Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Find the answers to all those questions you were too embarrassed to ask in Sunday School. Welcome to Weird Stuff in the Bible, where we explore scripture passages that are bizarre, perplexing or just plain weird. Hosted by Luke Taylor.
Battling Demons Should be part of your Christianity
Mark 5
Introduction
Welcome back to Demonology class.
I didn’t have this class in the school of ministry that I attended for three years.
I’ve never heard of a Bible college offering a class in exorcism.
I’ve never heard of a seminary giving a degree in demonology.
And yet, when Jesus gave His disciples a job to do, He said to preach the Kingdom, heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, and cast out demons. Now, I don’t know about you, but most of those things are not a part of my weekly walk with God.
I learned about preaching the Kingdom. That other stuff just kinda comes up once in a while. And even though we read about demons being cast out on almost every page of the four Gospels, most Christians have never studied how it works.
And if you do talk about it too much, you get branded a weirdo.
But is it weird for a Christian to do the stuff the Bible talks about? Or is it more weird if we don’t?
Turn to Mark 5, and let’s get normal.
[theme music]
Schizophrenic behavior
Welcome to Weird Stuff in the Bible, where we explore scripture passages that are bizarre, perplexing or just plain weird. This is Luke Taylor, and today we’re going to be learning some more Demonology, basing it on the text of Mark 5.
So we covered 5 verses last time. I actually received some feedback from someone who said I take too long to tell a story. I’ll share that later in the mailbag. Yes, I take things nice and slow, though, because when you take the time to do that, you find every verse so thick with meaning. And there is so much to learn in this chapter about demonology, the study of demons. Anyway, we already covered 5 verses.
Let’s look at verses 6-8 now.
And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him. 7 And crying out with a loud voice, he said, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I adjure you by God, do not torment me.” 8 For he was saying to him, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit!”
What I want to just comment on here is the schizophrenic behavior of this demon-possessed person, and that’s the next thing I want you to make a note about in this subject of demonology. People who are possessed by demons tend to exhibit multiple personalities or rapid mood swings.
We see it here as it says he sees Jesus from afar and runs to him, yet the first words out of his mouth are, “What have you to do with me?” He’s like, “stay away from me, I don’t want anything to do with you,” yet he just ran to Jesus. He just initiated conversation with Jesus, he was compelled to sprint toward Jesus like a magnet, yet with his mouth he’s asking to be left alone.
So that’s why I say that demon-possessed people are schizophrenic. They are very temperamental. Their actions can make them appear mentally ill, and it’s probably fair to say that they are mentally ill. A lot of our spiritual warfare takes place at the psychological level. What you think, how you think, what you allow into your mind, what you allow your thoughts to dwell on, a lot of this has ramifications for the influence of the demonic into your life.
And so think there can be a lot of mentally ill people who are allowing demons into their lives, and demonically oppressed people who are becoming mentally ill. It’s a vicious cycle. That’s why
II Corinthians 10:4-5 tells us
4 For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. 5 We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to obey Christ,
In case you didn’t know it, those are spiritual warfare verses. Take control of your mind. Think about what you think about. Because as a man thinks in his heart, so is he.
Demons know Jesus
Notice also that the demons know immediately who Jesus is. They recognize Him from a distance. They immediately recognize the Son of God. They fall at his feet like they just got called to the principal’s office. They call Him, “Jesus, Son of the Most High God.”
Nobody has used this title for Jesus so far in His ministry. Peter is going to use it later when he says, “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Nobody else is even being as bold as this demon is right here. Even Jesus’ disciples aren’t using this terminology to talk about Jesus.
Why do the demons call Him this? Because they knew Jesus before He was born into this world through Mary. They have known about Him as long as they’ve existed. They are spiritual beings, and Jesus is God. They hate Jesus. And they thought they had some dominion here in this region of the Gadarenes, which we’ll talk about soon. But demons are well aware of who the Son of God is.
James 2:19 says
You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!
Oh, you know about God? You know about Jesus? You know about the Trinity? Even the demons know all that. That’s not enough. James is making the point that salvation is more than just confessing Jesus as real. You have to make Jesus Lord.
Your Lord. Not just Lord in a general sense. You have to submit your life to Him if you want to be on His team. If you want to be saved.
Even the demons know He’s real. We see it right here in Mark 5.
Demons’ day of judgment
So in verse 7, they asked Jesus a question: “Have you come to torment us?”
There’s a parallel account of this story in Matthew 8. It’s a bit shorter, which is why I’m using the Mark 5 version. But in the Matthew 8 account, this question includes a phrase that isn’t in the Mark 5 version.
In Matthew 8:29, the question is
Have you come here to torment us before the time?
So what does it mean here that the demons were asking if they would be tormented “before the time”? What they are referring to here is their day of judgment. Demons are evil spirits inflicting torment and temptation to sin on human beings every day.
The Book of Enoch 15:11 says, “And the spirits of the giants (which is where the demons come from) afflict, oppress, destroy, attack, do battle, and work destruction on the earth, and cause trouble: they take no food, but nevertheless hunger and thirst, and cause offenses.”
So someday, these evil spirits are going to be punished for the torment that they have inflicted. They themselves will be tormented in hell. Hell was created for Satan and his minions.
Matthew 25:41 says
Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.
The Lake of Fire was not created for humans; it was actually created for the devil and his angels. But the Lake of Fire is the destination for all who refuse to submit to Jesus as Lord. They will join the demons and fallen angels and the devil himself in the afterlife. If you are listening to this and you’re not right with God, you need to drop to your knees and get right with him today, because you don’t want to join these demons for all eternity.
Philippians 2:10-11 say
at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
That includes every demon. Every person and every demon will bow the knee someday. Much better to do it now and get saved and be set free from the devil and his angels.
They know where they’re going. That’s why they say to Jesus, “Have you come to torment us before the time.” They know their destiny. They just want to take you with them.
I may have mentioned this story before. There was once a young woman who showed up at the church where I was the youth pastor. She told me she was demon-possessed. Now, she never spoke in strange voices, and this was actually a fairly undramatic encounter except for one part that I’ll tell you about in a second.
This wasn’t on a Sunday. This was just, like, on a Tuesday. This young woman showed up at the church, but she had absolutely no interest in having the demon cast out of her. She displayed some signs of mental illness or schizophrenic behavior, like we discussed before. Like showing up at a church and telling them you have a demon inside you, but telling us she had no intention of being set free.
And I tried to tell it to leave, but she was just expressionless. She outright told me it protected her and that she didn’t want it to be gone. I told her she was going to go to hell if she didn’t get set free of this demon. She told me no, that the demon told her that God is so merciful that someday God would forgive even the demons for their sins.
So I just happened to have my Bible open on my desk in my office at that time to Revelation 20. I had been working on a Sunday School lesson for my youth class, and we had been going through the book of Revelation. And so I picked up my Bible and said, No, God is not going to be forgiving the demons. Here is what
Revelation 20:10 says
the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
Now, as I said, this had been a pretty undramatic encounter, as far as demon-possession stories go. But when I read that verse, she was sitting on a couch in my office. When I read those words, she jumped up like that couch was on fire. She covered her ears with her hands and screamed at the top of her lungs, “Stop saying that.”
Up until this point, she had actually been pretty unemotional, just very matter of fact. But when I read that verse about the fate of the demons, she lost control for a second. The demon inside of her did not like what it heard, because the Word of God has power, and demons are afraid of it.
And they know where they’re going. There is a time appointed for them to be cast into the Lake of Fire. So they know it’s coming, and that’s what these demons got nervous about when they saw Jesus coming. They said, “have you come to torment us before the time?” The NIV says, “Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?”
Finding Out a Demon’s Name
Let’s read one more verse before we stop today. I had hoped to actually finish this story today, but I had too much today about those three verses. So one more verse this time.
Mark 5:9
9 And Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “My name is Legion, for we are many.”
So let’s explain what Legion means. In Roman times, a legion was a military term. It referred to a unit of 6,000 soldiers. So there was a lot more than just one demon inside this person.
Now, I don’t believe a Christian can be demon-possessed. I believe a Christian has the Holy Spirit inside of them, and that a demonic spirit and the Holy Spirit cannot inhabit the same space. If you’re a Christian, you may be tempted by demons, and you may even be oppressed by demons, but you can’t be possessed by a demon.
If you’re not a Christian, you don’t have that divine protection. A demon can enter you and control you. And apparently not just one. Multiple demons. They are not subject to the same spatial restrictions in the spiritual realm that we are in the physical realm.
So this man has many many demons inside of him. Was it literally 6,000? Maybe. We’ll learn later in this story that there were at least 2,000, so it could have been 6,000, or perhaps he could have been exaggerating to try and freak Jesus out.
Now, I want to bring something up about this practice of asking a demon its name. I’ve heard it said several times in my life from people who were experienced in demon possession that you want to find out a demon’s name, or what kind of demon they are, and that this will help you in casting them out.
I was always kind of wary about that because I didn’t personally want to get on a first-name basis with demons. If I’m trying to help someone who’s demon-possessed, I’m not trying to strike up a conversation with the demon. I just want it gone. So I’ve never really thought too much about doing it. Plus, it didn’t seem like the kind of thing I saw happening in the Bible.
But then as I was putting this lesson together, I saw it! We see it right here as Jesus asks them their name.
So, I always used to think that when Jesus asked, “What is your name,” that He was trying to ask the man himself. That Jesus was trying to make a connection with this demoniac on a personal level, to reach the person and lead him out of the darkness.
But now I think these people were right, that Jesus was asking the demon its name so that Jesus had a better idea of what he was dealing with. And I will tell you a couple of personal stories that I think kind of illustrate this as we wrap up today.
I can remember one time sitting in a church service at a charismatic church I used to visit sometimes. It was a Friday night; this church had Friday evening services. I remember that a gentleman had came in that night and sat right on the front row. This man had a smile on his face the entire time at church that night. He looked like he was on laughing gas or something. Just looked extraordinarily happy to be in church. It was actually kind of creepy. I had been at this church enough times that I knew this guy wasn’t a regular.
I didn’t pay him a lot of mind. I don’t make it a habit of staring at people in church. But every time I looked at this guy, he just had a big goofy smile on his face. I actually started to wonder that night if he was drunk or something, he just kind of had that look about him, but he stayed that way for two or three hours. It was a long service. Like I said, sat right on the front row.
Finally, right toward the end of the church service, and I think we’d had an altar call or something, and this guy had just sat there on the front row all through it. Hadn’t caused any problems, just sat there with this creepy grin on his face. And then the pastor of that church pointed at the man and said, “You have a spirit of alcoholism in you and it must come out right now.”
When the pastor said that, this man on the front row dropped down on the ground and started slithering like a snake. The pastor when over and prayed for him. He called some others to come over and pray for this man, and he stopped slithering but he just lay there on the ground.
It took about 15 or 20 minutes, but they finally cast that demon out of him. And I remember the guy sat up after all that and was just fine. He actually just looked like a normal person at that point. Really sweaty, but without the creepiness factor.
But that moment the pastor pointed at him and said, “You have a spirit of alcoholism in you,” that man had a physical reaction to it. So the pastor didn’t ask the demon’s name, but through the Spirit- because like I said, this was a Charismatic church, that pastor received a Word of Knowledge- the pastor recognized that something was inside this guy and he knew by the Spirit what it was and he called it out and that demon fell to the ground.
So that’s an illustration of how, when you know what you’re dealing with, you have more ability to take control of this demon and make it leave in Jesus’ name.
I have one more story and, theologically, I can’t explain all of this. But I’ll just put it out there and you can do what you want with it.
One time there was a church in my town that had a Saturday night worship service. That was basically all they would do for an hour or two each Saturday evening; just have their musicians get together and make a space where people could pray, worship, whatever they wanted to do. I went sometimes. As a teen and young adult, I visited all kinds of churches. This one was a charismatic church. Different from the one in the last story.
Anyway, one Saturday night, they were singing and I was just praying in my chair. I think I had gotten down on my knees and had my head in my chair, with my back toward the worship team. And I was just having a prayer time. This one young woman with kind of matted hair, maybe early 20s, kinda janky looking. Janky is a word the kids use nowadays, I don’t really know how to define it, but I’d say she looked kinda janky.
Anyway, I didn’t pay her much attention, I just kept praying there at my chair. After a little while, I suddenly get a really strong urge to go outside and go get a pack of cigarettes and smoke a cigarette. Now, this was the most bizarre sensation or temptation I’ve probably ever dealt with. Just this urge I suddenly felt to go smoke a cigarette.
It frankly just made no sense to me. I wasn’t a smoker. I had smoked a few cigarettes before, just kind of out of normal teenage curiosity. They never really had any appeal to me. I didn’t understand why people found them addictive. I hadn’t had the urge to smoke them regularly. So sitting in this church service on that Saturday night was the one time in my life I could say I’ve ever felt an urge to smoke. And it was so random that it just felt like an absurd sensation. Like getting a craving for broccoli while I’m in a candy store. Well I’m sitting in a worship service and getting this desire to go smoke when I don’t even smoke.
Well, I just kind of pushed the idea out of my thoughts because I was there to pray and spend time with God that night. Well, 20 or 30 minutes later, I look over at the janky woman who had stumbled in because some people had gathered around her and everyone else in the room that night, which was probably just 5 or 6 people, were praying over her. I decided I could go over and pray for her as well.
Well, long story short, come to find out, this woman was demon possessed. But she wanted to be free of these demons, and as the people prayed over her, she kept trying to fall to the ground. So they had a couple of us hold her up as people prayed for her. A very prophetic and godly woman who was there that night came and stood right in front of the demon-possessed girl and started calling these demons out of her. The woman who was demon-possessed kept making movements like she was throwing up. They put a trash can under her head, but I don’t think anything ever came out that I could see. But as they prayed over her and called these demons out, she just kept making puking motions.
Then the prophetic woman who was standing in front of her says, “You have a spirit of cigarette smoking in you, and it needs to come out right now, in Jesus’ name.” Now, kind of like the spirit of alcoholism in the other story, this woman just knew this by the Holy Spirit. We hadn’t been talking about it. Nobody had a cigarette in their hands. But this prophetic woman called it out, and the janky woman made motions like she was puking it out as well.
Once we had cast all the demons out, I learned that the janky woman- and I’m not saying janky to be mean, there’s probably worse things I could say- but the janky woman had been involved in witchcraft. They instructed her that when she got back to her apartment, she needs to clear out everything that has anything to do with witchcraft. They told her any articles of clothing, any coins, any medallions, any books, anything at all that has to do with witchcraft. Throw it away or destroy it.
These things can be open doors for demonic activity in your life. Come back for next week’s lesson to learn more about open doors.
But one last note on this story. As I was driving home that night- or it might have even been a few days later- I was thinking about that experience of praying for this woman and it finally hit me, I finally put two and two together. That urge I felt that night to go and smoke a cigarette. And then praying for her and they called out a demon of cigarette smoking. And I didn’t realize until later that those two things were probably connected. That there was a demon inside of or surrounding her who wanted to make people smoke. And that demon reached out and tempted me with it that night. Because like I said, that was probably the only time in my whole life I’ve ever had a temptation to smoke a cigarette. Like I said, I had done it a few times before out of teenage curiosity. But even that was nothing like what I felt that Saturday night in that church.
Now guys, I am not on here today to be judgmental of people who smoke. I have never cared about someone smoking cigarettes. I have never looked at cigarette-smoking as a test of someone’s spirituality. If I knew someone who smoked and they got saved and I was discipling them, I’d probably talk about a hundred other things before I ever got around to talking about smoking. I honestly don’t care. I have never made a big deal about it as a Christian because the Bible doesn’t talk about smoking.
But if we can be honest for a minute, it’s a self-destructive behavior. It’s addictive. It shortens your life. And there are many many good reasons we could go into not to smoke. Now, can I point to a demon of cigarette smoking in the Bible? No. Absolutely not. If you think this story sounds far-fetched and silly, I completely understand. I would probably think it was silly, too, if I hadn’t experienced it myself.
I only bring it up because it illustrates this point that Jesus does right here in Mark 5.
(Mark 5:9)
And Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” He replied, “My name is Legion, for we are many.”
When Jesus found out what kind of spirit He was dealing with, He was able to cast the demon out of this man.
When the pastor at that Friday night service recognized a spirit of alcoholism, they were able to cast it out.
When the woman called out a spirit of cigarette smoking that night, we were able to cast it out.
So I’d say there seems to be some credibility to this notion that identifying a demon actually makes it easier to get control of it.
Housekeeping/Mailbag
Now, if you’ve been paying attention, I still didn’t finish this lesson on Mark 5. So we’ll need to spend at least one more week on it, because I really wanted to get to the part about when Jesus cast the demons into the pigs. I’ll have to save that lesson, though, because I’ve already promised to share an interview with you next week about the book The Day Satan Called by Bill Scott.
Bill shares his story of helping a young lady caught up in witchcraft and demon possession. Some of his stories are pretty harrowing. If you thought anything I said today sounded far-fetched, you’ll need to fasten your seatbelts for what Bill shares next week. And read his book, The Day Satan Called, you have time to order it off Amazon and read it.
If you want to learn more about spiritual warfare and putting this stuff we’ve been talking about into practice, this book is a good guide. And we discuss some of those subjects in next week’s interview.
I’ll play a segment here where I ask him about the schizophrenic nature of demon-possessed people, which I talked about with you today.
[play snippet]
You don’t want to miss it; mke sure you’re subscribed so you don’t miss that conversation.
In the meantime, if you want to get in touch with me: weirdstuffinthebible@gmail.com
I heard back from several people last week in Part I of my demonology lesson. One said, “I came for the title but you take a long time to tell a story, on the beginning you have to break down nearly everything and refer to past videos? Just tell the story!” Oh man, if you think that’s bad, you need to see my Ezekiel podcast. I have spent three years going through the book of Ezekiel at a rate of about one chapter per month. I am starting my fourth year in it now, and just published my first study on Ezekiel 37 this week. That is just how I roll. I like to take my time working my way through a book or chapter slowly, leaving no stone unturned. But I can understand your frustration if you’re not into that kind of study. But man, we only did four verses this time and look how much we were able to churn out of those four verses! The word of God is so rich, I just hate to rush it.
Got a note from, I believe, “Sarah,” it says, “All I can say is… more weird stuff in the Bible please lol!!” Thanks for that. Another note that said, “Hey, thank you fir the knowledge you're sharing please keep going and God bless you and keep you in your journey with him” I appreciate that as well and bless you, too.
Closing Thoughts
And I hope you can all be here next week to hear my interview with Bill Scott, and the come back in two weeks as we keep studying demonology in the weird story of Mark 5.
Fighting demons is weird to us. It’s not part of most of our day to day lives. It’s not something we’re used to, not something we’re comfortable with- and some Christians flat out don’t even believe in them. And they’ll think you’re weird if you do.
But fighting demons wasn’t weird to Jesus. He does it all throughout the four Gospels. Mark was the first of the Gospels written. In Mark chapter 1, Jesus shows up, first thing He does is get baptized, then goes out in the wilderness and is tempted by Satan. Spiritual warfare. The first miracle He does in Mark 1 is casting a demon out of a guy. Mark chapter 3, He’s casting out demons. Mark 5, He’s casting out demons. Mark 6, the disciples are casting out demons. Mark 7, casting out demons. So casting out demons is not supposed to be weird. It should be normal.
WE are weird, because we don’t do it. We don’t even know a whole lot about it. But now we do. Thanks for listening, God bless you for sticking around until the end, and we’ll see you next time on Weird Stuff in the Bible.