31
And he went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee. And he was teaching them on the Sabbath,
32 and they were astonished at his teaching, for his word possessed authority.33
And in the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice,
34 “Ha! What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God.”
35 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent and come out of him!” And when the demon had thrown him down in their midst, he came out of him, having done him no harm.
36 And they were all amazed and said to one another, “What is this word? For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits, and they come out!”
37 And reports about him went out into every place in the surrounding region. 38
And he arose and left the synagogue and entered Simon’s house. Now Simon’s mother-in-law was ill with a high fever, and they appealed to him on her behalf.
39 And he stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her, and immediately she rose and began to serve them. 40
Now when the sun was setting, all those who had any who were sick with various diseases brought them to him, and he laid his hands on every one of them and healed them.
41 And demons also came out of many, crying, “You are the Son of God!” But he rebuked them and would not allow them to speak, because they knew that he was the Christ.42
And when it was day, he departed and went into a desolate place. And the people sought him and came to him, and would have kept him from leaving them,
43 but he said to them, “I must preach the good news of the kingdom of God to the other towns as well; for I was sent for this purpose.”
44 And he was preaching in the synagogues of Judea.
J. Gresham Machen was an extraordinary man with great gospel courage. In the early 1930’s he stood against the liberalism that was pouring into the Presbyterian Church.
The attacks were coming upon the reliability of the Bible and other ministers and professors were denying cardinal doctrines of Christianity such as the Virgin Birth, the Bodily Resurrection, as well as a full-scale attack on miracles. Those discrediting the
Bible wanted all the miracles in Scripture to be seen as stories and not historical happenings. Machen responded:
“The New Testament without the miracles would be far easier to believe. But the trouble is, it would not be worth believing. Without the miracles, the New Testament
would contain an account of a holy man…but of what benefit would such a man, and the death which marked his failure, be to us? The loftier be the example which Jesus set, the greater becomes our sorrow at our failure to attain to it, and the greater our hopelessness
under the burden of sin. (Christianity and Liberalism, page 103-104)
Our text this morning sets out the first miracles of our Savior that Luke records. These are in keeping with what Jesus Himself said his Messianic ministry would be
about; we see him doing exactly what he said he would do. He is proclaiming the gospel to the poor. He is binding up the broken hearted. He is proclaiming freedom to the captive. He is fulfilling the words of Isaiah the prophet.
As we said yesterday, the authorities are going to claim that Jesus was ‘saving all the wrong kinds of people’. We see Jesus going to the oppressed, hurting, blind
and helpless to those who were outcasts and disreputable in the eyes of society.
Jesus is in Capernaum, a fishing village on the north shore of the Sea of Galilee. It is in this city that he would find the two pairs of brothers, Peter and Andrew
and James and John. All of this is occurring on the Sabbath day. This is the first of five Sabbath confrontations that Jesus will be involved in, in Luke’s gospel. Jesus makes manifest the reality that the Sabbath day is a day for healing, a day for doing
good, a day for celebration in the face of the mighty works of God.
So, there is a demoniac, how he got into the synagogue in the first place is uncertain, but his problem is very clear…this man is in bondage, bondage to Satan, bondage
to an evil spirit and is hopelessly bound with no man able to save him. The demon is called out of the man by Christ and then after it speaks, told to be silent. Interestingly the Greek word here means to be muzzled, and it is the same expression that Jesus
will use when he addresses the stormy sea and calls for it to be still. He says to the demon, He says to his own creation, be muzzled, be still, you are under authority, MY authority, and creation and demons alike hear His voice and have no choice but
to obey and to follow His commands.
The creation does not talk back or beg for quarter as does this demon. The people are still trying to figure out who this man is, what exactly He is doing and why.
But the demons seem to have no problem at all with such questions; they are quite aware of who He is and what He is to do, even to do with them! “Did
you come to destroy us?” Well, yes, that is exactly why I have come and exactly what I will do…when it is time. There is a clear religious knowledge possessed by the devil and his demons. In fact, they are more aware of who Jesus is than the people
who encountered Jesus on this day!
Jesus then moves to Peter’s house where his mother-in-law is sick with the fever. Jesus bends over the woman, signifying his authority over the fever and rebuked it
in the same manner that he rebuked the demon. And just as the demon went out of the man so the fever departs from this woman.
We then read of many who were sick and had various diseases being brought to him and he laid his hands upon them and healed them. We must not read this too quickly.
Jesus touches them…Jesus lays his hands on the unclean…touched those who the respectable people would never have even allowed close to them, let alone be found touching them! To touch the unclean meant to become unclean the only problem for these
self-righteous folks was that after Jesus touched an unclean person, they were not unclean anymore!
The scenario might find someone saying, “Oh look Jesus, you touched him, therefore you are unclean because you touched an unclean man.” Jesus would respond
in essence, “What unclean man? Do you mean this man? This man who is whole, this man who has no disease, no infirmity, do you mean this man who is leaping up and down rejoicing in the love of God for him, this CLEAN man?”
What is set before us but that again Jesus is healing, loving, saving, rescuing all the wrong people! The unclean demoniac, a woman, and all kinds of sick people!
These were the outcasts. These were the wrong people. But these are the ones who are the targets of heaven’s mercy and the grace and love of Jesus, the Messiah.
Brothers and sisters, what has changed? Jesus comes to those who are downtrodden, the outcast, the person who for one reason or another, is rejected by other human
beings, isn’t good enough, the one who is broken. A demoniac, a woman, and all kinds of sick people, sinners! These were those who had no or little claim on the attention of society.
These miracles were a demonstration of love, divine love but they were also a demonstration that what we need we cannot get from any other human beings. What is needed,
cannot be gained, unless it comes from outside of mankind, outside of our hatred, our selfishness, outside of our existence as sinful men and women.
We live in a day of fear, calamity and confusion. Tensions about the pandemic, the race rioting and the political divisions dominate our cultural landscape. Men and
women are coming up with answers to all of this but let’s be candid, their answers at best are Band-Aids, and at worst only add fuel to the fire. Man has made this mess and so we think man is to come up with the answers. But that is not where our hope is ever
found.
Going from fear to peace, from hatred to the reconciliation of races, from collapse to rest in the midst of turmoil, these things happen only at the foot of the cross;
Only as men humble themselves, look away from themselves and find life, true life in the One who alone can calm the storms of this world.
As we go through the narrative of Saint Luke, remember, we are always to ask ourselves, “Who are we in the story?” Are we the self-righteous folks looking down on
others? Are we the religious authorities hiding behind our theology? Or are we the broken ones…the ones whose only claim to Jesus is our unworthiness and desperation?
Prayer: Lord have mercy on me, for I am a sinner. Without You I have nothing; without You I can do nothing. Forgive me for running around in my living in fear and
panic when the Prince of Peace and One who calms the storm has promised to never leave me nor forsake me. Give me faith, O Lord. Faith to see beyond what is seen, faith that causes me to stand firm, humbly and in great confidence that I am loved, made worthy,
and welcomed in Your sight, through Jesus Christ my Lord, Amen.
Hymn: Jesus What a Friend for Sinners
