Baltimore Lutheran Campus Ministry

Mark 1: 21-28

It was an ordinary Sabbath.  The people were going to the synagogue because that’s what good, observant Jewish people did.  They were expecting to hear about God’s rules for their lives and the promises that God had given them.  The usual synagogue stuff.  Not much different from the usual church stuff.  

But instead, there was this man Jesus, teaching.  He spoke with an authority that seemed to come from the heart of who he was.  Their minds were spinning and they were so quiet you could hear a pin drop.  

And in the midst of this hopeful silence, a man with an unclean spirit comes in.  In a synagogue, where the unclean were not welcome.  And he started shouting- “What are you up to, Jesus? Are you here to destroy us? I know you are the Holy One of God.”  These were things you just didn’t say in the synagogue or anywhere if you were in your right mind.  

But the crowds didn’t expect any different from this man.  He was one of those folks that people whispered about.  They knew that something was not right about him- something that was so powerfully wrong that he could no longer hide it.  They said he had a demon.  

And that’s where the story gets hard for us to swallow.  Many of us don’t quite know what to do with stories of demons in Scripture.  It’s something we skip over quickly when we ready Bible stories.  And it’s something we often apologize for when we talk to people outside the faith.  Because it may have been something that happened in the ancient world, but we don’t have demons anymore.  And we often assume that it was just their way of talking about mental illness.  But I think all the talk of demons goes a little deeper than that and I think we all know far more about them than we often want to admit.  

Maybe we prefer to talk about them as “unclean spirits” or addictions or compulsions or the power of evil, but whatever we call them, we still know those powers in our lives.  The ones that disfigure us like the man in the synagogue and turn us into what we are not.  These demons are all the forces that make run in the opposite direction of what God wants for us.  Rather than bless others, they encourage us to curse others, to tear them down.  They are the forces that drive us to hate, rather than love and drive us to side with powers of death and destruction rather than stand on the side of life and health.  They are powers that deform us and change us from who God created us to be.  

Maybe these powers get a foothold during the end of a relationship, when someone has hurt us more deeply than we can explain.  Right then, the power of hatred disfigures us and turns all our attention toward hurting that person back.  That power takes over and leaves no room for joy or for life or for thinking about others.        

Or maybe you have met those powers in a deep, painful grief after you have lost someone you love.  Maybe that sadness and hopelessness is so overpowering that you can’t even see through it, you can’t even remember who you used to be.  Each day begins and ends with that grief and there isn’t anything left of who you are- you’re just going through the motions of life.

Those powers may be at work through an addiction that claims that it is the thing that is control in your life.  That doesn’t even let you up to breathe.  It keeps calling out to you- whether it is alcohol or food or the desperate need to be in control.  It often feels good, it makes things ok for a time, but it also becomes something that you can’t say no to, even though you don’t like what it does to you.  

And sometimes demons hide in something that seems pretty good at the time- being successful or busy or rich.  You know, something that looks good, but ultimately changes who we are and makes us give our life to something that doesn’t matter.

These demons, these powers of evil don’t have to be dramatic.  They don’t have to be visible to anyone else like they were for the man in the synagogue, but they are real and we know what it is to fight these powers.  We know what it is to be controlled by forces that disfigure us.  Powers that make us into what they want us to be, not what we were made by God to be.  

Perhaps those in ancient times had a gift in being able to name these spirits for what they were- not just painful and destructive things, but spirits that are at war with who God made us to be.  Addictions and hatred and greed- these are all spirits other than God.  They’re not just bad habits or human nature.  They aren’t things to be laughed at or ignored.  The ancients could admit what we cannot- we are not made to be like this.  And in our finer moments, we know that’s true.  

We are made in God’s image, so we are not made to dwell in hatred and greed.  Even though it may feel good at times, we are not made to want revenge on our brothers and sisters.  We are not made for war and violence- in words or actions.  And we are not made to have anyone or anything have ultimate power over us other than God alone.  

But there is good news for us- What is true for the man in the temple is just as true for us.  

Jesus has power over all that threatens to define us and drag us away from who we were called to be.  He has authority over all the forces within us and around us that cause us to run away from God’s intention for us.  

Jesus doesn’t just help us keep New Year’s Resolutions or help us give something up at Lent.  That is too small a thing.  Jesus has the power to drive away the forces that draw us from God.  The power to put us in our right mind and our right identity.  To make us into who God hopes we will be- people of joy and love and compassion and service.

But how does Jesus do it?  How does Jesus drive away all those forces that try to own us?  I wish there were some big flash of light or some magical words or something that proved that these powers were gone, that they no longer had control over us.  Then we could have something to hold onto to trust Jesus’ power.  

But there’s not.  Jesus doesn’t so much as touch the man with the unclean spirit.  Jesus sends the evil spirits away simply by saying “Be silent, and come out of him!”  He tells the demons that they have no right to speak, that they no longer have authority.  They can no longer own this man because God has already claimed him.  

Jesus speaks and his words are somehow enough.  Because his words create exactly what they say they will.  That’s how it is with the words of God.  They do what they say. It sounds too easy.  Just as it was in creation, when God said “let there be light” and there was light, so it will always be.  When God speaks, it creates a new reality.  When God tells the waters of the flood to stop and the waters of the Red Sea to part, they do.  So when God pronounces a blessing, you are blessed.  When God gives you a promise, you are covered in it.   When God speaks words of forgiveness, you are forgiven.  

Jesus has authority over the demons, over all that tries to have control over us.   He has power over all that fights against us and he keeps speaking that truth because he doesn’t want us to live enslaved.  That’s what God declares in baptism- I choose you and you are claimed by me and no other.  These other powers may fight for you, but I will fight them even to death.  And I will fight them through death to the other side.  You are mine and nothing can take you from me.

As my favorite baptismal prayer says, “now the floods will not overwhelm you and the deep will not swallow you up.”  For you are mine and I have the power to bring you through.  This is what Jesus declares to be true.  When we are sinking deep in grief, when addictions and prejudice and hatred have a grip on us that we cannot shake, these words are like a life-preserver thrown out to us.  They may not take us out of the water just yet, but they will hold us up until the fullness of God’s reality breaks in.  

And this is no self-help talk.  This isn’t just wishful thinking or keeping a positive attitude.  Jesus declares that there is nothing in this world or beyond this world that can separate us from God’s love.  And there will be nothing that is allowed to be more powerful that God’s hold on us.  And as often as we give into those powers, as often as we choose to wallow in them, as often as we feel powerless to stop them- Jesus will keep speaking to those powers to send them away.  To tell them to be silent so that we can hear God’s hope for us and God’s plan for us far above their noise.  

God shuts those powers up, those voices, those desires and despairs so that we can hear the voice that seems too quiet and too small at times.  The voice that simply says- be silent, for that is my child.  I have claimed that one in love.  I have set this precious one apart to live in freedom and joy and love.  To live in loving community with others.  To serve me and all I have created.  And don’t you dare get in the way.  

To the man in the synagogue who could not hide his demons and to all of us who work so hard to cover ours up, Jesus’ words are still the same- none of these powers are as powerful as my words.  None have a chance to stand against all that I am.  And none have the right to claim what God already has.  It is the truth whether we believe it or not.  

And thanks be to God for that.