Stronger than Evil

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Transcript:

I’ve been talking to you the last several Sunday nights about the miracles of Jesus and the way each of these stories that I’ve picked out represents His sovereignty, His power over one aspect of the world or another. And the one we’re going to look at tonight illustrates one that we need to be aware of all the time. God’s power over this particular aspect of the world because we’re confronted by this aspect of the world all the time.

And that’s the reality of evil. Now I grew up in church as many of you did. Believing that God is all powerful and that God is all good.

and at some point we get confronted with this problem of evil. Either something happens in our lives to where we go through some kind of struggle and say, well, God, if you were really good or if you were really powerful, you wouldn’t have let this happen. Or, in my case, I went to school and was posed questions that I couldn’t answer about how does God allow this, how does God allow that, how does God let this happen?

but we’re going to see in the story that we look at tonight that God is so sovereign that even though it looks on our planet in our time it looks sometimes like evil just has free reign and evil can do whatever it wants and there are no consequences that the Bible tells a different story and says that even though God allows evil to do its thing for a while it can’t go outside of the bounds of what God allows. Excuse me. So we could look at the world around us and see how much evil is being done, how much violence there is, how much rebellion there is, how much wickedness there is, and say, well, it’s just out of control.

But these things are never out of God’s control. It doesn’t mean that God causes them, but it means God allows them. And if you think, well, how can a loving, good, all-powerful God allow evil to go on unchecked?

It’s not unchecked. Eventually, he’s going to bring it to an end. He restrains it because it could always be so much worse than it is.

And I know I’ve said this here before, but I go back to this all the time. When we think, oh, things have never been as bad as they are today. In Noah’s time, they were worse.

I was trying to explain this to the kids in their lesson on Wednesday night. by explaining to them, excuse me, what it means when God’s Word says that every thought of every man’s heart was only evil all the time. And I asked them, I said, do you sometimes want to do bad things?

And of course, the whole class consisted of my children, and so they looked at me and said, no, they didn’t want to get in trouble. I said, no, we’re just being honest here. I’m not asking for confession about any particular thing that you’ve done.

But do you sometimes want to do bad things? I think they still thought it was a trap I said do you ever sometimes think I don’t want to do what he said and finally they admitted yes I said but sometimes you want to do good things don’t you I think they still thought that was a trap sometimes we do want to do good things so sometimes you want to obey and you want to listen and you want to do things that make your parents happy and they said yes I said most of us are like that. Most of us at times have the desire to do good and the desire to do wrong.

But think of a time when everybody only wanted to do wrong all the time. That’s what it was in Noah’s day. And God dealt with that.

Our world for all the evil in it could always be so much worse if it was not for the restraining hand of God. and God also points out in his word that he’s not slack concerning his promises judgment will come that’s what Peter was talking about when he said God is not slack concerning his promises but that he’s merciful God hasn’t forgotten judgment God hasn’t forgotten that he’s good and that it’s his role to punish evil but he’s merciful and not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance God allows evil not to be destroyed for a time because he gives men the opportunity to repent. Not really what this is about tonight, except to point out that God, even when we’re confronted with the problem of evil, God is still in control.

The problem of evil doesn’t affect God’s goodness, it doesn’t affect God’s power. Despite what the people in the colleges tell us, despite what the media tells us, despite what some of your relatives may confront you with around the Thanksgiving table because they know you’re a believer and they want to irritate you. The problem of evil doesn’t negate any of God’s goodness or his power.

It just demonstrates his mercy and his restraining power that things could be so much worse. Because ultimately, as we’re going to see in this story, God is sovereign even over evil. It doesn’t mean that he caused it again, but it means that evil cannot go a step further than God allows it to.

And so we look at Matthew chapter 8, starting in verse 28. And it says, and when he was come to the other side, into the country of the Gergesenes, there met him two possessed with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way. And immediately just from that verse, some people want to claim that there are contradictions in the Bible because other gospel writers say that there was one man.

Well, if there were two men, then there was one man, wasn’t there? If my wife says, what happened to that dozen cookies? Did you have any cookies?

And I say, yeah, I had a cookie. And I really had three of them. If I had three, I had one.

So I wasn’t lying, I just didn’t mention the other two. I don’t recommend that, by the way. But for one of the gospel writers to point out, there was a man who was possessed by demons, and Jesus dealt with him.

And another gospel writer says at the same time, there were two men. That’s not a contradiction, because the other gospel writer didn’t say, oh, there was only one man. He just focused on the one man.

If I say that a big national figure, I remember several weeks ago Trump came and spoke at OU. If one news agency reports that Trump was at OU, and another news agency reports there were 30,000 people at OU, it’s not a contradiction. One just focused on one to the exclusion of the big number.

We also see that it says here that he was in the country of the Gergesenes. Now Matthew’s saying that he was near the city of Gergesa. Others say Galassa.

Some say Gadara. That’s not a contradiction. Those are just different names for the same area.

Kind of like out here. I say we’re in Seminole because that’s what I know. This is right close to the Seminole city limits.

When I came here, some of you say we’re out at Letha. There hasn’t been a Letha in my time here, so I don’t think of it as Letha. Other times I’ll hear people say we’re out between Seminole and Bolegs.

Okay, so none of those things are incorrect. Just different ways of saying the same place. The bottom line is Jesus has come out to this place on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee.

He’s out there in what’s now the Golan Heights in Israel. And he stepped off the boat. This is right after the miracle that I talked about several weeks ago where he had been on the ship.

He’d been asleep. The storm came up. The disciples lost their minds and finally went and woke Jesus up.

And he just told the storm to knock it off. So they’ve just seen the power of Jesus over the natural world. And then when they get over to the other side, they come into the hill country, and there are these two men who are possessed by demons, and they live out in the tombs.

They live out in the cemetery where the people are buried, and they’re so fierce, they’re so violent, that nobody will go anywhere near them because they’re afraid of these men. And this was the power that the evil had over them. Now, they were sinful men on their own, but there’s something about the influence of the devil that gets people to do things that they probably wouldn’t otherwise do.

And I doubt these men were just so savage on their own that they came out of the womb ready to destroy anybody who got near these tombs. Now, this was the influence of the devil. These men wouldn’t have been living out at the cemetery.

As Jews, you didn’t do that. You didn’t hang out in places where there were dead people. So they’re hanging around in the cemetery, and they’ve gotten so incredibly violent toward anybody who is unfortunate enough to happen out that way that people just steer clear of their all together.

And yet it didn’t bother Jesus at all. As he comes walking up that way, it says in verse 29, And behold, they cried out, saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? Art thou come therefore, excuse me, Art thou come hither to torment us before the time?

So ordinarily, it’s the other people approaching who are scared of these men possessed by demons. And fearful as they’re approaching. But notice this, when Jesus approaches the men, it’s the demons who are afraid.

I love that. When Jesus is present, it’s the demons who need to be afraid. And they cried out and said, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God?

They’re acknowledging who he is. Now, they don’t worship him as the Son of God, but they can’t help but recognize him for who he is. They know that he’s the Son of God.

They admit it. And just as James says, they know who he is and they tremble. And they said, What have we to do with thee?

In other words, what have we done? Leave us alone. Leave us alone.

Have you come to torment us before the time? see even though they run amok on the earth they know that the day is coming when Jesus by the word of his mouth will destroy them and cast them into the lake of fire and they know that time is coming and they tremble at the thought of that time and they’re saying are you coming to torment us they’re checking their watches is it time for the judgment yet we thought we still had a lot longer or they recognize that He’s coming to torment them and just even His presence is torment for them. Folks, this already demonstrates the power of God, the power of Jesus Himself over evil when His very presence torments evil.

His very presence is something that evil cannot stand. something that evil cannot tolerate. I want you to think of your biggest pet peeve, or maybe your top ten list. I have a few of them.

I’ve learned not to list them, because inevitably there’s somebody in the congregation who does one of the things that just makes my skin crawl. And then they come and tell me about it later. Think about all the things that irritate you the most, and roll them all into a ball, and then multiply it by ten, And that’s the sort of revulsion that these demons feel toward Jesus Christ because his goodness is so much stronger than their evil.

And it says, and there was a good way off from them, a herd of many swine feeding. So the devils besought him, saying, and by the way, I’ve never been able to figure out why this Jewish village was raising pigs. Yeah.

They weren’t supposed to be raising pigs because they weren’t supposed to keep them. They weren’t supposed to eat them. And that’s one reason, one reason among many, and it’s way down on the list, but one reason I’m glad for grace and the New Testament is I feel bad for the Jewish people.

They could not eat bacon. But they had these pigs that they were not supposed to have. And the demons see these pigs, this herd of swine feeding, and the devils besought him.

They begged him. if thou cast us out suffer us to go away into the herd of swine. Wait a minute, please, please, please, Jesus, if you decide to cast us out, if you decide to command us to leave, because they would have to leave.

If you decide to command us to leave, would you just send us into the pigs? See, they’re already admitting that Jesus is in control of the situation. A lot of times when we think of the devil, the world likes to think of the devil and God equals that are locked in this eternal struggle.

I would say spy versus spy, but last time I talked about that, nobody knew what I was talking about. This equal struggle where one can never get too much ahead of the other. One can’t ever get too much of an advantage over the other, and so they’re locked in this struggle and they’re so equally matched.

That is not what the Bible presents at all. These demons were scared to death of Jesus. And they recognize that whatever he said for them to do, they had to do.

And he said unto them, this is the first time Jesus has even spoken in this passage. He said unto them, verse 32, go. Up to them, it’s been just his very presence, and it’s been the demons who’ve been doing all the talking because they’re scared to death.

I don’t know how accurate this is, but I’ve heard from several people that most of the time the person who begins talking in a negotiation is the one who loses. that’s what they did I try that with my kids especially when they know when I know they’ve done something I’ll have them come to me in a room and I’ll just sit there in silence and look at them until somebody starts talking that’s what Jesus seems to have done up to this point it’s just his very presence has brought these demons to the point of breaking and finally when he does speak go. And when they were come out, they left immediately.

It wasn’t even, okay, let’s pack our bags and get ready. He said go. And they came out.

And it says, and when they were come out, they went into the herd of swine. And behold, the whole herd of swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea and perished in the waters. So when the demons went into the herd of swine, into the herd of pigs, and possessed that herd of pigs.

The pigs ran down a cliff. Ran down a cliff into the water. And they perished in the sea, it says.

And they that kept them fled. The pig farmers were scared to death by this. They fled and went their ways into the city and told everything and what was befallen to the possessed of the devils.

And behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus when they saw him. They besought him that he would depart out of their coasts. I would think that when they heard what Jesus had done, the people would be excited.

And here’s somebody, these men have terrorized our town. We can’t even go out near the cemetery because they’ll come out and hurt people. But no, these people were so upset that Jesus had come and upset their way of life.

They were bothered that Jesus had come and upset their way of life. And they wanted no part of it. They begged Him to go away.

The idea of this power, the idea of so much power in one man was frightening to them. And they begged him to go away. Just like the demons begged him to leave them alone and let them to depart in peace.

And I will tell you as I was reading on this passage this week, there are some people out there who say, well, this just proves problems with the Bible. See, Jesus was mean to the animals, and it wasn’t an ethical.. .

Okay. No, if anything, it just proves that God cares more about people than even the rest of his creation that he made. But Jesus’ desire for these men was that they be clean, was that the power of this evil that had destroyed their lives would be gone.

Jesus didn’t want them to suffer and be tormented and be a torment to other people. Jesus took no pleasure in this evil that had been terrorizing this village for so long. And Jesus walked in and by his mere presence brought the work of these demons to a screeching halt.

They could do nothing but beg for whatever mercy he was willing to offer. And folks, this story to me reinforces the idea that Jesus is more powerful than even the strongest evil. Whether it was 2,000 years ago with these demons that were tormenting these poor men, or whether it’s today and the evil that we see around us and we think things are going so dark and there’s no way forward, and what are we going to do?

Let’s just hang on until the end and hope that. . .

When did we decide that evil comes out on top? I mean, evil may win the battle, but when did we decide that the guys in the black hats win the war? What I see in Scripture is that good wins.

It doesn’t mean that every day it feels like good wins, but God’s side wins in the end. There’s no other possibility. God is so much more powerful than Satan that he could never lose.

And beyond that, Satan cannot. Satan cannot even sneeze without God being there to say, bless you. Satan cannot step one foot in any direction without God’s permission, without God allowing it to happen.

This story and the fact that they were begging Jesus, that they were begging Jesus for permission for their next move, reminds me of the book of Job, Or twice Satan enters into the presence of God. And has to ask God’s permission to test Job. See, we think of it as, now Satan’s doing all this stuff to me, and I just..

. Satan had to ask, how about you let me test him? And God said, that’s fine, but you’re not allowed to touch him.

And you know what? Satan wasn’t allowed to touch him. When he came back and said, well, you haven’t let me push him far enough.

I bet if I. . .

And then God said, you can’t take his life. And as much as Satan would have wanted to, Satan couldn’t take his life. We look at the fact that evil seems to get by with what it does for so long, and we think that God must be powerless.

No, no, no. Evil can’t step one foot beyond the parameters God sets up because God is more powerful than all the evil in the world combined. Jesus is more powerful than all the demons of hell combined. And if we question his goodness and say, well, why doesn’t he put a stop to it right now?

I’m thankful that God didn’t step in and destroy all the evil in the world today because it would include me. At some point, well, not today, I’m under the blood of Christ. But there’s some point in our lives before we repented, before we trusted Christ, that we were on Satan’s side. And it’s not that God takes pleasure in the evil that’s running amok.

It’s that God looks at his creation and desires men to have the opportunity to repent. And so God gives chance after chance after chance after chance. and if God stepped in today and destroyed every evil person, every person who didn’t believe in Him, every body doing wrong, if God stepped in today and destroyed all of that, then He sends people to an eternal hell separated from Him without the opportunity to repent, without the opportunity to be reconciled to Him.

Folks, the good and the bad, it all works together toward God’s plan. Don’t ever take that to say, well, this awful thing happened to me and God planned it that way. I see a lot of the stuff that happens to us, and I don’t think God planned it or God caused it, but I think God can use it.

And I know there are believers who disagree with me on that, and we can debate that, but I see where God can use all of us in His plan. And God is just and God is holy, but God is also merciful and desires us to have the opportunity to repent. but even when evil won’t repent it doesn’t change the fact that God is sovereign over all of it and he’s stronger than even the strongest evil that surrounds us in our world