Last week, we focused on the two verses preceding this passage and the idea of Jesus’ authority that the people recognized as He taught. Then we made a passing glance at this section and those that follow as evidences of His authority. In fact, authority is a recurring theme throughout the Gospel of Mark, but one that is in sharp focus in the section from 1:21 to 2:12. We have to keep that in mind today because we do not want to lose sight of the fact that this encounter was a demonstration of the authority of Christ, given to validate the authority of His teaching.
C. S. Lewis said in the Preface to The Screwtape Letters, “There are two equal and opposite errors into which,” people fall concerning demons. One, he said, “is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them.” The demons themselves, Lewis says, “are equally pleased by both errors.”[1] We want to avoid both of these errors. We don’t want to ignore the reality of demons in our world, but we also don’t want to obsess about it and develop an unhealthy fascination with demons. If we will concentrate on what we can learn from the Scriptures, we will be protected from both extremes. The Bible does not tell us as much as our curiosity may desire, but the accounts we have in Scripture tell us all we need to know to understand who demons are and how they operate. In this passage before us today we see something of the nature of demons, the activity of demons, and the destiny of demons.
I. The Nature of Demons (v23)
The word demon does not occur in this passage, but instead we read that this man had an unclean spirit. The word unclean means literally “polluted” or “contaminated,” but in Jewish thought, it had come to also be understood as “ungodly.” Fourteen passages of Scripture use this terminology to describe demons. The term unclean spirit speaks to us of the nature of who these spiritual beings are. To understand them, we need to see what the Scriptures teach about their origin.
Hold your place at Mark 1, and turn over to Revelation 12, where the Apostle John records a vision which he saw concerning a war that took place in heaven. We read in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28 that Satan sought to elevate himself above the very throne of God because of his pride, and this is what sparked the war. In Revelation 12:3, John says that there was a great red dragon. We are told who he is in v9: the serpent of old who is called the devil and Satan. Verse 4 says that his tail swept away a third of the stars of heaven and threw them to the earth. Stars are occasionally used, especially in Revelation, to depict the angels. If we keep this in mind, we see in v7 that Michael and his angels were waging war with the dragon and his angels. Verse 8 tells us that the dragon and his angels were evicted from heaven, and thrown down. He and his angels were thrown down to the earth, and we see that their primary occupation on earth is deceiving the whole world. When did this war happen? Well, we know from Genesis 1:31 that when God finished His creative work, which would include His creation of the angels, it was all very good. But by Genesis 3, the serpent is in the garden deceiving Eve and tempting Adam to abandon God.
Now from this, we can ascertain several important details about demons. First, they are fallen angels, who followed Satan in his rebellion against God. Second, they number one-third of the angels whom God created. We don’t know how many that is, but we know they are outnumbered 2 to 1 by the angels who maintained their rightful place as God’s servants. They have been kicked out of heaven, sentenced to roam the earth, and there they set out to deceive people.
So, as you turn back to Mark 1, let’s give a summary statement here about the nature of the demons: “Demons are evil angels who sinned against God and who now continually work evil in the world.”[2] They number one-third of the angels created by God. Like the rest of the angelic order, they do not have physical bodies, but are spirit-beings.
Now consider with me …
II. The Activity of Demons
Satan and his demons are at war with God. They cannot strike God directly, so they seek to strike that which is most precious to God – humanity. And they do so with certain tactics. Jesus said in John 10:10 that He came that we might have life and have it abundantly. He contrasts His mission with that of the enemy, whom He says comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I remember a picture floating around the internet in the days following the terrorist attacks of 9-11 showing what looked to be the image of a demonic face in the smoke of the
In this passage we are studying today we see three characteristic activities of demons.
A. Disrupting the Worship of God
Keep in mind the setting of this incident. It was the Sabbath, and it was in the synagogue. People had gathered together for the public worship of God, and in the midst of it, there was a crying out. While folks might be tempted to look at this man and say, “Can’t that crazy man just be quiet,” the fact is he cannot, for he is no longer in control of his own faculties. Instead, the demon has taken over and creates a disturbance which disrupted the worship that the people had come to offer God.
You recall that at the root of Satan’s rebellion was his desire to divert worship away from God to himself. In fact, Satan and his demons are not dead set on making devil-worshipers. They are just as content for people to worship anyone or anything other than God, who alone is worthy of worship. In my preparation for this message, I ran across a number of accounts in recent literature written by sound, conservative biblical scholars who observed this very sort of activity going on in public worship services in our day. Individuals would cry out, or act out in ways that took people’s focus off of God. Certainly we would not want to go so far as to say that any and every disruption that hinders worship is the effect of demonic activity, we would not want to dismiss the possibility. I would not want to suggest that when a baby cries or someone coughs or sneezes in a worship service, that person is possessed by demons. But, I would say that if someone is acting in a deliberate fashion to break our concentration on God and divert attention to himself or herself, or toward any other person or thing, we should rule out the possibility that Satan has planned to use that person for his purposes. When the demon inside this man cried out, it was a strategic act of the demons to disrupt the worship of God.
B. Distracting from the Proclamation of the Gospel
Also notice the timing of this incident. Verse 21 tells us that Jesus had begun to teach. We do not read that He was finished. We are not wrong to assume that it was in the midst of His teaching, as the people were caught up in amazement at His authoritative words, that the demon began to cry out. Why? Because the gospel is a threat to the forces of evil.
Satan has a grip on lost souls. He has them blinded and bound, and he knows that they will be his forever unless they are delivered by the power of God in the gospel. So, when the gospel is proclaimed, Satan and his demons work powerfully to distract individuals from understanding or responding to Christ. Paul talks in 1 Timothy 4 about doctrines of demons, and says in 1 Corinthians 10 that when people sacrifice to idols they are sacrificing to demons. Satan and his demons are behind all false religion because it keeps people distracted from the true gospel of salvation in Christ. It is a fact of history that Mohammed himself was unsure if the visions he had which led to the founding of Islam were from God or a demon. References to this can be found even in Islamic literature. And today, Islam is one of the many strongholds Satan uses to blind people to the gospel.
If you share Christ with enough people, you will eventually come to see how the enemy will use the minutest distractions to break people away from hearing the gospel. There will be interruptions of all sorts that Satan and his demons are using to convince that person that there are more important matters to tend to than the gospel. And when you encounter this, you need to be aware that you are in the midst of spiritual warfare. Satan does not mind people being curious or dabbling in religion, but when the call to salvation goes forth, it is a direct strike against his stronghold on that person’s life, and he will use all sorts of tactics to distract that person from the gospel.
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It was the same way in
The third activity of demons we see in this passage is …
C. Destroying Human Life
Notice that the demon had overtaken this man’s personality and identity. He could not control the outburst of the demon within him, and when Jesus rebuked the demon, the demon threw the man into convulsions. In another account in Mark 9, we read about a boy who was demonized. The demon made him dumb – that is unable to speak. And the boy’s father said, “whenever it seizes him, it slams him to the ground and he foams at the mouth, and grinds his teeth and stiffens out. … It has often thrown him both into the fire and into the water to destroy him.”
In Mark 5 we read about another demonized man who lived among the tombs. And Mark says that “no one was able to bind him anymore, even with a chain; because he had often been bound with shackles and chains, and the chains had been torn apart by him and the shackles broken in pieces, and no one was strong enough to subdue him. Constantly, night and day, he was screaming among the tombs and in the mountains, and gashing himself with stones.”
All these stories indicate that the demons were seeking to destroy the individual whom they afflicted. In Psalm 106:37, we read that the demons were behind those ancient pagan religions which commanded the people to sacrifice their children to the idols. “Satanic or demonic activity always tends toward the ultimate destruction of parts of God’s creation and especially of human beings who are made in the image of God.”[3] Unable to strike God, they strike His image in man, and seek to steal, kill, and destroy it. Stealing it – by hijacking the individual to make them an unwilling slave of Satan. Killing it – by inflicting bodily harm upon the individual. Destroying it – by ultimately desiring that the individual be separated from God for eternity in hell.
Now, finally, I want us to look quickly at …
III. The Destiny of Demons
The demons are intelligent. They are aware of spiritual realities. Notice in v24 that they know exactly who Jesus is. The demon refers to Him as Jesus of Nazareth and says, “I know who You are – the Holy One of God.” And the demons know their future. “Have you come to destroy us?” They know exactly why Jesus had come. First John 3:8 says, “The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil.” They know that the beginning of Christ’s earthly ministry means the beginning of the end for them. James says in James 2:19 that it is not enough for us to merely believe the intellectual facts about God, for he says, “the demons also believe, and shudder.” They shudder because of what they know. They know that Jesus is the Christ, the Holy One of God, and that He has come to destroy their works.
Jesus rebuked the demon with a simple word of divine authority, “Be quiet and come out of him!” And the demon did just that. Demons are not autonomous. They must submit to the authority of Jesus. And again, this caused amazement among the people (v27).
When Jesus was questioned in Matthew 12 about the authority by which He casts out demons, Jesus responded, “How can anyone enter the strong man’s house and carry off his property, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house.” In saying this, Jesus was saying that He had authority to enter where Satan’s dominion had gone unchallenged, and “plunder his house,” that is, liberate the captives from Satanic and demonic bondage. And His power to do this was His authority as the Son of God. He said, “If I cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the
We read in the book of Revelation that there is coming a day when Christ will reign on earth for 1,000 years, and during that time, Satan and his demons will be bound in a pit. But they will be loosed for a little while after that time, and they will gather the nations for the battle of Armageddon. But at that battle, by the word of Christ’s authority, Satan and all his forces will be fully and finally defeated forever. We read in Revelation 20:10 that they will thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, … and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. Jesus said in Matthew 25:41 that this eternal fire was prepared for the devil and his angels. But we also read that this will be the place of eternal torment for all people whose names are not written in the Lamb’s book of life – that is, those who do not know Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
That is what Satan and his demons want – they know they can’t escape their destiny, so they want to take as many with them as they can. And they deceive, distract, disrupt, devour and destroy to keep people from being liberated by the gospel of the grace of God.
Today, it may very well be the case that someone in our midst is lost apart from Christ, deceived by Satan and his demons into thinking that their own goodness or some other belief is going to put them in a better place when they die. But it is a lie. Our only hope is Christ. So I want to ask you today, if you never have before, to come to Christ and call upon Him as your Lord and Savior and experience the abundant life that He came to give.
And if you are a believer in Christ today, I want to caution you – Satan is still out to devour you. He knows that you belong to Christ and he can’t have you forever, but he will be content to destroy your testimony for Christ by leading you away from your walk with God. But know this – the word of God is sure: Greater is He who is in you than he who is in the world. That is a promise from 1 John 4:4. The strongman who occupies your life now is Christ, and Satan cannot bind Him. But he will continue to attack you and seek to destroy your life and your witness. And in the midst of attack, you have this promise from James 4:7-8, “Submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you.” And remember that Satan took one-third of the angels when he fell. That means that for every demon, there are two angels whom God has commissioned to render service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation according to Hebrews 1:14. That is you and I if we have been born-again by faith in Christ. So, you need to be aware of demonic activity, but you need not be afraid of it. But you can come against His attacks by putting on the armor of God and taking up the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God, by living a determined life of godliness, and by claiming victory through the authority of Christ.
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