Oculi – Sunday 3 March A✠D 2024
✠ Psalmody: Psalm 25:15-16;25:1-2, 17-18, 20;9:19, 3;123:1-3
✠ Lection: Exodus 8:16-24;Ephesians 5:1-9;St. Luke 11:14-28
In the Name of the Father and of the ✠ Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Mine eyes are ever toward the LORD; Look upon mine affliction and my pain; And forgive all my sins. We beseech You, almighty God, to look upon the hearty desires of Your humble servants; Unto thee lift I up mine eyes, O thou that dwellest in the heavens. Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their masters, And as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress; So our eyes wait upon the LORD our God, Until that he have mercy upon us. Oculi; the Latin word for eyes. Not only have our ears heard much about eyes, and their blessed sense of beholding and looking, not only is seeing found in the name given to this third Sunday in Lent, not only is it in our psalmody, not only is it in our collect, but it is also in the Gospel scenario where Jesus casts out a demon, and thus it is in our Christian life. Sight is important. It is good to value it, to thank God for it, for having it is a gift. Though not mentioned by St. Luke, sight is in this account of the demoniac, because when read together with St. Matthew, we learn that Jesus was casting out a demon from a man was mute, and deaf, and blind. In a word, he was someone greatly oppressed by the demonic. We all suffer various trials, yet imagine the true level of this poor man: mute, deaf, blind, and indwelled by a demon. It wasn’t, it isn’t, those who are healthy to whom Jesus comes, but to ones suffering just like this, which gives us confidence that He desires to aid us in all our suffering, too. Take heart. Jesus comes.
Just as unbelievers need not to believe in God for Him to still be real and their judgement by Him imminent, likewise even we as Christians need not to believe in demon possession for it to still be real. Very few of us have encountered demon possession similar to this, at least none that we’re aware of, but that is only because we live in an environment where seven other spirits more wicked than an original one cast out have come back. In a place once swept and put in order dwelt a people that held common values and morals, mostly godly ones, and now the collective is seen to be corrupt beyond levels of Sodom and Gomorrah. What was once gained generations ago by an unclean spirit being driven out of a land of darkness has now been forfeited seven-fold to those more wicked than the first. Does the blame lie upon demons or upon people? Yes. Both contribute because both are corrupt to the core, so much so that our debased ways of today don’t necessitate the fantastical tactic of common demon-possession as Jesus encountered and as many still encounter to this day in distant lands. The wicked ones of darkness in unseen places have returned to us with a different gameplan and the state is worse than the first.
By God’s grace, we see and are warned by three aspects in which people are possessed by demons. The first is front and center in the Gospel text. An unclean, wicked spirit, with the same ill-intent as Satan, the prince of demons, is being cast out by the stronger Man; the much, much, much stronger God-Man. The poor mute, deaf, and blind man was under direct attack by this demon taking up residence in him, further reducing even the basics of life: speaking, hearing, seeing. No gift of life, either temporal or eternal, are your foes content with you possessing. How ever they may take such things from you so that you grow distant from your Creator, and are tempted to curse Him for such, the more evilly gleeful they become. Such direct demon possession destroys that life, no doubt, but also the other lives that the Lord gives for it to interact with. The power of Christ is needed to restore order to such, and in mercy He does so for this poor man.
Jesus’ display of authority, evidence and actions that summon hearts to trust in Him Who wields it, produce unsurprising results among us sinners. Out of three groups, only one marveled. The Word revealing Himself had an effect in which they see Him in a good light. The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the LORD’s doing; it is marvelous in our eyes. Pious and true Christians marvel at the Lord’s doing; at His miracles, at His authority, at His mercy and forgiveness. Others discount Christ, whether in part or whole, it matters not, for any rejection of Christ is a full rejection. Some reject by blaspheming Him, saying that it cannot be true that He is Who He says He is and that He does these works by His Father of Whom He says He does. And others treat Him as Herod eventually does at our Lord’s trial, testing Him, seeking a sign from heaven for sport and more entertainment, obviously desiring a different one than what He just did. None will be given to them but the sign of Jonah and it will be for judgment upon their unrepentant hearts.
Demon possession may also come through the aspect of our voluntary submission to the ways of wickedness. This is the more common aspect in America, meaning that direct demon possession hasn’t been needed since we have grown so enamored with the ease of life. In our relaxed, apathetic, entertained state, we are easily fed much bull and we gladly gobble it up because, well, we feel good when we do, and isn’t feeling good our highest goal? In being so spiritually lazy, a demon needs not to dwell directly within us, because life is already being lived without Christ as Master. Rejection of God, rejection of His Christ is what the demons do, therefore one may say that any and all rejection of Him is demonic. Jesus says, “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.” We are with Him in the way that He commands, ordains, blesses, and flourishes, not by our wants and ways. When we are with Him more and more, our wants and ways become the same as His are, and this is good. We gather with Him the way that He gathers us as our Shepherd, not by our wandering as if it matters not whether we seek to remain in His pasture under His watchful eye. We all worship something. There is not a person who doesn’t. We all follow and are devoted to a master. Whoever that master is, we become like him or it. If it isn’t Christ, then it’s only of another nature. If we fear, love, and trust in things that have no life, be it the liquor bottle, refrigerator, bank account, the digitally reproduced voices on the talking box, or the icons on the screens to which we devote so much of ourselves, then we’re not fearing, loving, and trusting in Jesus above all things. When we submit ourselves to things that are not, cannot be God, then we become like the mute, deaf, and blind idols that we exalt above Christ. What do the Scriptures say that we become like in this voluntary submission, handing ourselves over to the be kept, to be possessed, to be led, to be enamored, to be entertained by demons? The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but they do not speak; eyes they have, but they do not see; they have ears, but they do not hear; nor is there any breath in their mouths. Those who make them are like them; so is everyone who trusts in them. (Psalm 135:15-18) We become lifeless. To blaspheme, to discount, to despise Christ to any degree is turn to the demonic, to turn to idols by which we become like the demon possessed man, deprived of true, good, real life: instead, mute, deaf, and blind, worst of all to spiritual things. There isn’t zero risk in being spiritually lazy, because when we are, it is a voluntary submission to the ways of demons.
If the risk of indwelling demon possession or giving oneself over to darkness weren’t enough to awaken us out of any spiritual apathy, then we must consider the third aspect of demon possession, the very one into which we were all born. The mute, deaf, and blind demoniac represents all the children of Adam, who through the flesh are possessed of Satan in original sin, so that they must be his slaves and do according to his will. We are born blind, not seeing God, but despising Him. We are born deaf, not hearing God’s Word, nor even desiring to, thus not being obedient or submissive to it. We are born mute not speaking the praises of the Lord or giving Him thanks, yet are all too talkative about the meaningless idols of the world that truly give nothing, but take much from us.
These are the conditions that needed and daily need Christ. You need the Stronger Man Who can overcome all demons and their prince and stretch forth the right hand of His mercy to be your defense against all your enemies, including your own flesh. No one but God can overcome the devil, showing that no one among us can boast of being able of himself to drive out either sin or the devil. Your dear Lord Jesus by His grace desires and wills you to see; not merely to receive light rays into your eyes so that your brain may interpret them into images that your mind can comprehend, but for you to be led in body, soul, and mind out of spiritual blindness to behold your Deliverer in the beauty of His holiness as your Stronger Man. He overcomes all evil for you and unstops your ears so that they may gladly hear and learn more of Him. He looses your tongue freeing it from the tyranny of sin and of speaking evil, instead filling it with praises for the One Who has set you free from all demons, from Satan, from sin, and from death itself. At His great love and mercy for us, let us ever marvel at Him.
In ✠ Jesus’ Name. Amen.
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