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Good morning.
I'm Julie Brown.
And I am part of the El Cerrito Kensington Group and, when I can, Women Reading Women.
Today's scripture reading is from the Gospel of Luke, chapter 11, verses 11 to 26, as printed
in your liturgy.
A reading from the Gospel according to Luke.
Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead?
Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?
If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much
more will your Father in Heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?
Jesus was driving out a demon that was mute.
When the demon left, the man who had been mute spoke, and the crowd was amazed.
But some of them said, by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, he is driving out demons.
Others tested him by asking for a sign from heaven.
Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, any kingdom divided against itself will be ruined,
and a house divided against itself will fall.
If Satan is divided against himself, how can his kingdom stand?
I say this because you claim that I drive out demons by Beelzebul.
Now, if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your followers drive them out?
So then, they will be your judges.
But if I drive out demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.
When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe.
But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up his plunder.
Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.
When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it.
Then it says, I will return to the house I left.
When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order.
Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there,
and the final condition of that person is worse than the first.
This is the gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, O Christ.
Good morning, Christ Church.
It's very good to be back here with my Christ Church family.
I missed you while I was traveling the last two Sundays visiting family and friends,
and really glad to have come back to begin the season of Lent with you all here on Ash Wednesday the other night,
and especially to also launch our Alpha course on Thursday night.
We had about 30-plus people, 30-plus guests who were there to just be in a season of spiritual seeking,
of exploring the Christian faith, people who are new Christians looking to build their life on a foundation of faith.
So we're so glad to be in this season of Lent, this season of our Alpha course.
And, you know, each year from Christmas to Easter, we preach through one of the four gospels in the New Testament,
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
And inevitably, when we do that, we run up against some of the hard sayings of Jesus that we struggle to understand.
And a lot of ink has been spilled trying to make sense about these most strange and enigmatic and perplexing things that Jesus ever said.
And what you just heard read is certainly one of those sayings.
It's hard to get.
But I liken the hard sayings of Jesus to hard candy.
You know, you don't want to, like, immediately bite on it.
But you just kind of want to put it in your mouth and start working it around and let it slowly kind of melt a little bit.
So that's what we're going to try to do in this sermon today.
But notice how our passage begins in verse 14.
It says,
Jesus was driving out a demon that was mute.
And when the demon left, the man who had been mute spoke, and the crowd was amazed.
So here's this dark power, and it's dehumanizing this human being.
And how is it dehumanizing this man?
It's diminishing the image of God in this man by stealing and killing and destroying his unique ability.
The unique ability that we human beings have been given by God to speak.
Right?
This amazing gift that we have to use language to relate to one another and to communicate with each other,
to articulate things that are good and true and beautiful.
That gift has been diminished.
It's been taken away.
And Jesus is restoring that to this man.
And yet his critics say in verse 15, it says,
And Jesus both agrees and disagrees with that statement because he says in verse 18,
If Satan is divided against himself, how can his kingdom stand?
I say this because you claim that I drive out demons by Beelzebul.
And Jesus is assuming that there are dark powers in this world,
that those dark powers form a kind of hierarchy, an imperial hierarchy,
that they're organized as a kingdom against the kingdom of God and against the image of God,
and that Satan is the prince that's ruling over the top of that hierarchy that's oppressing human beings.
And Jesus says this in verse 20.
He says,
But if I drive out demons by the finger of God, by the spirit of God, by the power and authority of God,
then the kingdom of God has come among you.
It's an amazing statement of Jesus' life and his mission,
that he's stepped out of eternity and into time,
that he's come down from heaven to earth and taken on human flesh in order to do just this,
in order to expel this dark kingdom from the world,
and to bring in the gracious rule and the liberating reign of the kingdom of God.
So I want to just kind of slowly work on this hard saying,
this hard candy of Jesus under three headings this morning.
I want to talk about the reality of dark powers
and the presence of a stronger power,
and then thirdly, the indwelling of a holy power.
So the reality of dark powers, the presence of a stronger power,
and the indwelling of a holy power.
When we think about the reality of dark powers,
some of you say,
Well, wait a minute.
You really want me to believe this?
When we look at the gospel and we find Jesus as a prophet who's speaking truth to power,
we say,
I like that Jesus.
Or when we find Jesus acting like a social revolutionary,
and he's empowering women,
and he's including the outcasts,
and he's lifting up the poor,
we say,
Yes, that's a Jesus I can really get down with.
But then we find Jesus talking about Satan,
and working as an exorcist,
and driving out demons.
This is just bizarre.
It's absolutely shocking.
And some of you say,
Well, I'm not sure I can accept this,
because I'm educated.
You know, I went to university.
I have an undergraduate degree.
I have a graduate degree.
I read the New York Times.
I read the Wall Street Journal.
I have a computer in my pocket with access to the internet.
I have chat GPT on my phone as a co-intelligence.
When you think about the last 150 years of human history,
all the progress we've made in education,
all the advances we've made in economics,
all the breakthroughs we've made in science and technology and medicine,
do you really expect me to buy into all this demon stuff?
Right?
Do you realize how primitive and how backward
this first century talk about evil spirits and dark powers sounds?
And I want to say,
Yes, I do realize how strange it sounds,
which is why I'm taking the time to talk about it.
For many, many complex reasons,
late modern, secular age, post-Christian people in the Western world
with their enlightened, materialistic vision of reality
struggle to believe in malevolent spiritual beings.
And if that is your paradigm today,
I would like to ask you to consider this,
that the policy of the devil
is to persuade you that there is no devil.
Or to put it a different way,
the devil's most clever deception is to convince you
that he's not there.
And Andrew and I, at least once a year,
we trot out this quote.
You know what I'm about to quote?
Delbanco, right?
Okay, Andrew Delbanco.
He's a professor at Columbia University.
He's a secular Jewish professor in humanities.
And he wrote a book in 1995
called The Death of Satan,
How Americans Have Lost the Sense of Evil.
And this is so relevant to us.
This is why we quote it at least once a year.
Here it is.
A gulf, he says,
a gulf has opened in our culture
between the visibility of evil
and the intellectual resources to cope with it.
We have jettisoned in the West
the idea of cosmic evil
or transcendent evil
or supernatural evil.
We don't believe in it.
In fact, we even,
we don't even like to use the word evil
because it implies moral absolutes
and value judgments.
So we use medical terms.
We talk about dysfunction.
We talk about pathology.
We don't use moral terminology.
But, Delbanco says,
he says,
as the 20th century has gone on,
it's gotten harder and harder
to say that holocausts
and ethnic cleansings
and serial killings
are just bad psychological
and sociological adjustments.
What we said 150 years ago
that all evil has natural causes,
has scientific causes,
is wearing thin.
I find this is a fascinating thesis.
He goes on.
He says,
the repertoire of evil
has never been richer,
yet never have our responses
been so weak.
We have no language
for connecting our inner lives
with the horrors
that pass before our eyes
in the outer world.
And he concludes the book.
Delbanco says this
at the end of the book.
He says,
my driving motive
in writing this book
has been the conviction
that if evil,
with all its insidious complexity,
escapes the reach
of our imagination,
it will have established
dominion over us.
If we no longer
have an imagination
for evil,
it will have established
dominion over us.
What he's saying
is that if you've been educated
and socialized
into a particular
plausibility structure,
into a particular paradigm
that denies dark powers
in this world,
then you are particularly vulnerable
because you don't have
the intellectual resources
and the imagination
and the language
to deal with the world
that we actually live in.
When I was traveling
this last week,
going from California
to Georgia
to New York
and back here,
I took as my companion
the Lord of the Rings.
I haven't read this book
in like 20 years,
so I decided
to start rereading it.
And I was reminded
of Tolkien's brilliance,
because he's got this chapter,
chapter two of the book,
it's the critical chapter
in the whole thing,
it's called The Shadow,
The Shadow of the Past.
And in chapter one,
he depicts the easy,
comfortable lives
of the hobbits
in the Shire.
But then in chapter two,
he reveals that
actually all the hobbits
in the Shire
are completely oblivious
to what's really going on.
They're oblivious
to the whispers
of this enemy
on this eastern land
of Mordor.
And the mood
in the Shire
is one of just
complacent ignorance
as these great evils
grow and become
like this ominous
sort of disquieting shadow.
And it's only
the most far-seeing,
it's only the most wise people
in Middle-earth,
like Gandalf,
the wizard,
who are able
to discern
the true contours
of the danger
that they face.
And so Gandalf,
what does he do?
He comes to the Shire
to counsel Frodo,
to warn Frodo,
and to kind of wake him up
to this malignant shadow
in this metastasizing darkness.
And I want to suggest
that that's what Jesus
is doing for us here.
What Gandalf does for Frodo,
Jesus is doing for us here.
He's revealing to us
that something dark
and something deadly
is at work in the world
that we disbelieve
or we take lightly
at our own peril.
So that when we read
these words from Jesus
in verse 20,
if I drive out demons
by the finger of God,
then the kingdom of God
has come upon you.
What do we do with that?
Right?
Where does that fit
in our vision of reality
in the world?
Do you trust yourself?
Do you trust
your plausibility structures,
your cultural paradigms,
your educational experience,
your formative institutions,
which have told you
there is no such thing
as demons?
There is no such thing
as a battle or a struggle
between the kingdom of Satan
and the kingdom of God.
Or,
will you trust
the Son of God
who's speaking here,
who made the world?
Right?
The Son of God
who took all the risk
upon Himself
to enter into this world.
The Son of God
who laid down His life
and died for this world.
The Son of God
who rose again
to authenticate
His authority
to interpret His world.
When you become a Christian,
when you say,
Jesus is my Savior
and Jesus is my Lord,
what happens is that
you're baptized
into Jesus' vision
of the world.
You're baptized
into His interpretation
of the world
where He says,
this is the fundamental conflict.
This is the fundamental thing
that's happening
in your life
and in the life
of this world
that I've come to engage.
The Apostle Paul
says it this way
in Ephesians chapter 6.
He says,
for our struggle
is not against flesh and blood
but against the rulers,
against the authorities,
against the powers
of this dark world
and against the spiritual forces
of evil
in the heavenly realms.
And I think Jesus
is trying to get us
to take seriously
the reality
of the dark powers
that are at work
in the world.
So that's point number one.
Point number two
is not just about
the reality
of the dark powers
but secondly,
the presence
of a stronger power.
The presence
of a stronger power.
Jesus could not be more clear
that Satan's not only real
but that he's strong.
And He says it explicitly
in verse 21.
He says,
when a strong man
fully armed
guards his own house,
his possessions
are safe.
Jesus is saying there
that Satan is strong.
Right?
He's mighty.
He's powerful.
Jesus calls him
in other places
the prince of this world,
the ruler of this world.
Right?
He's fully armed
with defensive armor,
with offensive weapons.
And it says
he has a house.
That word house
is a palace.
It's a castle
of this dark warlord,
this heavily fortified
military installation
where Jesus is describing
this evil
and strong prince
who takes possession
of people
and he puts them
in his castle prison,
his castle dungeon,
and there
his unholy spirits
are holding people
there in bondage.
Right?
They're oppressed
and they're dominated
by the will
of this strong man.
And Jesus says
He has people
in His possession.
And how do people
come to be
in His possession?
Well,
Ephesians chapter 6,
again,
the Apostle Paul
says this,
he says,
put on the full armor
of God
so that you can
take your stand
against the devil's
schemes.
Right?
The devil
has schemes
by which he takes
possession of people.
And what are those schemes?
Well,
you can trace
sort of a golden thread
all the way back
to the beginning
of the Scriptures
in Genesis chapter 3
where the scheming serpent
comes into paradise,
he comes into
the garden of God
questioning God's Word.
Right?
He's saying,
did God really say?
And he begins
to twist
and distort the truth.
He begins
to sow seeds
of doubt
and disbelief
in the heart
of human beings.
Is God really for you?
Isn't God
kind of holding out
on you?
And you can trace
that thread
of his schemes
all the way
into the New Testament
where the Apostle Paul
says in 2 Corinthians 11,
he says,
Satan disguises himself
as an angel
of light.
Satan disguises himself
as an angel
of light.
In other words,
his strategy
is deception.
And if you read
the letters
of the New Testament,
it's very clear
that this dark warlord
is at work
particularly
among the people
of God.
Right?
Because he wants
to distort
the truth
of the gospel.
He wants to add
to the gospel.
He wants to take away
from the gospel.
He wants to lead
God's people
into this ditch
of legalism
over here,
into this ditch
of licentiousness
over here.
He wants to lead
us into conflict
with one another
or compromise
with the world.
Right?
He wants to disrupt
our relationship
with God.
He wants to disrupt
our relationship
with each other.
He wants to discredit
our life
and our message.
He's got schemes
that need to be resisted.
And the question is,
do we take Jesus seriously
when he talks about
this strong man,
that he actually
is highly intelligent,
that he's immensely powerful,
that he's utterly
unscrupulous,
that he's a formidable
adversary
with deceptive schemes
that we must take
seriously?
How else do we
explain the brokenness
of this world,
right,
that's in bondage
to forces of sin
and disease
and injustice
and poverty
and hunger
and alienation?
How else do we
describe the eruption
of anger
and fear
and violence
and death
in this world
unless we take
Jesus' words
about the strong man
seriously?
But what's amazing
about this passage
is that Jesus
is not only telling us
about the strong man,
but he has the audacity
to say,
I'm stronger
than the strong man.
Right,
he says in verse 22,
but when someone
stronger attacks
and overpowers him,
he takes away
the armor
in which the man
trusted
and divides up
his plunder.
You guys still awake?
All right.
I know we had one less
hour of sleep last night,
so I'm just making sure.
Jesus says,
my life
and my mission
is a full frontal
assault
on the strong man.
Right,
when I touch,
when you read the gospels
and you see Jesus
touching people's bodies
with the power of God
and you see people
teaching people
and regenerating their souls
by the truth of God,
Jesus is saying,
look,
I'm attacking
and overpowering
the strong man.
I'm dethroning Satan.
I'm driving out
his kingdom.
I'm repossessing
what God
owns by right.
I'm possessing them
for the kingdom of God.
What is amazing
is the apostle Paul
says this
in Colossians chapter 2
verse 14.
He says,
talking about Jesus' ministry
and the climax
of Jesus' ministry,
he says,
God has taken away
our sin,
our death,
and our condemnation
by nailing them
to the cross.
And he says,
in having disarmed
the dark powers
and the authorities,
God made a spectacle
of them,
triumphing over them
by the cross.
What Paul is saying there
is that Jesus' cross
is the decisive moment
of his attack
on the strong man.
Right?
On his cross,
Jesus looks as if
he's a helpless victim,
but something actually
much deeper
is going on there,
that on his cross,
Jesus is attacking
and overpowering
and overcoming
the strong man
by sacrificial,
self-giving love.
Right?
That on his cross,
Jesus is actually
disarming the dark powers.
He's taking away
the strong man's armor
in which he trusted.
And on his cross,
Jesus is making
a public spectacle
of Satan
and his dark kingdom.
On his cross,
Jesus is conquering
over that kingdom
of darkness
and winning a victory
for the kingdom of God.
And Jesus says
that he's dividing up
the strong man's spoils.
On his cross,
Jesus is dividing up
the strong man's plunder
by reclaiming men
and reclaiming women
so that people can live
in freedom again
according to God's
original design.
And through his resurrection,
Jesus is continuing
this work
of plundering
the strong man's spoils.
Right?
He continues this work
until he comes again
to fully drive out
the evil one
from this world
until he fully
and finally sets up
the kingdom of God
on earth as it is in heaven.
And so,
what does this mean for us?
What does it mean for you?
It's a matter of
utmost importance
and urgency
for you to know
whether you're
in the possession
of the strong man
or whether you belong
to the stronger one
who came to overtake
and overpower
and disarm
and plunder
the strong man.
Right?
The question for us is
who do I belong to?
Have I been transferred
from one dominion
into another dominion?
From one possession
into another possession?
From one safekeeping
into another safekeeping?
Again,
the Apostle Paul
says this in Colossians 1.
He says,
for he,
God,
has rescued us
from the dominion
of darkness
and brought us
into the kingdom
of the Son
He loves.
Is that how we see
the world?
Is that how we understand
our lives?
Third point
is not just the reality
of dark powers
and not just the presence
of a stronger power,
but finally is to talk
about the indwelling
of a holy power.
power.
The indwelling
of a holy power.
And this is where
I want to just look
for a moment
at the most particularly
strange,
at least for me,
the most enigmatic
and puzzling part
of this text.
And you're like,
we haven't talked
about that already.
But one thing
we haven't really
looked at is
where Jesus says
in verses 19 to 20,
He says,
other people
are driving out demons.
Other Jews,
other followers
of the Pharisees,
they're also
driving out demons.
And then He says
in verses 24 to 26,
He says that a demon
leaves the house
and then He comes back
and He finds it swept
and put in order,
but it's empty
and so He comes
and occupies it
with seven other
more wicked demons
than Himself
and the situation
is far worse
than it was before.
What in the world
is going on there?
Well, I think Jesus
is suggesting that
there are multiple ways
to get symptom relief
for our human misery.
but to not really deal
with underlying root causes.
Right?
He says, you know,
other people are dealing
with troubles
and miseries
and demons are,
you know,
taking off.
But they're not really
driving them out
like I am
by the finger of God
and the Spirit of God
and the power of God
so that the kingdom
of God is coming.
They're giving symptom relief
but they're not really
bringing the kingdom of God,
Jesus says.
And what does that mean?
It means that there's
actually many different ways
that we can change.
There are many ways
that we can get
the power to change
but there's only one way
to change thoroughly
and to change permanently.
Right?
Many of us have changed
because we've looked
to therapy
and we've looked
to self-help for change
and that was good.
We needed that.
Others of us
have looked to science
and drugs
and medicine
for change
and that was good.
We needed that.
Others of us
have looked to education
and knowledge
for change
and that was good.
That helped.
We needed that.
All of these are good gifts
of God's common grace
in our lives.
But I think this text
challenges us
not to be
overly simplistic
and overly reductionistic
in the way
that we approach
human problems.
Because obviously
we're psychological
and social beings.
Obviously we're biological
and physical beings.
Obviously we're intellectual
and rational beings.
But what this text
reminds us is that
we are not only
those things
we are spiritual beings.
And if we only deal
at the superficial level
of doing symptom relief
in our life
we're not going deep enough
to deal with underlying
root spiritual causes.
It's possible
Jesus says
to use other powers
to change.
And we might be
massively helped
by emotional catharsis.
We might be
significantly helped
by willpower
and just sheer
self-determination
and self-discipline.
We might be helped
by some kind of
support group.
And one demon
might say
oh my goodness
he's getting serious
about his life
I think I'm going to
take off
and leave his house
for a while.
And your house
lo and behold
is swept clean
it's put in order.
But if that's all
you've done
Jesus says
if that's all
you've done
your house
is swept clean
and it's put in order
but it's sitting vacant.
It's sitting empty
you're just inviting
trouble.
You're eventually
going to attract
vandals
and invaders
and squatters
who are going to
come and make
things worse.
If you're a kid
and you ever
discovered
an abandoned house
you know
and there's glass
in the window
don't you just want
to pick up a rock
and throw it
through the window?
Was that just me?
Jesus says
an empty house
is just asking for it.
An empty house
needs to be filled.
An empty house
needs a new
and a holy power
that keeps all
those old
and unholy spirits
from coming back.
I had a friend
who I met
in seminary
and he became
a pastor
and he no longer
is part of a church
no longer identifies
as a Christian
and he posted
on social media
recently
he said
these last three years
I've been in a state
of barely contained
panic.
Right?
I've not been sleeping
I've not been exercising
I've been pounding
ice cream
late at night
I've been binging TV
to distract myself
from my pain
I've been on four
different psychiatric
drugs
and I've often
wanted to just
go to sleep
and not wake up.
And he says
you know
the good news
is that my wife
and my kids
they rallied around me
and I restarted
exercising
and I got
on a clean diet
and I stayed sober
from alcohol
and I weaned myself
off this drug cocktail
and he's reporting
you know
I felt stuck
in despair
but now I'm happy
and I have hope again
and I rejoice
with him
that is such good news
his house
has been swept clean
his house
has been put
in order
but Jesus would say
the problem with that
is that your house
is still empty
your house
is vacant
there's nobody
in there
vandals
and invaders
and squatters
are just going to come
and make things
worse for you
what does he need
what does my friend need
what do I need
what do you need
Jesus says
we need a new
and a holy
and indwelling power
that's stronger
than all of those
dark powers
that can come
and fill
and occupy
our house
and our life
right
it's possible
to have your life
swept clean
and put in order
without the redeeming
presence of Jesus
and without the
regenerating power
of the Holy Spirit
it's possible
to engage
in a thousand
life hacks
to optimize
your life
maximally
but unless
the expulsion
and the removal
of dark
and dehumanizing
powers
is followed
by the filling
of your life
with the power
of the living God
you've not deeply
changed
your change
is only superficial
and temporary
you're just creating
a vacuum
inside of you
that can be filled
with more dark
powers
Jesus says
if you want to change
thoroughly
if you want to change
completely
if you want to change
permanently
you need to let me
move into your house
you need to let me
take possession
of all that you are
and all that you have
you need one
stronger than the
strong man
to come and take up
residence inside of you
right
you need the one
who drives out demons
by the finger of God
and who brings the kingdom
of God
to come
and set up his kingdom
in your life
what you need
is the spirit
of him
who raised Christ
from the dead
to come and be
that indwelling
power
and that indwelling
presence inside of you
enabling you
to live
the faithful
and fruitful life
that God
created you to live
there are other
sources of power
there are other
means of help
that can deal
with this particular
sin
or that particular
trouble
or misery
or demon
but Jesus
the son of God
has conquered
over sin itself
and he's overcome
Satan
himself
and what he offers
you
and what he gives
you
is not deliverance
from this sin
or from that sin
or from this demon
or from that demon
no what he gives you
is complete deliverance
what he's freeing you
from is all sin
what he's emancipating
you from is entirely
from the dominion
of Satan
what you need
is not a house
that's been swept
clean and put in order
what you need
is a house
that's occupied
by the presence
of the living God
a house that's full
of Christ
through the power
of the Holy Spirit
you don't need
a power
that will make
your house
swept clean
and put in order
but leave you
exactly as you were
before
where now you just
have to fight
and struggle
to keep it clean
where you grow
tired and weary
to keep it
in good order
and all those
old troubles
and all those
miseries
you have to fight
to keep them away
what you need
is the power
of the living God
and your house
increasingly filled
by the presence
and the power
of the Holy Spirit
so friends
if you're not sure
what the season
of Lent
these next 40 days
is all about
if you're not really sure
what to pray
I want to point you
to this simple prayer
in verse 13
and I'll close with this
Jesus says
if you then
though you are evil
know how to give
good gifts
to your children
how much more
will your Father
in Heaven
give the Holy Spirit
to those who ask Him
what I want to encourage
you to do
over the next 40 days
is just to ask God
to fill your house
and to fill your life
with the Holy Spirit
to say Father
you love to give
good gifts
to your children
and I'm asking you
for the best gift
please give me
the Holy Spirit
please give me
more and more
of your Spirit
please fill me
from the top of my head
to the tips of my toes
body and soul
with the Spirit
of Jesus Christ
Holy Spirit
come rest on me
Holy Spirit
come enter into me
Holy Spirit
come live in me
and dwell in me
and reside in me
and abide in me
Holy Spirit
come
come fill my mind
and my thoughts
come fill my heart
and my affections
come fill my will
and my desires
Lord
enable me
to be full
of the Holy Spirit
and to walk
in the Holy Spirit
to be led by
the Holy Spirit
friends
who's dwelling
in your house
who's taking up
residence
in your life
in your house
let us make this
our prayer
over the next 40 days
as we journey
toward Easter together
in the name of the Father
Son and Holy Spirit
Amen