Scripture Mark 1:21-28
They went to Capernaum, and when the Sabbath came, he entered the synagogue and taught. They were astounded at his teaching, for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes. Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, and he cried out, “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.” But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be quiet and come out of him!” And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him. They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching—with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” At once his fame began to spread throughout the surrounding region of Galilee.
Sermon
For the past several weeks we have been following Jesus’ ministry closely.
It begins with his baptism, a scene where God’s presence is made known by the descent of the Holy Spirit upon Jesus, and God’s own voice claiming Jesus as Beloved Son.
It continues in the wilderness, a passage we haven’t read, but in which the Holy Spirit also figures prominently, driving Jesus out there so that he will experience the following, summed up in a single sentence:
He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him (Mark 1:13).
The ministry expands as Jesus calls the four disciples, his brand-new followers, Simon Peter and Andrew, John and James.
But today, something different has happened, something new. Today we hear about Jesus doing two things for the first time, and these actions set the tone for everything else that follows in the gospel according to Mark.
The issue at question is Jesus’ authority. As one scholar puts is, “Why does [Jesus] do what he does? For whom does he speak and act? Who has authorized his ministry?”[i]
Over these weeks, we have been witnesses to the answers to all these questions, but that’s not the case for the people Jesus is about to meet. He goes to Capernaum, a seaside town, on the sea of Galilee, the hometown of those four new disciples. In Jesus’ day, Capernaum was a vibrant town, a busy center of trade. It was also a garrison town, which mean that a detachment of Roman soldiers lived there, under the supervision of a Centurion, as well as other government officials. Jesus considered it his second home.[ii]
At Capernaum, Jesus goes to the synagogue on the Sabbath, and he teaches—not an unusual thing in itself. But his teaching prompts the hearers to marvel, because “he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes” (Mark 1:22). In Jesus’ day, the scribes, the Temple’s experts on scripture, would make claims about scripture based on the traditions that had been handed down to them—the various interpretations of the wisest rabbis, in conversation with one another. Jesus didn’t do that. Jesus taught directly, clearly, not appealing to any experts to shore up his arguments. This struck the people as a strength. Jesus had authority, in himself.[iii]
Then, Jesus follows up his words with actions. A man in the synagogue has “an unclean spirit,” also known as a demon.
This is where reading scripture can get tricky for us. We hear a lot of possession stories in scripture described in ways that sound like mental illness to our modern ears. In Jesus’ day, it was common to think illnesses of every kind came from demons or demonic spirits. That was the norm, for the terrible and the inexplicable. In some ways, the belief in demons provided an explanation for the unavoidable trials and sorrows people experienced, things that made life painful, difficult, and sometimes, cut it short.
We have modern medicine to cast out many, if not most of those ailments. There are medications and therapy to give folks who struggle with mental illness or depression at least a fighting chance to live at peace with themselves. But life isn’t perfect yet. We still experience and witness things that bring us down. Depression that convinces us nothing will ever change, and there’s no reason to try. Illness that seems responsive to the latest drug or procedures, but which returns, or never truly leaves. Not to mention, systems that oppress, dominate, and harm, treating human beings as cogs in a machine, or worse, as animals, vermin, only worthy when they are useful. And such systems transcend place and time—here and now, there and then, they were and are active. No wonder the concept of “demons” is so strong in scripture. When faced with these kinds of intractable problems, we can understand why people would attribute them to supernatural forces.
But that’s us, today. In Jesus’ day, demons were as real as the weather and as persistent as the rising and setting of the sun. A man had a demon. And that demon had a voice. Upon seeing Jesus, he cried out,
“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.”
What do you notice about the words the demon speaks to Jesus?
I notice three things. First, the demon knows who Jesus is. The demon not only identifies who Jesus is known to be—Jesus of Nazareth—but who, day by day, he’s being revealed to be: the Holy One of God. In fact, Jesus’ name dominates what the demon says—he starts and ends with it.
Second, the demon speaks in the first-person plural. In chapter 5, Jesus has another encounter with a demon, and this time, he asks the demon its name. It replies, “legion.” That word has come down to us meaning, “a vast host, multitude, or number of people or things” according to the Oxford English Dictionary. But that’s its second definition. The first definition was the only one Jesus and his contemporaries knew: “A unit of 3000 to 6000 men in the… Roman army.” The choice of that word for the demon’s name is no accident. You could describe the Roman Empire’s brutal occupation of the Holy Land and its inhabitants as “demonic,” by which I mean cruel and inescapable. The practice of crucifixion would certainly fall into that category. The authority of Jesus, beginning in this encounter, is shown as being in opposition to everything Rome stands for. This encounter marks the beginning of that struggle.
The third thing I notice is that the demon knows it. He cries out, What have you to do with us? Have you come to destroy us?
The answer is yes, or at least, to destroy the demon’s hold over the man whose body it is possessing. Jesus rebukes the demon, says, “Be quiet and come out of him,” and, the man’s body convulsing and the demon hollering in protest, it does leave him.
I feel compelled to say, in all honesty, I don’t know whether demons are real but just rare in these days, or whether we really can account for these stories by pulling out the latest version of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for psychotherapists or Grey’s Anatomy (the book, not the show). I don’t pretend to know the answer to that question. But I do know “There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, / Than are dreamt of in your philosophy (by which Hamlet means, science).”[iv] We do well to stay humble when it comes to things that just aren’t explainable (yet).
Back to our passage, Jesus has an audience for all this, and twice, once after he teaches, and once after he has freed the man from the demon, that audience is struck by the authority Jesus possesses—now, not only as a teacher, but also, as an exorcist. This is what, in those days, would be called a deed of power, and that power came through Jesus. And from this point on in the gospel, Jesus’ ministry centers on setting people free from those things that bind them, that harm them, that tell them there’s no hope, that cause them to despair. He does this by teaching, he does it by healing and casting out demons, and he does it by feeding those who are hungry.
So, my question for you, today, is, what particular demon has a hold of you? I pray that for every one of you, the answer is, “none.” But if you do have some pattern of thought that is preying on you, or an illness or condition that is sapping your emotional as well as your physical energy, or a deep grief that holds you in its clutches… there are so many routes through which we can access God’s care. Prayer is one, simply expanding your heart before God and letting everything pour out. Talking with a kind person is another one —a friend, a sibling, a teacher. God becomes present to us when our hearts are truly opened to one another. And don’t forget modern medicine, therapy, call your doctor, if that one doesn’t help, call another doctor. Most of these won’t give the kind of quick relief Jesus gives in calling the demon out of its host. But it is God’s desire that none of us be stuck because of things or situations that bind us, harm us, or tell us there’s no hope. God did not create us for that life. God created us for joy. And God’s care is available to us all.
God has likewise commissioned us all to be agents of that healing to one another. So, for those of us who can make a phone call or say a prayer, or drop by to say hi or bring some soup, or drop off the flowers from church, or give the Food Pantry a couple of hours—congratulations, you are participating in Jesus’ ministry of care and healing. And if any of you does happen to have that “rebuke and cast it out” thing handy, be sure to let me know—we need all hands on deck to care for one another. Jesus has authorized us to do it all.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
[i] Matt Skinner, “Commentary on Mark 1:21-28,” Fourth Sunday after Epiphany (Year B), Working Preacher, February 1, 2015. https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/fourth-sunday-after-epiphany-2/commentary-on-mark-121-28-3.
[ii] “Capernaum,” Places to Visit in Galilee, Tourist Israel: the Guide. https://www.touristisrael.com/capernaum/7636/#:~:text=In%20Biblical%20times%20Capernaum%20was,Capernaum%20on%20the%20Via%20Maris..
[iii] Skinner, op. cit.
[iv] Hamlet, Act I, Scene 5.