The Word: Mark 5: 18 (KJV)
18 And when he was come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that he might be with him.
Dig Deeper: Mark 5: 19(KJV)
19 Howbeit Jesus suffered him not, but saith unto him, Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee. 20 And he departed, and began to publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him: and all men did marvel.
Think about it
LOVE THE DRIVING FORCE
‘Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat;’
We have an interesting story from the gospel of Mark in our 2 texts today: There was this man who was demon possessed. Somehow unclean spirits had taken over his life. They were not few, they were actually many because the demons said their name was legion. There was a possibility that he was into repeated sins (We don’t fully know because the bible didn’t explain how he came about a legion. But we know from another illustration that Jesus gave – Matthew 12:43 that when an unclean spirit is cast out of a man, there is a tendency for it to go back. and if that house is empty, the unclean spirit will go back with 7 more wicked spirits. Also after Jesus healed the man at the pool of Bethesda, He later saw the healed man in the temple and told him to stop sinning so that something worse will not happen to him – John 5:12 – So we know that continuous habitual sin can make someone prone or vulnerable to demonic oppression or possession). So if we are struggling from any sinful habit, we need to seek help so we don’t become exposed or vulnerable to demonic operation. But that is all a digression:
So this demonic man was living among the tombs where they bury the dead, no man could tame him, he would break the chains and perhaps deal with the people that were trying to restrain him. Then one day Jesus came and saw him, Jesus had compassion on him (God’s love is what gives birth to his compassion), He delivered him from demonic oppression. When the man was healed and came to his senses. He felt a mixed emotion of love, gratitude to Jesus. He didn’t want to stay in that area, he wanted to follow Jesus everywhere. He was now drawn and attached to Jesus. He wanted to pursue a deeper, daily relationship with Jesus……(Maybe he was also afraid of staying in that area because of the demons…. but we don’t know)
Some of us are like this man, messed up by satan or in the process of being messed up by satan but Jesus intervened and redirected our lives in the right direction. Some of us would have ended up badly, perhaps our lives would have been nothing to write about but then someone introduced us to Jesus and our lives changed.
However the amazing part of the story was that Jesus did not allow the man to follow him. Instead Jesus told him that one of the ways you can show your love and gratitude is to go about telling everyone else what I have done for you.
Every pursuer of God becomes a natural evangelist and this is born not out of a formal instruction to preach but because you love God, you just want to talk to other about the things he has done for you. Our love is what drives us to tell others about him. As we go out again today, for the remaining part of this week and month, it will be great to tell someone about how good Jesus has been to you.
Nuggets:
Every pursuer of God is a lover of God, Every lover of God can’t stop talking about him
Our memory verse for June 2018
Psalm 42: 1
1 As the deer panteth after the water, so my soul pants after you O God.
Let’s take a few moment to learn our memory verse for this month by heart. It can be memorised in 2 lines:
Line 1: As the deer panteth after the water
Line 2: so my soul pants after you O God.
Once you say it a few times it will stick.
Prayer focus: Our next level prayers:
Lord help me to genuinely love you.
On the word: Recommended book
The Bible Study Methods – Rick Warren
