Are we better than they? Are
we better than the Gentiles? Are we better than the self-righteous
Jews? Are we better than those who
would bring an accusation against God in His making, putting God
on the witness, I mean, on the stand of the accuser, making
Him the accused? Are we better than they? He says
in answer, no, in no wise. For we have before proved, both
Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin. All of us. We're all under sin. We're all
under the same sin. Not one of us can stand up and
say, I'm better. Because we're all before God
under sin. And then he gives the account
from the Old Testament from several places, pulling it together.
He says, as it is written. And when he says as it is written,
this is absolute truth, cannot be denied, cannot be argued against. He's bringing the scripture here.
There is none righteous, no, not one. God looked, he says
in Psalm 14, and he searched, are there any? Are there any
among all the children of men, on the face of the earth, across
all time, who understand and do what's right?" He says, no,
not one. He searched your heart. He searched
my heart. And he said, not one righteous. There is none that understandeth. There's none that seeketh after
God. They're ignorant. They've gone out of the way,
it says in Isaiah 53. It says here, they're all gone
out of the way. They're all together become unprofitable. If you stack them all up, you
know, at the Tower of Babel, they tried to build a tower to
heaven. Do the best that men can do.
Produce the best that men can produce. And what do you, what
does God think of it? It's all unprofitable. He says in the book of Luke,
around chapter 17, He says, that which is highly esteemed among
men is an abomination to God. How often do you see on TV programs
men applauding and lauding the accomplishments of men? And there's
nothing wrong with trying to be an honorable person. But before
God, before God himself, In the examination of his courtroom,
the world stands guilty and with no prophet before God. And then
he says this. He says, their throat is an... I'm sorry, I missed verse 12.
They are all gone out of the way. They are together become
unprofitable. There is none that doeth good.
No, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher. Remember this man? Where did
he live? In the tombs. Why? He preferred the company
of the dead to the living. He preferred death to life. Their throat, out of their mouths,
out of the deepest recesses of who they are, what comes? Death. It's an open sepulcher. Because
inside the sepulcher is nothing but death. With their tongues
they have used deceit. The poison of asps, that's a
poisonous snake, is under their lips. Their mouth is full of
cursing and bitterness. Remember what this man did? He
went in the mountains and in the tombs day and night crying. And what do you think he was
crying? He was shouting obscenities, foul things, hatred. He was shouting
things to scare, death, all the things that men do. Taking the
things that God has made holy and speaking unholy of them. Rude speech. Abominable things. All the things that come of men
whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. And look at verse
15. What did this man do? He ran
out when other people were near and he would attack them. Their
feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in
their ways. He was miserable and his business
was to make men miserable. and the way of peace they have
not known." It says in Isaiah 56 or 57, it says, the wicked
are like the troubled sea. It's just constantly turning
and churning up. And it says, it's in Isaiah 5720,
"...the wicked are like the troubled sea, it cannot rest, whose waters
cast up mire and dirt." I've been to the coastline of California,
and there's places where the embankment goes down at a steep
angle, so when the waves come, They don't roll up onto the sand,
but they turn like a rolling over. It's like the water is
almost churning against that embankment. And what it does
is it stirs up mud and rock and sand and it's just constantly
churning. It's like the sea is constantly
clawing at the land, trying to erode and destroy all that are
on the land. But God says to to those things,
the enemies of God's people. He says, you can come this far,
but no further. And so the wicked are like that.
That's what we're like by nature. In our souls, there's this constant
troubling. It's like the troubled sea. And
it stirs up dirt. And it's not clear. It's misery. There's no peace, saith my God,
for the wicked. But here in Romans 3, he says,
there's no fear of God before their eyes. That's the summation. When Abraham was among the Egyptians,
and the Egyptian king wanted his wife, it says that Abraham
saw there was no fear of God there, and so he was afraid.
He was afraid for his life, because they didn't fear God. And when
there's no fear of God, there's no respect of God. And I think
that that's one of the things that this text of Scripture shows. Is here is a man who did not
regard God and did not regard men. He was out of control. He was insane. He was crazy.
But this shows that this is what God describes of us. And look at other places. Look
at Titus chapter 3. Titus, I just take you to a few
of these because God has made, He's taken the time to give us
a detailed account of a man who is naked, wild, uncontrolled,
untamed, untameable, and he couldn't control himself. And he was helpless
and hopeless, and there was nothing that could be done for him by
men. Something, God had to do something, and this describes
our case. Look at Titus chapter 3. He says
in verse 3, We ourselves were also sometimes foolish, disobedient,
deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice
and envy, hateful and hating one another. But after that the
kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared, not
by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to
His mercy, He saved us." You see that? It's all the work of
God. It's God's mercy. We're out of control. We're opposed
to God. We oppose ourselves. Look at
2 Timothy. Just back a couple of pages.
2 Timothy. In chapter 2, verse 24, he says,
"...the servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto
all men apt to teach, patient in meekness, instructing those
that oppose themselves." Doesn't that describe this man? He opposed
himself. If God, per adventure, will give
them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth, that they may recover
themselves out of the snare of the devil, who are taken captive
by him at his will. This man was a slave. of the
devil. He had been taken captive by
the devil at the devil's will, and he did the devil's will.
This describes us. And God says here, the only recovery
is that God would give us repentance to the acknowledging of the truth.
And that's the gospel. The gospel is the truth. Repentance
is God-given faith of that truth. Look at Ephesians, a couple more
along the way here. Ephesians chapter 4, in verse
17. Ephesians 4, 17. This I say therefore
and testify in the Lord that you henceforth walk not as other
Gentiles walk, He's speaking to believers now, and he's referring
to other Gentiles, meaning this is what we were. Other Gentiles
walk, not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind,
having the understanding darkened. being alienated from the life
of God through the ignorance that is in them because of the
blindness of their heart, who, being past feeling, have given
themselves over unto lasciviousness to work all uncleanness with
greediness." It's just like adjectives stacked upon adjectives describing
our filth and uncleanness. Look at 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians
chapter 6 and verse 9. Well, actually we should read
verse, yeah, 1 Corinthians chapter 6 and verse 9. Know ye not that
the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived,
neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate,
nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous,
nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit
the kingdom of God." And before you get, well, I don't have a
problem with any of those things, No, no. The point of this text
is to show us to take back the covering of our self-righteousness
and what we do to appear good before men and show us this is
what we are by nature. The unrestrained, unadored, naked
self. That's what we are. unless God
has mercy unless he does something that's what will remain and so
he says and such were some of you but you are washed you are
sanctified but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus
and by the spirit of our God you see that and one more I should
have had you look at this while we're in Ephesians Ephesians
chapter five all these things don't they describe this man
And having to use the same words to describe this man in Mark
chapter 5, also describe us by nature. The Lord saves us out
of these things. In Ephesians chapter 5, he says
in verse 5, For this you know that no whoremonger,
nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, have
any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. Let no
man deceive you with vain words. For because of these things cometh
the wrath of God upon the children of disobedience. Be not ye therefore
partakers with them. For you were sometimes darkness,
Doesn't that describe this man? Darkness. He lived in tombs,
he yelled all night long, and during the day he's shouting
and yelling, howling. out of control. He's the servant
of Satan. He says here, ìYou were sometimes
darkness, but now are you light in the Lord. Walk as children
of the light.î So this describes us, doesn't it? Can you see this? Do you see this? God has to cause
us to hear the gospel as sinners. And not just sinners like, well,
yeah, I'm a sinner like everyone else. Who could fault that, you
know? Everyone else does it. No. You have to do with God. The thing of it is, is that here's
a country of people. Think about the setting here.
Here's a man, completely out of control. And what are the
people doing? They're taking care of pigs.
Here's a man who was wild and untamed and uncontrolled and
uncontrollable. And here these people are peacefully
feeding pigs. The people were at peace as long
as the pigs were happy. And there was a man who was controlled
by the devil. But as soon as Christ came and
commanded the devils to depart from this man, and he was at
peace, and the pigs were destroyed, then the people were upset. Then
they were at unrest. And so you see, our nature is
It's just like that. But it's latent. It's hidden. It's repressed.
It's held down. And it's held down because of
various things. A lot of it is simply that God
restrains what's in us. He holds back what we are by
nature. And if He didn't hold it back,
we would be no better than the devil. So, let's look further
now at Mark chapter 5. Jesus crosses. He comes to the
other side. It's His purpose to do so. His
purpose to save. He must come. We must hear the
gospel. He must save. Remember what David
did? He was taking care of his sheep, and a lion came. and got one of the lambs in his
mouth. And David rose up and he took
the lion by the beard and he smote the lion and took the lamb
out of the lion's mouth. And a bear did the same thing.
He killed the lion and the bear. And then there was the giant
trying to destroy all Israel. And David comes with one stone
and sling and kills the giant. Cuts off his head. That's what
Jesus is doing here. He's like David, the shepherd.
He's coming to save one sheep. Remember in Luke chapter 15?
The shepherd who cares for the sheep, he leaves the ninety and
nine that are in the fold, and he goes after one that is lost. Out into the wilderness, looking,
searching, finding, putting it on his shoulders, carrying it
back. And that one sheep, that one sheep, represents all whom
the Lord saves. The 99 sheep in the fold represents
those who think they're saved, but are actually lost. That's
what this parable is teaching here. Here's one man. The worst
of men, the meanest of men, and he's saved and the rest are lost. And I say all that so that we
would appreciate and we would come to the Lord and say, Lord,
help me to hear the gospel as a sinner. Not as a righteous
man, but as a sinner. Because only sinners are the
people Jesus came to save. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation. That Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners, Paul said. And then he said this, "...of
whom I am chief." I'm the chief. That's the way we need to hear
the gospel. He came to this country for this one man and rescued
him. He rescued him. And so then,
look at this a little further. I've talked about the description
of this man. I've shown you scriptures to show that this is what we
are by nature. Our helpless condition. Now we
see how salvation comes to us. Look at verse 6. It says in verse 6 of Mark 5,
and when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him. He saw Jesus afar off to see
the Lord Jesus Christ. Isaiah 65 and verse 1, it says
this, I am found of them that sought me not. In fact, let's turn there. It's
one of those verses that we should just take like honey on a hot
buttered biscuit into our mouth and just let it savor there. Isaiah 65 verse 1, he says, I
am sought of them that asked not for me. I am found of them
that sought me not. Does that not describe this man?
Was he seeking the Lord Jesus Christ? He found him. The Lord was seeking him, but
he wasn't seeking the Lord. And then he says, the Lord says
here, I said, behold me, behold me unto a nation that was not
called by my name. A nation? the Gentiles, us, those
who were in themselves the deceived, the unrighteous, the ungodly,
those who were opposing their own salvation. God, in His mercy,
says, Through the Lord Jesus Christ, behold me, behold me. The man saw Jesus afar off and
came to Him. And when he came to Him, he worshipped
Him. He had to see the Lord Jesus
Christ. Jesus says this in John 6 and verse 40. He says, this is the will of
Him that sent me. that everyone who seeth the Son,
and believeth on him, shall not perish, but have everlasting
life." The ones who are saved are the ones who see the Lord
Jesus Christ. Until we see the Lord Jesus Christ,
there's no hope for us. God has to come to us and make
himself known to us in the gospel of his son. And that's how we
see him. We see him in the gospel. Now
look, he says, and he ran and worshipped him. He ran and worshipped
the Lord Jesus Christ. And take a look at what it says,
the same thing as in Matthew chapter 8. I think it's Matthew's
version. He says this in Matthew 8. And verse, well it doesn't say it there,
but it's in Luke chapter 8. Let me go to Luke chapter 8.
In Luke chapter 8, I'll give you the verse here. It says, Well, I'm not finding it. But He bows down and worships
Him. He falls at His feet in worship
in one of them and says that. He fell down and cried out. But I'm not seeing it. But I
know that that's there. The point I'm trying to make
is this. Is that when we worship the Lord
Jesus Christ throughout Scripture, and I looked at every verse in
the Bible where God uses the word worship. And when God uses, when God describes
us when we worship God, do you know how He describes us? He
describes our posture, our position that we take before Him. And
what is that position that we take when we worship God? We
bow down. We bow down with our face to
the ground. We lie prostrate on the ground
before God. And what does it mean to lie
prostrate on the ground? To bow down? It means a number
of things. First of all, it means that we're
lying on the ground at the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lying
on the ground subject to his mercy. We're in the hand and
at the mercy of God. And here's a man who comes to
him. He bows down to the Lord Jesus. I am in your hand. You can do with me whatever you
will. Remember the leper? He said,
Lord, if you will, you can make me whole. You can make me clean.
Here's a man who bows down to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
the first thing. He's at his Mercy. I'm in your
hand. You're sovereign. And you can
do with me whatever you want. The second thing is, about worship,
is that when people worship, they're giving an admiration,
an adoration to the one they're worshiping. They're saying, you're
good in all that you do. You alone are good in all that
you do. They worship, they give, they
ascribe to the one they worship all of the goodness. That's the
second thing. And certainly this, when we worship
God we're saying, you're the Lord. You can do whatever you
want. All power is in your hand. All
power over me is in your hand. All these things were meant when
this man came to worship Him. He's saying, you are holy. You are all powerful. And what you do is right. And
the right that you do should be done to me. I deserve it.
Look at Philippians chapter 2. Just a couple of... We could
do a big study on this, but I just want to take you to a couple
of places here. And I'm going to have to continue
this count here next week because we're running out of time. But
Philippians chapter 2. He says this in verse five, let
this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. Think this
way, have this attitude. Who being in the form of God,
thought it not robbery to be equal with God. The Lord Jesus
Christ is equal with God. And he didn't think it robbery
to be equal with God. That's who he is. But, verse
7, he made himself of no reputation. And he took upon him the form
of a servant and was made in the likeness of men. He became
a man, but He still was God. And being found in fashion as
a man, not only was He in the likeness of men, but He humbled
Himself further and became obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross. This describes our Lord Jesus
Christ. What it's saying there in verse
8 is that the Lord Jesus Christ, as God, became man, And as man
fulfilled the everlasting will of God by his obedience unto
God in even the death of the cross. In every way he was obedient,
and especially in this way, his own death on the cross. Now,
the result of that is in verse 9. Wherefore God also hath highly
exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that
at the name of Jesus every knee should bow. And of things in
heaven? All of heaven is going to bow
to Him. And things in earth? All the
people. Everything in earth. And things
under the earth? All devils. Every created being
in the universe is going to bow in worship to the Lord Jesus
Christ. The saved and the unsaved. And
look what they're going to say. and that every tongue should
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the
Father." Now that's what's going to happen. You can take it to
the bank. This is going to happen. The
Lord Jesus Christ is going to be the object of the worship
of every created being in the universe. Of devils and saints,
of angels and wicked men. They're all going to say, He's
the Lord, and they're going to confess. They're going to agree
with God. They're going to say, He's the
Lord, and they're going to agree with Him about how He has always
been good, and they've always been, in themselves, evil. They
have to confess what God has said. They're going to say the
same things that God has been saying all along. And this is
going to happen. And now we see it happening here
in Mark chapter 5. He runs, he sees Jesus, he runs
to Him, and he worships Him. And this is how God saves us. He causes us to submit without
opposition to the Lord Jesus Christ, to own Him as God, to
own Him as Lord of us, as good, and we ourselves take our place
in the dust because we are nothing but sin. And that's what this
man was. He was out of control. And I
want to get to the rest of this next time, because we're running
a little late here. But think about these words,
what happened next. In verse 7, "...he cried with
a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus,
thou Son of the Most High God? I adjure thee by God, torment
me not." Did the Lord Jesus Christ hear that prayer? Did he answer
the man's request? What have I to do with thee,
Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Remember, he answered the request
of the devils. Can we go into the swine? Yeah,
go. How about the Gadarenes who said,
leave us. Jesus left. But to this man,
what did he say? What have I to do with thee,
Jesus, Son of God? Did the Lord Jesus Christ leave
this man because he said that? He had nothing to do with the
Son of God. Everything about this man was
exactly opposite to what Christ is. There was no point of correspondence,
no part of this man that you could say, that corresponds to,
that has something like the Lord Jesus Christ. He should find
something there in this man that he could identify with and find
a reason in this man to have mercy on him. Nothing like that
at all. What have I to do with thee, Jesus, Son of God? There
was nothing in this man. Everything in him cried out for
his destruction and his rejection. But the Lord Jesus Christ did
not answer that request, did he? And that's why I see in this
scripture the irrepressible, the unstoppable, amazing grace
of God. Here we see the words, but God,
in scripture. God is fulfilling for this man
what he does for all of his people. He saves us in spite of what
we deserve, in spite of who we are. In the midst of our sin,
He commands the devils to depart, and He causes us to sit before
Him clothed and in our right mind, submitting to Him, hearing
His words, admiring Him, wanting nothing but Him. That's the result
of this man's salvation, isn't it? The devil's departing, this
man's seated, and the country around begging Christ to leave. It's quite a picture of our salvation,
the irrepressible, unstoppable, unquenchable, irresistible work
of God in the Lord Jesus Christ to save His own. Here we are,
exposed in our nakedness, in our rebellion, in our uncontrolled
rage against men and God, and Christ comes and He puts us in
our right mind. Until we see the Lord Jesus Christ,
we are insane. Until we bow before Him, we're
out of control and under the dominion of Satan. Only God can
grant us repentance unto life. Let's pray. Father, we thank
You for being so gracious that where sin abounded, Your grace
did much more abound. We see it in this man, and we
know something of it even in our own experience. We were believing
the lies of all of man's religion. We were living in pleasure for
ourselves, and you arrested us. Religion couldn't control us,
and we couldn't control ourselves. We tried to do things we didn't
want to do, and found our nature was opposed to it. And we tried
to stop doing what we wanted to do and couldn't stop. But
then you came, you showed us yourself, and now we sit before
you desiring nothing but to hear your word, to do your will, and
to give you honor and praise. We pray, Lord, take glory to
yourself for saving us from what we are and what we deserve by
your own blood. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.