The gospels often give the impression that when it came to healing and deliverance, everything was easy for Jesus. A verse that sticks in people’s minds is Mat. 8:16 (NIV) – “When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick.” But not always…
Let’s look at a well-known story of the man who lived in the tombs, where a close reading will give many readers a surprise. To start, read the accounts of the story in Mark 5:1-20 and Luke 8:26-39. Keep your Bible or Bible app open, this will be interesting…
Let us now look closely at Luke 5:29 (NASB) – “For he [Jesus] had been saying to him, come out of the man…” The NLT reads, “For Jesus had already commanded the evil spirit to come out of him.” ESV reads, “For he had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man.” The parallel passage in Mark 5:8 reads similarly.
So here we see many demons, who Jesus had already commanded to leave, speaking through demonized man, pleading with Jesus not to torment them. They were in a dialogue with Jesus. They were not leaving. Jesus had a battle on his hands.
The rest of the story is well known – after the demons (still refusing to leave) engage Jesus in more dialogue, they finally depart into a herd of pigs.
My take-home thought is that I will not be discouraged if I am doing deliverance and the demons put up a fight, which takes a good deal of time. They didn’t always obey Jesus right away either. Be encouraged, dear ones…
