Text: Mark 5:1-20 (see below)
A reader will discover three healing stories in the fifth chapter of Mark’s Gospel that will assist him or her in answering the question asked by the disciples about Jesus’ identity in the previous chapter: “Who is this guy? (Mark 4:41). This seems to me to be one of the central questions of the Lenten journey. By the time a Christian arrives at Easter Day, have they been able to answer this question with confidence and know without doubt that Jesus is the Son of God, the Messiah, the King of King and Lord of Lords?
The story of the Gerasene Demoniac is a frightening story of a man clearly out of his mind and possessed by an evil spirit(s). Just when the disciples thought it was safe to get out of the boat after a hellacious night at sea, they are “immediately” thrown right back into the fray with a person lost in utter darkness.
A careful reader of the text notices that there is an epiphany of sorts as the crazed man meets Jesus and falls to his feet declaring “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God?” It appears as if this man knows who Jesus really is, the "Son of the Most High God." While others in Mark’s Gospel struggle to understand Jesus’ identity, those persons lost in spiritual warfare seem to easily identify with the powerful light of God associated with Jesus.
“What is your name?” Jesus asks.
“My name is Legion, for we are many.”
An illuminating insight into this text comes from the New Interpreters Bible Series: “Some interpreters have suggested that the demon’s name, ‘Legion,’ contains a veiled reference to the devastation of people and property caused by the Roman occupation. The Tenth Legion, which used a boar as a symbol on its standard, had been station there since 6 CE. The imperial power that controlled the region perceived themselves to be a source of civilization and peace. The local populace, faced with powers it could not resist, had a very different perception, regarding imperial power as oppressive. Jesus, whose cosmological power was demonstrated at the sea, shows the presence of God’s rule can also disrupt the structural violence done to persons in this setting….. At full strength a legion consisted of 6,000 infantry, 120 cavalry, and associated auxiliaries. The term legion might also be used for a battalion of 2,048, which is closer to the number of pigs in the herd. An astonishing visual image results: As soon as Jesus steps in this Gentile territory, a legion prostrates itself before him. God’s kingly power has subdued imperial domination” (The New Interpreters Bible, page 584).
Wow….. This Jesus of Nazareth can calm raging storms and subdue the imperial domination systems in our world. Radical concept? Threatening message? Hope for us all? Who is this guy?
At the end of the story, once healed and liberated of the demons, the man asks Jesus if he can follow him on the way. Jesus tells him no but gives him a directive. “Go home to your family and tell them how much God has done for you.” In other words, go and be a witness to the Good News of Salvation in your own home and neighborhood. Share the Good News of abundant lifewith others! Be an evangelist. And that is indeed what the man did becoming the first evangelist to the Gentile community in the Gospel of Mark.
I cherish the last line: “And all the people were amazed.”
Aren’t you?
Love One Another – Brian
Our Hearts Are Restless Until They Rest in God
“River” by Shuntaro Tanikawa
Mother, why is the river laughing?
Why, because the sun is tickling the river.
Mother, why is the river singing?
Because the skylark praised the river’s voice.
Mother, why is the river cold?
It remembers once being loved by the snow.
Mother, how old is the river?
It is the same age as the forever young springtime.
Mother, why does the river never rest?
Well, you see it’s because the mother sea is waiting for the river to come home.
Source: The Vintage Book of Contemporary World Poetry, ed. J.D. McClatchy, Vintage Books, 1996.
Mark 5:1-20
They came to the other side of the lake, to the country of the Gerasenes. And when he had stepped out of the boat, immediately a man out of the tombs with an unclean spirit met him. He lived among the tombs; and no one could restrain him any more, even with a chain; for he had often been restrained with shackles and chains, but the chains he wrenched apart, and the shackles he broke in pieces; and no one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs and on the mountains he was always howling and bruising himself with stones. When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and bowed down before him; and he shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.’ For he had said to him, ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!’ Then Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ He replied, ‘My name is Legion; for we are many.’ He begged him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now there on the hillside a great herd of swine was feeding; and the unclean spirits begged him, ‘Send us into the swine; let us enter them.’ So he gave them permission. And the unclean spirits came out and entered the swine; and the herd, numbering about two thousand, rushed down the steep bank into the lake, and were drowned in the lake. The swineherds ran off and told it in the city and in the country. Then people came to see what it was that had happened. They came to Jesus and saw the demoniac sitting there, clothed and in his right mind, the very man who had had the legion; and they were afraid. Those who had seen what had happened to the demoniac and to the swine reported it. Then they began to beg Jesus to leave their neighborhood. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed by demons begged him that he might be with him. But Jesus refused, and said to him, ‘Go home to your friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and what mercy he has shown you.’ And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed.
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