The Gerasene Demonic and Us

As I continue to preach through the gospel of Luke with Cypress Lake Baptist Church, I am amazed at the number of ways my life is impacted. My hope is that our church would know more of Biblical Jesus so we can trust in Him and His work on our behalf. Just recently I added Philip Ryken's Commentary Set to my collection, and I am very thankful already. In preparing for Sunday Evening's message from Luke 8:26-39 I read this quote about the demon possessed man:

The man that Jesus met was in nearly the worst condition that anyone could imagine. He was naked, lonely, violent, and insane; he was walking naked among the dead. Yet even for all his misery, we can see ourselves in his situation, because sin has similar effects on all of us. It exposes us naked in our guilt. It alienates us from one another, leaving us lonely and alone. It makes us violent, at least in our attitudes, if not in our actions. Spiritually speaking, we walk among the dead. Thus the madman in the graveyard shows the wretchedness of our condition outside of Christ.

I can relate to this on so many levels. Apart from Christ I am certainly here. Thanks be to God who has cleansed me through the blood of His Son, Jesus.

I Need the Gospel...Today!

It seems in many churches the need of the gospel is ONLY for unbelievers. I'm thankful that this is not true in all churches, but unfortunately it is in many. The gospel is, of course, for unbelievers, but I'm reminded this weekend why I still need the gospel more than a decade after I came to trust in Christ.

Last week I had the opportunity to preach Matthew 5:3, "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." The way to be poor in spirit is to place oneself before the Almighty God and see how you measure up to His expectations. During the Sermon on the Mount Jesus tells us exactly what His expectations are. In Matthew 5:48 Jesus says, "You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect." Wow! Those are high expectations. It would have been easy to try to explain that God doesn't really expect us to be perfect, but that would not be true. God does expect perfection. And when we place ourselves open before Him we will see how miserably we have failed to keep His requirement of perfection.

This leads to Matthew 5:4, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted." Many Christians today, I think, jump to the second half of verse 4 before dealing with the first half. For me, I often times rest in Christ without realizing I still continually fall short of the requirements of God. But this verse says we are blessed when we mourn over our sin. I think it is very important that we see ourselves before God Almighty and realize that we still need His grace. We still need His mercy. We still need His hand to keep us because without we will fall away!

However, as Christians, we cannot stop there. The gospel is still applicable for us today. When I stand before God on my own I mourn the sin and devastation that I have brought upon myself. But I also rejoice and worship when I see that Christ took that judgment for me on the cross. Beloved, the gospel is still true. The gospel is still needed. I love the fact that I can still see the application of the gospel in my own life!

Where do you Turn?

We all sin. There is no one who is without sin. However, I've been thinking a lot lately about those sins that continually creep up in your life. You know the one's I'm talking about. They are different for different people, but they're there. It seems like I've gotten wrong this whole time and I think others probably have as well. Let me explain. When I sense the temptation coming on to sin I begin to dwell on that sin and try my hardest to think of ways to avoid that sin. You may think that sounds like a good plan, but I'm not convinced it's a terrible plan. The more we think of that particular sin the more the temptation grows until we satisfy our longing for that sin by giving in. That is not helpful. Indeed this will happen from time to time. This is why we never get past the gospel. In those times when we do give in to sin where do you turn? If it were not for the gospel of Christ I wouldn't know where to turn. It's in those moments that I remember that Christ purchased me and paid for even that sin on the cross. So when we sin we need, no, we must, turn to the gospel of Christ.

But my question was how do we fight the temptations of sin before we give in? There are many helpful strategies, but I think the answer is the same as the last answer: the gospel. In those moments of temptation we do not need to think about that particular sin. Rather, we need to preach the gospel to ourselves. We need to think of Christ. We need to set our minds on things above, not on things that are on earth (Colossians 3:2). The answer to fighting the temptations of sin are not found in strategies (though they may help to some degree). The answer is found in drawing close to God through Christ. So when you feel the temptations coming on stronger and stronger get on your knees and plead with God to help you and open up His Word and see His unbelievable grace in the gospel of Christ. Pray that God would deliver you from the evil one. Don't turn to your sin! Turn to Christ!