Not to Torment

Text: Luke 8:26-39

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

            For those who would be great, there’s an unalterable truth that must be faced: there will always be someone greater than you. No matter how strong, fast, smart, or skilled, there will always be someone stronger, faster, smarter, or better. Every record set will eventually be broken. It’s the way of the world.

            This explains the first reaction to Jesus that we’re given to witness this morning in our Gospel reading. Jesus takes a boat across the Sea of Galilee to the region where the Gerasenes, Gentiles, lived. The very moment Jesus steps onto shore, a man meets Him. This man was living a most unclean life. He was possessed by demons, unclean spirits. He lived in tombs instead of a house, in constant contact with the dead. He wore no clothes. When the people of the area tried to restrain him in chains, the demons possessing him gave him unnatural strength to break the bonds so that he could flee back into the wilderness, the haunt of jackals and unclean spirits. But when he confronts Jesus, the man cries out and falls down on the ground, yelling, “What have you do to with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me.” The demons were afraid. They knew Jesus was infinitely stronger than they were. They feared torment at the hands of Jesus. They were afraid to be cast back into hell, the abyss. Even though they had broken chains and shackles, they knew they could not fight against Jesus and win. They were scared to death.

            It’s not an uncommon thing for the fallen children of man either. We might not yell, “I beg of you, don’t torment me,” but we do say things like, “Why is God doing this to me?” “Is God punishing me?” “Is God angry with me?” “What am I doing wrong that’s making God mad, that this is happening to me?” “Does God hate me?” These are questions that every person has asked at some point in life, in some form or another. Whether it’s standing in the ruins of a great tragedy, personal or widespread; or if it’s an unsettling train of thought in the quiet of a sleepless night; if it’s after a terrifying diagnosis, or an uneasiness you can’t quite put your finger on, there’s a suspicion that God is pulling some sharp strings. He’s the one making things so painful. “What have you to do with me, Lord? I beg of you, don’t torment me.”

            This is not a completely uninformed idea. We know that unholiness cannot stand in the presence of perfect holiness. It’s burned up, like impurities are burned up in a purifying fire. We know that God and evil are incompatible. And so, we conclude, like the demons, like the residents of the town after the demons were banished when the herd of pigs they were transferred to ran off the steep bank and drowned in the Sea of Galilee, like the people in our reading, we infer that God is inflicting pain or punishment on us. The best we can think to do is to ask Him to leave us alone, like the Gerasenes asked Jesus to do after He purified their town of the legion of demons. We wonder what Jesus has to do with us, if not punishment and misfortune.

            But the Lord Jesus, Son of the Most High, has not come to exact every ounce of punishment and torment that, by all rights of the Law, He could. Because the Law has told us how to stay in bounds when it comes what God desires for human life. But we’ve run outside of those boundaries, preferring to play among the tombs, to run off into the desert so that we can be the little gods and goddesses of our own lives. But Jesus does not desire to strike us down or torment us with those punishments that wallowing in unholiness warrants. He doesn’t do that to the man or the demons who possess him. In fact, we should take a step back in wonder at the fact that instead of getting vengeance on the legion of demons, Jesus grants their requests—twice! He’s not here to punish and satisfy some kind of divine bloodlust. Rather, He grants the demons’ first request by not tormenting them. Then He grants their second request by giving them permission to enter the herd of pigs when they’re ordered to leave the man; to not be immediately banished back into the abyss. The demons themselves are the ones who cast themselves back into hell by driving the pigs off the bank into the lake. Evil cannot help but destroy itself.

            But Jesus has not come to torment or punish—not them, and not you. He’s not interested in making you pay for your breaking of the Law. Rather, He’s come to pay it all back for you. This is what He does at His cross, when He bears the penalty for your wandering into the unclean playground of unholy spirits and sinful thoughts and words and deeds. He’s the one who gives the Law what it demands—death—for rebelling against the Lord of life. The verdict and sentence is taken on by Him. As St. Paul told us this morning, “Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed…But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth His Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” Now, after He has redeemed you, purified you with His cross and blood, drowning your sins in the sea of Baptism, you might still fear Him in an unholy way, like the Gerasenes did. That’s the reaction of unfaith, that does not trust that God would do all of this out of grace and mercy; unfaith, that thinks God still has some secret ammo up His sleeve.

            But for those who live under faith, for you who have your sins forgiven, who are united to the Son of the Most High in His body and blood, you desire to follow Him. Like the man who was saved in the reading, you’re healed, forgiven, cleansed, clothed in Christ’s righteousness, in your right mind, sitting at the feet of Jesus. When He does all of this for you, He tells you what He told the man He saved in the land of the Gerasenes: “Return to your home, and declare how much God has done for you.” He sends you to the places He has established for you to be light to others, to proclaim how much your God has accomplished for you in His life, death, and resurrection—the threats He saved you from, the fears He has stilled, the comfort He has given you. And then, in your home, among your family and friends and neighbors, you proclaim how much Jesus has done for you. In the name of Jesus, who delivers us from evil, Amen.