{"id":2072,"date":"2022-10-24T09:41:40","date_gmt":"2022-10-24T13:41:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=2072"},"modified":"2022-10-24T09:41:40","modified_gmt":"2022-10-24T13:41:40","slug":"that-wild-and-crazy-guy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2022\/10\/24\/that-wild-and-crazy-guy\/","title":{"rendered":"That Wild and Crazy Guy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Unfortunately, I’ve been afflicted with laryngitis for several days, so I wasn’t able to record this podcast.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>
\u00a0<\/em>
That Wild and Crazy Guy<\/strong>
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According to the eighth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, what happened when Jesus led his band of apprentices to \u201cthe other side\u201d of the Sea of Galilee?
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The disciples were probably not surprised that Jesus was immediately confronted by a demon-afflicted man.
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Traditionally he is known as the Gerasene or Gadarene demoniac.\u00a0 When Jesus asks his name, he identifies himself as Legion.
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How did he get into this condition?\u00a0 We aren\u2019t told.\u00a0 What does it mean that his name is Legion?\u00a0 A Roman legion was a unit of heavy infantry that numbered somewhere between 4,000-5,000 soldiers.\u00a0 Luke tells us he is \u201clegion\u2026because many demons had gone into him.\u201d
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Here is where people who live in the 21st<\/sup> century run smack into Hollywood Hogwash, especially as Halloween approaches every year.
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According to the entertainment industry, the spirit world is alive and well.\u00a0 But human beings are little more than helpless pawns.\u00a0 Movies about spiritual darkness tend to have ambiguous theology, no ultimate resolution, and feature really scary things happening to Jamie Lee Curtis.
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But the \u201cshowdown\u201d between Jesus and Legion is over from minute one.\u00a0 The afflicted man immediately falls down and begs Jesus for mercy.
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The demons\u2019 motivation has been to destroy this man \u2013 to keep him as far away as possible from the love and grace of God.\u00a0 But the Bible unflinchingly asserts that Jesus is master of the seen and unseen worlds.\u00a0 The demons are powerless in his presence.
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It seems clear that the demons at the very least want to disrupt Jesus\u2019 ministry.\u00a0 They ask permission to be sent into a large herd of pigs feeding on a nearby hillside.\u00a0 The gospel of Mark tells us there were 2,000 of them.\u00a0 The demonized pigs promptly rush down the hillside and into the lake.\u00a0
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The shocking thing is that they all drown.\u00a0 Pigs are excellent swimmers.\u00a0 They are the Michael Phelps of barnyard animals.\u00a0
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But the demons want to create havoc.\u00a0 By drowning the pigs, they cause an economic disaster for the people in this region.\u00a0 These pigs represented the 401(k) of multiple herders.\u00a0 They were the \u201cpiggy bank\u201d of a lot of people who didn\u2019t yet know God.\u00a0 The upshot is that these people now associate Jesus not with good news but with a major financial setback.
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According to this fascinating text, we can experience the transforming touch of Jesus in two ways.\u00a0
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First, Jesus is willing and able to do what no one else can do: \u00a0He can unchain our hearts, release us from bondage, and send us into a whole new life, just as he did for this one shattered man.
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Second, Jesus invites us to join him in this ministry of transforming others.\u00a0 We may be called to journey \u201cto the other side\u201d with him, just as he did with the disciples.\u00a0
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Or we may be called to stay right where we are and make a difference in our present context, which was his ultimate intent for the Gerasene demoniac.\u00a0
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Either way, we become agents of God\u2019s reign.\u00a0 We may not have the power of Jesus, but we bear his authority \u2013 authority to help bring healing to a broken world.
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It\u2019s just possible that the saddest verse in the Bible is Luke 8:37: \u201cThen all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear.\u00a0 So he got into the boat and left.\u201d\u00a0
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Do you realize how much power you have?\u00a0 You have the power to make the Son of God go away.\u00a0
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All you have to do is ask.\u00a0
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Or you can do just the opposite.\u00a0 Like the demon-haunted man in this story, you can respond to Jesus\u2019 transforming touch by choosing to embrace a whole new way of life.\u00a0
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Choose wisely.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Unfortunately, I’ve been afflicted with laryngitis for several days, so I wasn’t able to record this podcast.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0That Wild and Crazy Guy\u00a0According to the eighth chapter of the Gospel of Luke, what happened when Jesus led his band of apprentices to \u201cthe other side\u201d of the Sea of Galilee?\u00a0The disciples were probably not surprised that Jesus was immediately confronted by a… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2073,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[520,521],"class_list":["post-2072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-evil","tag-transformtion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2072"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2072\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2074,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2072\/revisions\/2074"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}