I'm turning to Mark chapter 5. Mark chapter 5. I titled this message, Christ's
Power to Save. His power to save. in the Bible class, his power
to give sight. Last week, we saw his power over
creation. He made the winds and the waves
be still, to lie down, be quiet. Throughout the Gospel, he demonstrates
his power over absolutely Everything. He gave the deaf their hearing.
The dumb was able to speak. The lame was able to walk. He
raised the dead. He's showing us, by doing these
things, His power to do these things spiritually. To give us
spiritual sight. He can give us our physical sight,
but which is more important? To have 20-20 vision or to be
able to see Christ? He says it's better to be halt
and lame than to enter into heaven than to be made whole and go
straight to hell. That's what he said. And here he saves a man from
an evil spirit. And don't think, don't think
that this was something that was prevalent in his day. It's
just as prevalent in our day as it was in his day. It's just
as prevalent today. The lost are still walking under
the power of darkness. The prince, the God of scripture
says, the God of this world, little G. Still that way. And here's my question that I
want to be on your mind and my mind through this whole message. Is He able to save me from? And you fill in the blank. You
fill in the blank. I know we believe He's able to
save us from the power of the wrath of God. He's able to
save us from the wrath to come. That's the scripture I'm trying
to think of. We know that. He's able to make us stand before
God. But you know, I have a life to live right now. Don't I? You do too. We have a life to
live. I might live to be an old man.
I mean, I'm getting close to that. I mean, 50's not old, but
it's getting there. I remember Henry said one time,
you're 50, you're not young anymore, you're getting old. He just knew
how to put it, didn't he? But I might live to be an old
man. I might live to be into my... Nobody's here that's a
hundred. I'll say a hundred. I might live
to be a hundred. I need Him for the journey. I need that. I need Him to save
me every day. You know, I do. And I realize
this as I've gotten older. I need Him to save me every day. Every day. To deliver me every
day. And he's able. He's able. And we're going to see this.
This is a tough case here, we think. Not for him. We couldn't do it, but he can
do it. Doctors can't do it. He can do it. He can do it. Doctors are going to throw some
medicine at him, but I tell you what, after a while, you know down
there it says he was often bound with fetters. He broke them. You know, after
a while it wears off, doesn't it? And you've got to deal with it. So we're going to see here
that our Lord's power to save. And they came over onto the other
side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes. They came over
there for, this is not just a leisure visit. He came to save. He came to save. He came to get
one of His sheep. That Satan was molesting. That
Satan was tormenting. And our Lord knows what torment
is. We saw that last Wednesday night. Crying out of darkness,
my God, my God, why dost Thou forsake me in torment? He knows
what torment is. He knows what mental anguish
is. When He was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He said, if you
don't do something, my soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto
death. And what he is saying, if you
don't do something right now, I'm going to die right here.
That's the mental anguish. He knows what that's all about.
So they come over to the other side, and they come over here
to this country of the Gadarenes, and when he comes out of the
ship, immediately they're made him out of the tomb, A man with
an unclean spirit, he's possessed of a devil. I have no doubt. No doubt. I don't know much about
this, but everyone outside of Christ is possessed of an unclean
spirit. I believe that. You remember this story where
this father brings his son to the disciples and they couldn't
help him. He was throwing himself into
the water and into the fire. And the moment at the mouth,
I mean, he was just bad. And the disciples couldn't
do anything about it. And the Lord said, bring him
to me. Bring him to me. And he said, how long has this
been going on? And that father said, since he
was a child. That's how long. He said, from a child. It says over in Ephesians chapter
2, look over there. Ephesians chapter 2, and you hath he quickened who
were dead, trespasses and sins, verse 1, wherein in time past
you walked according to the course of this world. according to the
prince of the power of the air. That's how you walked after him,
under his power. You walked under the power of
Satan. That's every person outside of
the Lord Jesus Christ. The spirit that now worketh in
the children. Where does he work? Does he work?
Does it say he works among them? It says here he works in them.
He works in the children of disobedience, among whom also we had our conversation. We were in that mess. We were
under that same power. But when he was come out of the
ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs, a man with
an unclean spirit. His problem was within. It wasn't his environment. It
was what was in him. My problem is what I was born
with. My problem is not with you, and yours is not with me.
It's not with society. It's what I was born with. I
was born in sin and shaped in iniquity. That's what the Word
of God teaches us. And it's so, isn't it? It's so. He had an unclean spirit, a foul
spirit, an immoral spirit, a wicked spirit. This describes that man. You
know, in Genesis it says, when God looked down from heaven,
he saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and man's
imagination was evil, and that continually. No let up. No break. And this man lived in the tomb,
a graveyard. You know why he lived there?
Because he felt at home there. He felt at home among the dead.
What's that old adage, birds of a feather flock together?
He felt at home there. He felt out of place anyplace
else. And verses 3 through 5, we are
going to see all human effort fails. All human effort. Religion fails. Doctors fail. And we have to come to this place
where everything fails. And then the Lord picks us up,
if He's going to save us, and He brings us to that place where
everything else fails, and He's the only one left, the only one. It says here in verse 3, He had
His dwellings among the tombs, and no man could bind Him. They
couldn't chain Him up, couldn't bind Him. No, not with chains
they couldn't do it. because he had been often bound
with fetters and chains. That didn't work. You see, all
human effort to control this man failed. Human nature is such, it's like
a beast. It's like a beast. You can cage
it for a little while, but you give it an opportunity to break
out. It's coming out. It's going to break out. It's
powerful. Powerful. Religion couldn't do it. They
try to bind laws and dues and notes and ceremonies. And I tell
you what, it doesn't change the nature, does it? You cannot change the nature
of the beast. When God saves a sinner, He doesn't
change the nature of the beast. He gives a new nature. That's
what he did. He's not changed that old nature
into a new nature. It never happens now. He gives
a new nature. There is a new creation. He's
going to lay an old beast in the dirt one day. That's when
that will be over with. But they had chained him up,
but he plucked him asunder and broke him in pieces. I bet they tried everything.
They probably tried chains and fetters and medicine and everything
they could try. And it all failed. And it always
will. It always will. And always, night
and day, he was in the mountains and in the tombs crying and cutting
himself with stones. No let up. Sin never lets up,
does it? This old nature never lets up.
Satan never lets up. He's merciless. Absolutely merciless. He doesn't know an inkling of
mercy. Not at all. And all that they tried to do
was really, what did they try to do? Bring him into bondage.
They tried to bound him. They thought that would work.
Just let's bring him into bondage. Whom the Lord sets free, he's
what? Free indeed. Ain't no bondage to it. He sets
us free. He sets the captive free. And
that's what he's going to do with this man. He's going to
set him free from this foul, well, legion. I read someplace
where it's like 6,000. This man's possessed of 6,000.
Unbelievable, isn't it? And it says here he's cutting
himself with stone. I tell you what, until God saves
us, until there's really a true salvation that happens, we are
self-destructive. We spend our life destroying
ourselves. Don't we? I know we do. I can look back
at my own life. If God didn't guide and direct
me, every decision I ever made in my life would be wrong. Every
decision I've ever made in my life would be after the lust
of this flesh. It would be after serving John. Believe me, you'd
just be secondary if that. But when he saw Jesus afar off,
he ran and he worshiped Him. It wasn't the kind of worship
we have here this morning at first. At first. It's not that
kind of worship. He acknowledged Him to be who
He is. Now, that's worship. That's called worship. Acknowledge
Him to be who He is, the Son of God. But this man, it says
here, he saw Jesus. Now, you look that up, and that
word saw means this. It doesn't mean that he saw Him
coming at a distance. It means he perceived who He
was. When this man saw Jesus, when
he got out of that boat, he perceived as the Son of God. The Son of
God has just shown up. That's what he perceived. The
Lord revealed himself. He made himself known. You know,
he doesn't have, you know, you and I have to go up and introduce
ourselves. I have to introduce you and introduce myself to you
and tell you my name and and others. If I don't tell you any
more, you're not going to know anything else. The Lord doesn't have to
say a word. Like that thief on the cross.
He said they both cast the same in their teeth. They were both
reeling on him. And all of a sudden, all of a sudden, that one thief
realizes there's something different here. This is the Son of God. The other one didn't realize
a thing. He just kept on running his mouth. But that one realized,
this is the Son of God, and He's going to paradise. Lord, would
You remember me when You come into Your kingdom? When the Lord reveals Himself, you know it. And you know Him. You know it. And there's a difference. I promise you, you'll never be
the same. You'll never be the same person. He has the power to save from
sin. The guilt of it as well as the
power of it. He has the power to do it. Salvation happens when we perceive
in our hearts this is the Son of God. When Jesus Christ really
becomes real. And He's not just someone that
lived 2,000 years ago. He's someone who lives and is
seated at God's right hand right now. He's as real to me as you
are sitting where you are. If He's not that real, you're
not there yet. You're not there. Because we're
not dealing with just believing a story. We're dealing with believing
a person, a living person, the Son of God. That's what we're
dealing with. And he cried with a loud voice,
and he said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of
the Most High God? What are you doing here? My beef's
not with you. What do we have to do with you?
You leave us alone, and we'll leave you alone. This man, and
it's hard to tell who's speaking, isn't it? It's hard to tell when
you read through this which one's speaking, the man or the devil.
Because it's intertwined. That's how much in league we
are by nature with Satan. It's hard telling who's doing
the talking. You just look at the language. First it goes we,
then it'll go I. I mean, it just goes back and
forth. The Lord knows who's talking. I'll tell you that. He knows.
But what have we to do with Thee, Jesus? Here's the question. What's He going to do with me? What's he going to do with me?
It's not what I'm going to do with him. What have I to do with
you? No, it's what does he have to do with me? We all have to deal with him
sooner or later. What's he going to do with me?
Thou Son of the Most High God, the Son of God, I adjure thee
by God that thou torment me not. It doesn't say us, does it? It
doesn't say we. I adjure thee by God that thou
torment me not. Hard to tell which one's speaking,
but they're so in league. They're so in league with one
another. This shows us how closely connected
the lost are to Satan and under his power. It says in verse 8, For he said
unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit. Oh, here's the power of God. There's no begging going on here.
There's no compromising going on here in any way, shape or
form. The Lord came to reclaim his sheep. He came to claim this
man. This man's his. This is mine.
This one's mine. You're not getting it. You come
out of him, you leave. The stronger man has shown up.
The stronger man of the house is going to take over the house
and that's going to be his house. And Satan is never going to enter
into that man again. That's not going to happen. Christ
is going to possess that man. He's going to be possessed of
God instead of Satan. And he says to him, come out
of the man, leave him, he's not yours, he's mine. This is how
God says. This is how God saves. He commands
the God of this world to give it up. To give it up. And he has to
give it up. And the Lord asks him, what's
thy name? Now he didn't ask him that because he didn't know his
name. You know that. He's going to make this man, in his situation here, confess
who he is and what he is. Just like that woman with the
issue of blood. We'll see that here in the next time. Yeah,
probably the next time. Well, maybe the next time after
time. But he's going to make, he had her confess why she touched
him. She reached out, she touched
him, then she drew back. She didn't want to slip off and
go back home. And he stopped. He called her out. He called
her out. And she had to confess before
everyone why she touched him. And he's making this man confess
before all of us. He's making him confess who he
is and what he is. And he said, my name is Legion.
That's not the name his parents gave him, I know. That's the name of the devil,
or legion, many. Many, we are many. And he besotted
much that he would not send him out of the country. Don't send me into the abyss. Don't torment me now. He knew
he deserved it. He knew he deserved it and the
devils knew they were going to get it. They know that. They know
that judgment is coming and torment is coming. At different times
they said, you come to torment us before the time? It's coming. But don't cast us out. Don't
cast me into hell. Don't cast me into the abyss. And there was there, nine to
the mountain, a great herd of swine feeding. What do swine
represent in the Scriptures? The ungodly. The ungodly. Who are the ungodly? Everyone
that believes not on the Lord Jesus Christ. Everyone. Everyone that does not believe
on Christ is ungodly. and possessed of an evil spirit.
You know, Hollywood gives us this thing of being possessed,
of the head spinning around and throwing up something green.
You've seen that movie. I didn't see it, but I've heard
about it. I've watched a little bit of it. It's bad stuff, isn't
it? That's Hollywood's version of
what it is to be possessed. You don't think someone's carrying
a Bible, Liz, do you? Those Bible-thumping Pharisees.
Christ said, you're of your father's devil. You're possessed of him.
He's got you. That's who your father is. God
is not your father. The devil's your father. Nobody
would have thought that. Would you have thought that? No one
would have thought that. The best people in town. Most
law-abiding citizens in town. If they said 55, they'd drive
55. I know they wouldn't either. They'd lie about it. You'd use
the ticket for not doing it. But they claimed to do it. And
they were thought to be the best people around. And they were
possessed of the devil. And all the devils besought Him.
They all started begging Him. They started begging Him. Send
us to the swine that we may enter into them. And forthwith, Jesus gave them
leave. Sometimes He just lets men, women, devils have their
way. It will fulfill His will, though
we can't see it. He let them have their way. Gave them what
they wanted at that time. But they had to beg Him. Here's
the thing. They had to bow down to Him,
didn't they? They had to bow to the feet of
the Master and say, would you please, would you please, please,
please let us go over into those pigs? Would you please not cast
us out of the country? Would you please not cast us
into hell? And even here He let them have
their request, didn't He? How much more do you think he'd give
a man if he said, would you please have mercy on me and forgive
me? And they that fed the swine, they fled
and they told it in the city and in the country. That word
went abroad. And they went out to see what
was done. And they came to Jesus and see
Him that was possessed with the devil. The one that they had
chained. The one that they had tried to rein in. They tried to rein Him in. They saw Him. And here's how
they saw Him. Sitting with His clothes on. Where do you get those clothes?
I'm sure the Lord provided. Just like He provided us with
a righteousness to stand before God clothed. We won't stand before
God naked. My soul won't stand before God
naked. My soul will stand before Him
clothed in the righteousness of Jesus Christ. And I tell you what, you're going
to see a throng of sinners a number that cannot be numbered, sitting
at the feet of Christ and in the right mind. That's when a person is in the
right mind, is when they finally sit at His feet and listen to
Him and worship Him. He's got the power to save now.
He can do it. Now, what was that? 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 to
depart out of their coast. And he answered that prayer,
didn't he? He takes his disciples. They
go through this storm to get to this man possessed of the
devil. As I was reading over this, I
was thinking, What he does put his ministers through in order
to get to that next sheet. You don't know what you have
to go through to get to that next sheet. He puts them through that
storm. They were so scared. They said,
did you ever thought that we'd perish? You know, he has to make us put
a real value on life, doesn't he? You don't value your life
nearly as much as you think you do until you get ready to lose
it. I was watching a thing on television or a program here
some time ago. This young man, he was getting
ready to do the Iron Man. He had Lou Gehrig's disease.
He probably looked like he was 22, 23. He had Lou Gehrig's disease. But he wanted to do this Iron
Man first. And so his dad helped him and stuff like that. And
his dad said, I had to bend down and tie his shoe for him because
he didn't have the strength in his hands to do it. And he said,
it really made me realize how appreciative I need to be of
the small things in life. Just being able to tie a pair
of shoes. We lose that, don't we? We lose that. Those disciples had to be brought
through a storm to where they were afraid of losing their life,
and then they would learn to put some kind of value on life.
That man's life is just as valuable as theirs. Isn't it? Just as valuable. And they began to pray Him to
leave, and He's going to do what they ask Him to do. They liked it better the other
way. Isn't that amazing? They would have just assumed
that this guy would have stayed back up in the tombs and gone
around and they had their pigs back. They lost 2,000 pigs and
that was a shot to the pocketbook. Now if you want to mess with
somebody, just get in their pocketbook. Just get in their pocketbook.
Somebody tried to steal Vicki's pocketbook at Walmart too long
ago. She was screaming like a fancy. I bet he wouldn't try to steal
that pocketbook again. He'd give somebody's pocketbook.
You want to get that reaction. Well, he got in her pocketbook.
He got in her pocketbook and it made him mad. Made him mad. Parents, religion, want you to
get saved until God actually does it. I've told you this before, but
I had a friend I used to run around with when I got older. He told me once, he said, I wish
God hadn't saved you. He told me that. I wish God hadn't saved you. I'm so glad He did because God
killed him. He was about 19 years old. I'm glad he did. I wish it had
saved him, too. I wouldn't have thought that he would have, but
it is what it is. And when he was coming to the
ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that
he might be with him. Let me go with you. That is the
attitude of every child of God. Lord, let me go with you. Let
me follow you. is not following after Christ. You're lost. You're lost. And your interest in following
Christ, it's evidenced by you being here at the gospel, to
hear it all the time. I mean, there's an evidence of
that. It's your love of Christ. It's your love of the Word. It's
your love of His people. That's evidence of it. The others there said, leave!
Leave. He said, Lord, let me go with
you. But you know what following Christ
is all about? It's doing His will. If it's
His will for me to stand here and preach, if it's His will
not to, that's following Christ. If it's His will for you to live
here and move and be somewhere else, that's following Christ.
Following Christ is following Him wherever He is. Howbeit, Jesus suffered him not,
but saith unto him, Now you go home to your friends. You go home to that home you
tore up, that you messed up, and you tell them what great
things God has done for you. You tell them how great things
the Lord hath done for thee and hath had compassion on thee. Go home and tell them what mercy
God has had on you and your family. Go home and tell them. Have you and I told our friends
and family what great things the Lord has done for us? Don't go home because I've done
this and made the mistake of doing it. Don't go home and try
to convince them that God chose a people. You can't convince
a dead man of anything. Just go over to the graveyard
and see what you can accomplish. But you go home and you tell
them what great things God has done for you. For you. Your experience of it. You can't tell what you don't
know. And he departed. He did what
he was told to do. And began to publish in Decapolis
how great things Jesus had done for him. And all men did marvel. He did just what he was saved
to do. He became a flaming witness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Go home. Go home. Tell them what great
things the Lord's done for you. When's the last time you ever
did that? When's the last time? I was thinking about this myself.
Because I do it here every week. But when's the last time I ever
went out here, outside, for you going home and myself, and actually
told someone what great things God's done for me? When's the
last time that ever happened? Well, do it.