Dominion

Grace to you and peace from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. It is privilege to share in the Word of God with the saints and faithful believers at Durbin Memorial Baptist Church.

In preparation for the message today, I found myself going down a rabbit hole I wouldn’t typically expect or explore. I took a look at the top grossing horror movies released thus far this year. Now, this is not a genre I typically look into and I hadn’t seen any of the movies on the list, but I did go through and read the brief synopsis of each of the movies in the top 10. As I was reading through the plot lines, I found something to be very interesting. At least 6 of the top 10 movies were directly driven by some sort of demonic presence, possession, or spiritual haunting of some kind. This probably isn’t too surprising if you’ve seen commercials for any of these films. But what does confound me a bit is the popularity of this genre and this fixation with demonic, supernatural influences in fictional movies, while the general public also holds a general denial of the reality of supernatural forces. Culturally, we’re fine digesting the graphic, indecent imagery and be thrilled by the spiritual spectacle, while at the same time denying the existence of anything beyond materialism.

Materialism is a form of belief, a worldview which holds that matter is the fundamental substance in nature, and that all things, including mental states and consciousness, are results of material interactions of material things. According to philosophical materialism, mind and consciousness are by-products of material processes (such as the biochemistry of the human brain and nervous system), without which they cannot exist. To put it simply, materialists believe that everything boils down to scientific interactions between atoms.

And don’t think that I’m just describing the unbelieving World. Materialism has found its way into Christendom as well. I was looking at a study this week that is admittedly a bit dated, being from 2009, but it was the most recent I could find on the topic and in this study, self identified nearly 60% of Christians agreed that “Satan is not a living being but is a symbol of evil.” Many Christians deny the existence of spiritual forces beyond their total comprehension! We can understand when someone does something good or bad, but angels being cast out of heaven, throwing flaming darts, wrestling, scheming against us, being chained in the depths of the earth, all of that sounds like a fairy tale. To some, to some even claiming to be Christian, Satan is a metaphor and the Bible is just one big allegory. This is given even more support when the same survey that showed Satan to be a mere symbol, also showed that these self identified Christians believed that the Holy Spirit is “a symbol of God’s power or presence but is not a living entity.” Church, I don’t say this lightly, a denial of the third person of the triune God is heresy. American cultural Christianity that denies the existence of anything beyond the material world, is not congruent with God’s Word. Allow me to read for you from Ephesians 6.

Ephesians 6:11–20 ESV

Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil. For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm. Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace. In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one; and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end, keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.

This is a large section of Scripture that deserves and will get a deeper exposition at some point down the road. But there are a couple of nuggets, bullet points, that we need to understand today.

“Praying in the Spirit”, verse 18, is not referring to an impersonal force, but the third person of the Triune God, promised and given to all those who believe in Christ as Lord.

“The devil, the rulers, authorities, cosmic powers over this present darkness, and the forces of evil in unseen, heavenly faces,” Are not presented as a symbol for the bad things mankind does. They are presented as real entities that followers of the Lord are combatting whether we recognize it or not.

The whole armor of God, though it may not be a material suit of chainmail we are to wear each day, it is a real, literal and spiritual adornment given to believers by the grace of God to protect us in this battle being referred to throughout this passage.

I wholeheartedly believe that that our American, materialistic worldview is very well one of those schemes of the (literal) devil talked about in verse 11. If Satan can convince us that everything in existence can be simply explained by the interaction between atoms, then we come to believe we can explain everything on our own and manipulate everything for our own purposes. In short, in a materialistic worldview, we don’t need God.

But the reality presented to us in this passage and all throughout Scripture for that matter, is that there is more to existence than the interactions of atoms. While God is a God of order that created matter to generally act in predictable ways, we have seen for the last few weeks that Jesus Christ has sovereignty over matter and creation.

Today we are going to walk through the final section of Matthew 8. We are going to see a story of possession. This is not presented to us as some sort of allegory, this is a real instance of demonic influence. This is an occurence unexplainable in the materialistic worldview. Terrifying as it may be, it is not the musings of a depraved and depressed fiction writer. This is a presentation of the realities of spiritual forces and demonic oppression. Church, it’s real. That might sound scary. But as we see today, Christ is stronger.

Begin with me in verse 28.

Matthew 8:28–31 ESV

And when he came to the other side, to the country of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men met him, coming out of the tombs, so fierce that no one could pass that way. And behold, they cried out, “What have you to do with us, O Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?” Now a herd of many pigs was feeding at some distance from them. And the demons begged him, saying, “If you cast us out, send us away into the herd of pigs.”

In this verses we are seeing what real possession looks like. We are also see the hallmarks of demonic activity. It is important to note that some of this will be descriptive of this specific encounter, while other parts will be prescriptive of demonic influence in general. Let’s walk through this.

First we will look at the descriptive part, those are the things that are specific to this event. This takes place in the country of the Gadarenes. This is on the outskirts of a coastal community to the northeast part of the sea of Galilee. Two men, both afflicted with demons, come out of the tombs in front of Jesus. The tombs were dug out chambers in the side of the mountain used to prepare and keep the bodies of the dead. According to levitical law, such places were unclean. This was not a regular place to be hanging out. The Physicians of the day described hanging around such places as a symptom of madness. I think the same might be said today. The demoniacs would have taken the tombs to be their home for one of two reasons. Either, they were cast out from society to a place where the common man would not regularly go. Or, they if the possessed men were Jewish, it is possible that the demonic influence wished to further their defilement and increase their humiliation. Either way, these men were marked as outcasts. Matthew describes these men as so fierce that no one could pass by them. The parallel passage in Mark 5 focusses on the stronger of the two and shares that no one could bind him, not even with a chain, he broke shackles in pieces. Physically strengthen yet spiritually and mentally disturbed, the man would cut himself with stones, while ranting and raving in the wilderness. It’s clear this afflicted group was a band of chaos, avoided by the masses. And it is also clear that their afflictions were not explainable by natural processes. These men were POSSESSED. Though we only think about such things in the context of movies, this no movie. This is a historical occurence of a literal possession.

Now that we have seen the particular description of what takes place here, what can we infer as prescriptive of in the evils of demonic influence?

First, we see a connection between evil and death. These afflicted men preferred the company of the dead to that of the living. Darkness was deep upon them. They are entangled with death and separation from God. 1 John 1:7 says God’s people are to walk in the light as He is in the Light. We are to be in fellowship with one another. Living life together. Not finding comfort in the darkness.

Then, we see not just a desire for darkness, but a shunning of Christ. “What have you do with us. O Son of God?” is saying, Why are you here? Why are you bothering us? We want nothing to do with you. They want nothing to do with him, yet they are afraid of being tormented by Christ. In Mark it says that the possessed man bows before Jesus. Why is this so? It is because the demons possessing these men are fallen angels. They have known well the triune God from the onset of their creation. “Though they had never before seen Him in human form, they instantly recognized Jesus as the second person of the Godhead. As spirits, they recognized His Spirit. They intuitively knew they were standing in the presences of the Son of God.” In this realization we learn a few things. The demons possessing these men have “good” theology. They know who Jesus is. They recognize His divinity. They even have “good” eschatology. They recognize that a time is coming when all the demons will be permanently cast into the lake of fire. They recognize the future judgment that is going to take place! What does this mean for us? It means that right knowledge is not a substitute for adoring faith! Even the Demons see Christ for who He is and yet they still shun His presence.

Demonic activity thrives in darkness. Away from the light. Away from the Light of the World. In the text this morning, the demons, showing that they are not omniscient, say to Jesus, IF you are going to cast us out put us in those pigs over there. The unclean spirits ask to be sent into unclean animals. We aren’t given the specific reason as to why the demons requested to be sent into the pigs. We do know that it ends in an act of violent destruction that hurts the whole of the community in the area.

In just this short interaction we can see a pattern of the things that accompany demonic activity in the world. There is a clear correlation between evil and death. There is a shunning of Jesus, even if there is a correct understanding of who He is, there is clear rejection, and there is corresponding darkness and destruction.

Those things happen. Those things happen today. Those things are happening around the world. Similar hauntings to the scene we have read thus far do happen.

This is the part where everyone looks at me like I’m crazy. Or you turn want to turn me off and scroll through your phone for the rest of the time. Hear me here, I know what it sounds like. I know that we live in a materialistic society that claims the ability to figure out every occurence. But I cannot in good faith tell you that there is no such thing as demonic activity when we see examples of it in the gospels, warnings about it in the epistles, and records of accounts throughout the centuries that are marked by death, darkness, and rejection of Jesus Christ.

You might say to me, “Well Pastor Brad, I’ve never seen a possession. Have you?” To which I’d respond, “No, but I’ve read about it right here.” Also half of those haunting movies you just love to watch each October claim to be based on real events. Just because we haven’t been witness to something, does not mean that it has not occurred. When you read through the Bible you will see a variety of times in which demons are cast out, but interestingly enough, we don’t see any accounts of a demon possession in the city of Jerusalem. One commentator noted, “Throughout history, including modern times, that particular aspect of Satan’s activity [, possession,] seems to appear more commonly in rural and unsophisticated urban society. It is also more common where animistic religion and its accompanying fear and worship of evil spirits are strong.”

These things are real, and they are not something to take lightly. Through demonic forces, men are robbed of their self-control, filled with fear and utterances, removed from the comforts of homes and friends. Society doesn’t know what to do so they ostracize the afflicted. They restrain and isolate but are unable to change.

At this point, it is a deeply unsettling story!

But read with me verse 32

Matthew 8:32 ESV

And he said to them, “Go.” So they came out and went into the pigs, and behold, the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned in the waters.

The thought of demonic possessions, especially when we are surrounded by a science driven, materialistic culture is deeply unsettling. But the great hope that all believers can have is that Jesus, the same Jesus who healed the sick, Jesus, the same Jesus who calmed the sea, Jesus, the Supreme over the natural, that same Jesus is Supreme over the supernatural. There is no Spiritual force, no cosmic entity, no goblin, goon, or ghost, that does not bend to the ultimate will of Jesus Christ.

It took but a word for Christ to command these afflicting spirits. Just as He healed with but a word earlier in the chapter, He now simply states a single word and the demons obey. The same demons that had given supernatural strength, so that the man could not be bound by chains, are helpless but to obey the command of Christ. Hebrews 1:3 tells us that Christ upholds ALL things by the word of His power. No Word of God shall be void of Power.

The demons obey, they go into the pigs and the whole herd plunges from the hillside, into the waters, where they drown. We don’t know what happens to the demons from theres, but we see in this act a full display of the malice, the hatred of God’s creation, and a love of mischief in the demons. Each of these being attributes of Satan.

Charles Spurgeon noted something interesting in the behavior of the pigs. He said, “Swine prefer death to devilry; and if men were not worse than swine, they would be of the same opinion.”

The sad reality is that many of mankind enjoy a tryst with the devil. The immediate pleasure of licentious behaviour is too alluring to pass up. If only we would see how bad evil really is! If only we would understand the darkness of sin! If only we be more enamored with the light of God’s righteousness, than the false cover of darkness.

We see in this encounter, that Christ is better. Christ is stronger.We may have questions about how things play out here, but there is no question of Jesus’ might.

From what we see in the text, we don’t know why Jesus allowed the demons to go into the pigs. There are a variety of guesses. If the owner of the pigs were Jews, Jesus may have been rebuking their unclean trade. If they were owned by Gentiles, it may have been to show them the danger of the evil spirits around them. It may have been to proclaim His power and authority over creation. We can’t give a definite answer as to the why. But we clearly see the “what”. Jesus is Sovereign.

While we are taking this morning to recognize the existence of demonic entities, cosmic powers over the present darkness, spiritual forces of evil in unseen realms, we need to also understand Christ is King. He is Lord of All. One day every knee will bow, every tongue will confess, Jesus Christ is Lord. Even the demons recognize this. So while we are recognizing the existence of these forces, as unsettling as it may be, we need not be afraid. We read in Psalm 118, The Lord is on my side, I will not fear. What can man do to me? I believe we see through this text that we can be confident to add to that, Christ is on my side, what can any demon do to me?!

Christ is King over all the powers.

How did the community react to all this? Their crazy men in the cemetery problem has been fixed, you’d think everything would be good now, right? Look at verses 33-34:

Matthew 8:33–34 ESV

The herdsmen fled, and going into the city they told everything, especially what had happened to the demon-possessed men. And behold, all the city came out to meet Jesus, and when they saw him, they begged him to leave their region.

How do we respond to the power of Jesus?

Well, I can tell you the herdsmen, those watching the pigs, those guys were terrified! That word fled, is fleeing in a sense of escape, to seek safety. They just seen some stuff and didn’t know what to do! So they run into the city and just tell everyone! Now I can only imagine the reaction of the people. They would have been well familiar with the two men in the tombs. They would have been well interested in seeing if they had been cured. But the idea of this man from nowhere cleansing the men and then pigs jumping off a cliff, that would have sounded insane! So what do they do? They go investigate! They run to the scene where everything happened. Matthew writes that “all the city” came to meet Jesus. They want to confirm what happened. And confirm they did. They see the evidence of the pigs by the beach, they see the men acting normally, and they see Jesus.

We need to note their response when they see Jesus. They see the man who cleaned the two souls that had pestered the community for some time, they know He did it, and they beg Him to leave.

This is one of the saddest verses in all of the Bible. These villagers were either more concerned with the death of a few pigs than they were over the deliverance of two humans souls crafted in the image of God. Or perhaps they were wrongly convinced that He who knew no sin was evil.

This is so sad because this entire village did not see Christ for the good He is. The prophet Isaiah wrote, Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter! But that is exactly what we are seeing in this town! The sad truth that we are seeing played out in this text is that in our fallen, sin-fuel state, mankind feels more at home with demons than with the Christ who has the power to cast out demons!

Jesus performed an undeniable miracle, one of many as we have walked through this chapter and will see many more as we continue, but yet the people rejected Him.

The question as we head towards our conclusion this morning is this: How do you respond to the power of Jesus?

Do you respond with apathy? As we read this story it seems like just another tale.

Do you respond with recoil? How could He let those pigs die?!

Do you respond with fear? That Man has power over demons, surely He must be one!

Do you respond with disdain? As the demons recoiled in His presence.

Or, Do you see the great Authority and Majesty in Christ the King? Do you respond with a humbled, I am weak and thou art strong? Do you respond with I’ll say yes Lord yes?

How do you respond to the power of Jesus. Scripture tells us the only right response is to repent and believe in Jesus as Lord.

Do you believe today? Have you been putting off belief in Jesus? One pastor made a frightening comment: “Tell Him to leave you alone, and He will. And if you tell Him enough, there will come a time when the opportunity for repentance will be gone. If you have not already done so, turn to Christ for salvation. Come to Christ for healing. If He is speaking to you, you must respond now, for this may be the last time!”

In just a moment we are going to have a time a response. If you’ve been putting off belief in Christ, I hope today is the day the Holy Spirit convicts you to say No More! I see that Christ is King over sickness, over creation, and over the supernatural. He is worthy to be served. I would love to talk to you about that. Come forward during the hymn of response.

But before we conclude I do just want to make one more note on the greatness of Christ. The worthiness of Christ to be served. Today may have opened our eyes to the supernatural realities around us. But let it be stated again: Christ is King.

1 John 3:8 ESV

Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

Yes, Satan schemes. Yes there are demonic influences in the World. Satan even tried to tempt Jesus in the wilderness. That account is given in Matthew 4. But in those temptations Jesus never once would bend to Satan. In our text today, in dealing with the Demons, and with His resurrection from the grave, We see Jesus demonstrate His Power to overcome and subdue Satan. Not only would Christ NOT bend to Satan in the wilderness, but Satan is made to bend to Christ! Even the demons believe, Christ is King!

He is worthy to be served! What is your response to Christ the King? Let’s pray.