Transcription

Connor
Hey, you’re listening to The Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk about the Bible in fun and practical ways.

Jeff
Welcome back to another amazing episode of The Bible Guys. He’s Chris and I’m Jeff and we’re thrilled that you decided to join us today.

Chris
Are thrilled.

Jeff
Yes. So we have a very special segment to kick things off today. Yes, I think every one of our segments has been very special this week, hasn’t it? Very special. Is that how I’ve introduced every one of them?

Chris
You want to introduce them as special?

Jeff
Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Chris
That’s exciting because you’re special, Jeff.

Jeff
So I’m not sure you meant it the way you said it.

Chris
Hey, see, that’s just projection right there. Okay. Yeah. This segment is called this or that. Which one would you rather do? Okay. And we’ve not read these that I don’t know I, you know I like that more than this. Yeah.

Jeff
Yeah I didn’t read it.

Chris
I didn’t read it either. So we’re reading them on the spot. And the goal is to immediately, instinctively say which one we’d rather do. Okay okay, okay. Number one, would you rather be best friends with a famous musician or a famous athlete?

Jeff
I’m not really looking for any more friends.

Chris
Oh my goodness gracious.

Jeff
A famous athlete. Yeah.

Chris
Me too. Famous athlete. Yeah. Okay. Although musician or artist. Because a singer. Oh, I can, I can go, I can go singer. Yeah. Actually, you know what I’m going to say? Musician. Yeah, I’m going to change my answer on the spot. What one Carrie Underwood.

Jeff
Really? Sure.

Chris
Yeah, yeah. She’s awesome.

Jeff
Yeah. That’s awesome.

Chris
All right. Number two. You like country.

Jeff
Music? Oh, country music I love it.

Chris
I love country music. Love it. Number two. Would you have a hat?

Jeff
I have a cowboy hat. Sure I do. And boots. Yes. Do you go boot scootin. No, no. Okay.

Chris
But I haven’t worn it since I moved here from Georgia. Okay.

Jeff
Just checking.

Chris
Would you rather be able to breathe under water or for an unlimited amount of time? Oh, excuse me? For an unlimited amount of time or walk through fire without getting burnt?

Jeff
Uh, underwater? Yeah.

Chris
Because the other one doesn’t seem like it has too many applications.

Jeff
I can’t figure out what I would.

Chris
Use unless you. Unless you want to go rescue people. Rescue people? Yeah. And then all of a sudden, you join the fire department.

Jeff
Yeah, but I’ve already got a job.

Chris
Yeah? Yeah.

Jeff
Underwater. Underwater. Sounds fun. Great. Yeah.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah.

Chris
Number three. Would you rather be the last person on Earth or the first person on Mars? You’re stuck on the planet. You choose.

Jeff
Oh, that’s a hard one.

Chris
That’s an awful question, actually. Yeah, it’s just an awful. Whoever thought of that is really Desiree.

Jeff
Me Desiree’s fault.

Chris
You’re mean. Desiree.

Jeff
Okay. Um. Boy, I don’t know. That’s a hard one. Uh, first person on Mars.

Chris
Oh.

Jeff
Not me. I’m all about beginnings.

Chris
Have you ever seen Matthew Damon when he was on Mars?

Jeff
Do you want to be the last person on Earth?

Chris
It’s an Earth with oxygen. Yeah. So for that alone. Yes.

Jeff
Yeah.

Chris
Okay. We don’t know if it’s even possible to grow potatoes on Mars.

Jeff
It would be kind of fun. You just go running through the malls, playing with all the toys.

Chris
And I’m not a botanist like he was in the movie.

Jeff
Yeah. Okay.

Chris
Yeah, I.

Jeff
Don’t know, man.

Chris
Number four, would you rather encounter aliens or would you rather encounter dinosaurs?

Jeff
Dinosaurs?

Chris
Oh not me. Yeah, aliens.

Jeff
Well, we don’t know if the aliens are going to be friendly.

Chris
I know, but we already know dinosaurs are going to kill. You know.

Jeff
The huge majority of dinosaurs weren’t meat eaters.

Chris
How do you know you weren’t here, huh?

Jeff
Because I read about dinosaurs. Yeah, yeah, most of them were not meat eaters. Yeah, it didn’t say that. You have to run into T-rexes all day, every day.

Chris
I’ve seen Jurassic Park.

Jeff
Yeah, it doesn’t work out well.

Chris
And I know it doesn’t work out in the end. Okay.

Jeff
So. Okay.

Chris
And then number five, would you rather be stuck in a phone box with ten snakes or ten tarantulas? Again, very mean question.

Jeff
Well, what kind of.

Chris
Snakes and what kind of tarantulas? Are all tarantulas poisonous?

Jeff
Yes, I think so.

Chris
Well then then you have.

Jeff
But they’re not deadly. Tarantulas aren’t deadly. They just hurt.

Chris
Oh, well, then tarantulas has to be the. Yeah, but.

Jeff
If they’re not poisonous snakes, then it.

Chris
Doesn’t matter. Okay, I’m going to go on a limb and say tarantulas because I can kill them easily.

Jeff
Squish squish squish. Yeah.

Jeff
Okay.

Chris
Punch. Just punch the tarantulas.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah.

Chris
And squish them.

Jeff
I don’t think either one of these bother me, so it doesn’t matter to me. Stop it. Tarantulas. Stop it. One time. One time.

Chris
This is a true listen. Listen for real. There’s one thing of saying, look at me. I’m a big, bad world traveler. And there’s another thing with truly meaning what you say.

Jeff
Yeah, I mean that I’m not afraid of either one. Have you ever held tarantulas in your hand?

Chris
I have not.

Jeff
So? So one time we were camping and I didn’t know this, but tarantulas migrate. Yeah. And and we were in Big Bend National Park down in southern Texas. And we were. It was during the migration. I woke up in the middle of the night and we had about 300 tarantulas had got underneath our rainfly on the ceiling of our tent. You can just see them crawling around, and they were just like carpet out on the roads and everywhere. We were at just millions of tarantulas moving through the. Moving through the desert.

Chris
I just had a heart attack and died. And now this is my spirit because I’m dead on the ground.

Jeff
Couple couple weeks ago, my my daughter and I were in Togo and Benin in Ouidah. Benin is and this is interesting we’re talking about because we’re talking about the demon possessed guy today. But that’s the the kind of the headquarters of voodoo worldwide. And there’s a Python temple there, and the temple is full of pythons. And once a month they open it and let all the pythons go, and they go feed in the village. And then if you find a python in your home, they believe you’re blessed. And then you bring the python back to, oh.

Chris
Yeah, I’m so.

Jeff
Blessed. It’s like it’s like Indiana Jones. Just tons and tons of pythons in this temple that we went to.

Chris
Yeah, that’s that’s just. Yeah. It’s crazy. Yeah. So I don’t like snakes or tarantulas. When I was in Haiti, I went down a big, long, narrow hallway to the last shower stall and one of our dorms, and I took a shower and it’s just, you know, it’s all back, you know, it’s just like a big block, you know, it’s just all cinder block, right? And then this very, very, very narrow hallway to get back to my bed. And I came out of the shower and there was a tarantula on the ground, and I’m talking like the entire hallway was maybe three feet, like. And so I had to literally step over. And I had read that they can leap up to like 12ft.

Jeff
Yeah, they can jump.

Chris
And so I didn’t know what to do. And so I was yelling. And then I realized nobody was in the dorm room except nobody cared. Nobody cared. Yeah. So I was stuck. I was stuck there like, you know, with only a towel and just and bare feet, by the way, you know, I didn’t even have flip flops, and I was just holding this towel. And eventually what I ended up doing was I just sort of held the towel up like a wall and snuck past and snuck past it. And I was so scared. I was just petrified.

Jeff
It was scared too.

Chris
Yeah, well, I’ll tell you what. Yuck. It was terrible.

Jeff
It was. It was terrifying. Most of the time, tarantulas are they’re pretty passive. They’re not aggressive critters. So.

Jeff
Yeah, I don’t need to worry about it.

Chris
All right, well.

Jeff
Well.

Chris
Let us move on.

Jeff
You survived.

Chris
Yes, I did survive.

Jeff
I’m so glad. We are so glad you lived through that.

Chris
Yeah.

Chris
Terrible moment. God delivered.

Jeff
Me. He delivered.

Jeff
You.

Chris
Hey, before we move on with our Bible reading stuff, I just want to say, if you’re watching on YouTube, share it with somebody. Share the Bible. Guys. In fact, take just a second and say, you know what? I’m going to pick? Even the people that I don’t like, I’m going to go ahead and send it to them because they need the Bible guys, just like we all do. So we would really appreciate it. Subscribe and leave us a message. We’d love it. Thanks so much.

Jeff
So hey, we are talking about today one of the most amazing spiritual warfare encounters Jesus has in in the Gospels. And this comes up in three in Matthew, Mark and Luke. Right. Is that the three? Yep. In the three Gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, they tell the story of what we would call. Some people would say he’s the maniac of Gadira is what some people would say. He’s the demon possessed man of the Gadarenes. Right. And just the description of how totally overtaken by the devil this guy is is really amazing. So listen closely. Here’s what it says in Matthew chapter eight verse 28. It says, when Jesus arrived on the other side of the lake in the region of the Gadarenes, two men who were possessed by demons met him, and they lived in a cemetery and were so violent that no one could go through that area. They began screaming at him, why are you interfering with us, son of God, have you come here to torture us? Before God’s appointed time, there happened to be a large herd of pigs feeding in the distance. So the demons begged if you cast us out, send us into that herd of pigs. All right. Go! Jesus commanded them. And so the demons came out of the men and entered the pigs, and the whole herd plunged down the steep hillside into the lake and drowned in the water. And the herdsmen fled to the nearby town, telling everyone what had happened to the demon possessed men. Then the entire town came out to meet Jesus, but they begged him to go away and leave them alone. Mark chapter five says, so they arrived at the other side of the lake in the region of the Gerasenes when Jesus climbed out of the boat, a man possessed by an evil spirit came out from a cemetery to meet him. Jeff
This man lived among the burial caves and could no longer be restrained, even with a chain. Whenever he was put into chains and shackles, as he often was, he snapped the chains from his wrists and smashed the shackles. No one was strong enough to subdue him. Day and night he wandered among the burial caves and in the hills, howling and cutting himself with sharp stones. When Jesus was still some distance away, the man saw him and ran to meet him, and bowed low before him. With a shriek. He screamed, why are you interfering with me? Jesus, son of the Most High God! In the name of God, I beg you, don’t torture me. For Jesus had already said to the spirit, come out of the man, you evil spirit! And then Jesus demanded, what is your name? And he replied, my name is Legion, because there are many of us inside this man. Then the evil spirits begged him again and again not to send them to some distant place. There happened to be a large herd of pigs feeding on the hillside nearby. Send us into those pigs, the spirits begged. Let us enter them. So Jesus gave them permission. The evil spirits came out of the man and entered the pigs, and the entire herd of about 2000 pigs plunged down the steep hillside into the lake and drowned in the water. The herdsmen fled to the nearby town surrounding countryside, spreading the news as they ran, people rushed out to see what had happened. A crowd soon gathered around Jesus, and they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons, and he was sitting there fully clothed and perfectly sane, and they were all afraid. Then those who had seen what had happened told the others about the demon possessed man and the pigs, and the crowd began pleading with Jesus to go away and leave them alone. Jeff
As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who’d been demon possessed begged to go with him. But Jesus said, no, go home to your family and tell them everything the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been. So the man started off to visit the ten towns of that region, began to proclaim the great things Jesus had done for him, and everyone was amazed at what he told them. And then Luke chapter eight, it says, so they arrived in the region of the Gerasenes across the lake from Galilee. As Jesus was climbing out of the boat, a man who was possessed by demons came out to meet him. For a long time, he’d been homeless and naked, living in a cemetery outside the town. As soon as he saw Jesus, he shrieked and fell down in front of him and the man. Then he screamed, why are you interfering with me? Jesus, son of the Most High God, please, I beg you, don’t torture me. For Jesus had already commanded the evil spirit to come out of him. The spirit had often taken control of the man, even when he was placed under guard and put in chains and shackles, he simply broke them and rushed out into the wilderness completely under the demons power. Jesus demanded, what is your name? Legion? He replied, for he was filled with many demons. The demons kept begging Jesus not to send them into the bottomless pit. There happened to be a large herd of pigs feeding on the hillside nearby, and the demons begged him to let them enter into the pigs, and so Jesus gave them permission. Then the demons came out of the man and entered the pigs, and the entire herd plunged down the steep hillside into the lake and drown. Jeff
When the herdsmen saw it, they fled to the nearby town and the surrounding countryside, spreading news as they ran, people rushed out to see what had happened. A crowd soon gathered around Jesus, and they saw the man who had been freed from the demons, and he was sitting at Jesus feet, fully clothed and perfectly sane, and they were all afraid. And then those who had seen what had happened told others how the demon possessed man had been healed, and all the people in the region of the gerasenes begged Jesus to go away and leave them alone, for a great wave of fear swept over them. So Jesus returned to the boat and left, crossing back to the other side of the lake, the man who had been freed from the demons begged to go with him, but Jesus sent him home, saying, no, go back to your family and tell them everything God has. Done for you. And so we went all through the town proclaiming the great things Jesus had done for him.

Chris
Whew! I’m glad you were reading. I like the fact that you read because you read so well. Oh. Thank you. And you got a really nice voice.

Jeff
Oh. Thank you.

Chris
Yeah, but that’s a lot of reading. There’s a lot. And that’s that’s all three accounts. And the biggest difference between the three accounts is that the first one in Matthew chapter eight says there are two men. Yeah. And then the other passages say there was one man. Right. So obviously there were two. And and then obviously there was one of them stood out among the other ones, probably. It’s sort of how I read it. Yeah. Right. Because the other ones focus on the actual man himself. They give very great detail about the one man breaking the chains, smashing the shackles, you know, going to the ten towns afterwards. Right. And so obviously there were two men in this one account, but one of them was, I think, probably more prominent since the other disciples talked about just that one.

Jeff
Yeah. It seems like.

Jeff
The one guy does all the talking, and then there’s only one who, when when he’s been healed, says, Jesus, I want to go with you.

Chris
Yeah, right.

Jeff
So these aren’t two differing things, and these aren’t even a problem. Two guys, one talker. Yeah, that’s.

Jeff
Kind of what.

Chris
It did say. They were both screaming at him. Yeah, it says so. So at least they. But I think the main interaction it seems like was the one.

Jeff
It’s on the back end when he says on the.

Chris
Back end I want to.

Jeff
Go with you. And Jesus said, no, you stay.

Chris
Yeah. But the first one says they both screamed at him, saying, why are you interfering with us? And you know, what’s interesting is that it says there were many demons in him and it was legion. And you know what Legion means? Legion means a thousand soldiers, right? Right. Or at least that’s that’s the word that.

Jeff
That’d be the Roman.

Chris
That’d be the Roman definition. Right. And so it gives us an idea of, you know, if demons leave a possessed man and go into 2000 pigs, are you kidding me? 2000 pigs. How many demons were in this guy? Yeah. Yeah. Right. Or in the two? Two men. Right. It’s just unbelievable. And, um. And so anyway, the whole idea of demon possession. Now, you travel a lot around the world. And I thought that I’ve been I’ve been to like, 13 or 14 places around the world, you know, like Brazil and India and Kenya and South Africa. And I’ve been to, you know, Haiti and I’ve been to all those places. But it’s not even compare. It doesn’t even compare to the places that you’ve traveled. So but often times when you travel, you hear a lot more about demon possession. Yeah. Outside of the United States. Yeah, I.

Jeff
Think I think demon possession is exists everywhere. Right. But I think it’s more overt in the countries that overtly worship demons. You know, like Haiti overtly, openly worships demons through voodoo. A lot of places in West Africa, depending on what version of Hinduism. There’s a lot of places in India, in the other Hindu nations that that worship demons, and they know that. Right? And they’re admitting that or animism in East Africa or in Central America and Southeast Asia, where they know that they’re messing around with demons. And so then because of that, it winds up being way more overt. But yeah, I’ve seen seen it before. And it’s a pretty, pretty amazing thing.

Chris
I’ve never seen it. Yeah. I’ve never I’ve never been to a scenario in person where somebody has been demon possessed.

Jeff
Yeah. So in the context of the Timothy Initiative, that’s that’s why I do a lot of travel is I work with Timothy Initiative developing and training church planters and leaders around the world. And it’s a common thing for many of those pastors to say, oh, this happens all the time, right? Right. Can you imagine if that was a big part of our Sunday morning services? Yeah, right. But for for them, they say it happens often and they’re prepared for it. And you have to be be ready for it.

Chris
Well imagine how they would receive this scripture.

Jeff
Yeah. Yeah. They see it as that’s normal. That’s yeah that’s.

Jeff
Tuesday that’s.

Chris
Tuesday right. Yeah. Yeah. That’s it’s just very different for us. And I would, I would guess that anybody who’s listening in the United States of America, I would say the vast majority probably said I’ve never seen that.

Jeff
Yeah. I think.

Jeff
We don’t recognize it when we see.

Chris
It. Yeah, that’s probably true. Right.

Jeff
Right. So we would say, oh it’s the drugs or oh, it’s the, you know, a health issue or whatever. And not always that they think that’s true. I think it can it can often be a demonic kind of an issue happening. So I don’t believe that every illness is demonic. I’m not saying that. Right. But I do believe that maybe we see it more often than we recognize it.

Chris
I remember one time my old church administrative assistant, the secretary one time I was setting up a sound system in the fellowship hall, and it started squeaking. And I couldn’t figure out how to how to what the knobs. And she came out and prayed the demons out of it. But the only difference is she was absolutely 100% serious. 100%. She. I’m praying demons and I’m like, I’m Sherry. I’m pretty sure there’s no demons in the sound system. Like I’m pretty positive, right?

Jeff
Right, right.

Chris
But it was pretty funny.

Jeff
So, you know, it’s really astounding to me that especially in the other two, Mark and Luke, this this guy is engaging with Jesus. And I kind of I kind of view this. Okay. There’s two guys here at the beginning in Matthew, but there’s this one guy that seems to really, really be engaging. The two are saying, go away from us. Yeah, don’t persecute us. But there’s the one that seems to be. It’s almost like Jesus on the cross with the two thieves. They’re both engaging with Jesus, but one really seems to be transformed.

Chris
And I think.

Chris
Jesus only addressed one because he said, what is your name? Right?

Jeff
Right. Yeah, yeah.

Jeff
And so it seems like this one guy is really open to it, right? And is really open to this engagement with Jesus. But you think about it. Here’s these guys are running around. If you combine all three stories, they’re running around naked, living in the tombs, living among the.

Jeff
Dead and howling.

Jeff
And howling at the moon.

Chris
And cutting themselves.

Jeff
And, yeah, cutting themselves, hurting themselves, breaking their chains. Nobody can can manage them or they’re totally out of their minds, totally out of control, with almost supernatural power, doing physical damage to themselves. Yeah, right. You want do you want to know what is demonic in the world around us? When people are out of control, howling at the moon, living among the dead, hurting themselves uncontrollably, right. That’s. That’s a sign, perhaps that there’s a that there’s some kind of demonic influence. And then they have this encounter with Jesus and they immediately recognize him. Think about this. These demons called Jesus, the son of the Most High God.

Chris
Yeah, they immediately knew so.

Jeff
So believing who Jesus is isn’t enough.

Chris
James says even the demons believe in tremble.

Jeff
Yeah, yeah.

Jeff
But just believing isn’t isn’t the threshold, right? A lot of people say, oh, I believe in God. Well, so do the so does the devil these demons do. There’s a couple thousand demons here and they recognize who Jesus is. So I think it’s interesting. We’re my. My name is Legion. That’s a thousand. But there were 2000 pigs that get destroyed. That hints back at the two men. Yeah, two men had a thousand demons apiece.

Chris
Right? Actually, I thought it was a thousand. But the the note in the Life Application Study Bible says the evil spirits name was Legion. A legion was the largest unit of a Roman army consisting of 3000 to 6000 soldiers. Wow. This man was possessed by many demons.

Jeff
Okay. Wow wow wow.

Chris
Wow. Yeah. So it’s more than I thought. So it’s.

Chris
Even more. I thought it was a thousand.

Jeff
Yeah, I thought it was two. Wow. Well, that’s the benefit of having a study Bible.

Chris
That’s right.

Jeff
When we got a couple of guys just sitting around talking about the Bible.

Chris
Yeah, well, I’ll tell you what. I think that this is a, you know, so the significance of pigs, there’s a so the Jews thought and considered still today they consider pigs as unclean animals. Right. So when the pigs drowned in this lake, can you imagine? For us, it would just be a tragedy of a great waste of bacon.

Jeff
Right? Exactly right.

Chris
But, you know, unless you retrieve them all up there. But, but but for them, can you just imagine the just the view of, of, you know, just the attitude, you know, all these unclean animals running down the cliff and and the significance of that? I’m not sure if there’s a sermon in there, but I just I just know that for them, it was more significant that they were pigs.

Jeff
Yeah.

Jeff
So these guys so this is on the other side of the lake, this is on the side that was not the Jewish side of the lake. So the Jewish side of the lake is over on what is now modern day Tiberius side of the lake. Right.

Chris
Yeah. Yeah.

Jeff
So right here. Yeah.

Jeff
Um, yeah, I’ll get to that part. But these guys were already unclean in a lot of ways. One, they weren’t Jewish. Two, they were living in caves that were, you know, burial chambers. They were around the dead all the time. They had all these things in their life where they they were unclean. And the Jews would have considered them repulsive from the beginning. And then they were demon possessed. So the Jews would have considered them repulsive. From the beginning. Jesus seems to just go over to the other side of the lake for this purpose. He goes for these two guys, which is really special. Nobody else would touch them. And Jesus gets on a boat, goes to where his ministry is not centered, his ministry centered on the other side of the lake. And he goes over there for this one event, for these two guys that nobody else cared about. Even the people from the village wanted Jesus to leave after he healed them. Get out of here, dude. Right. And so they were unclean from start to finish and nobody cared about him. And Jesus goes, hey guys, let’s get in a boat. We got to we got a mission over there. And he just encounters these guys and delivers them whatever you’re going through, as unclean as you feel as. Is ignored and is marginalized as you feel Jesus cares and Jesus wants to interact with you and then to go on, then the rest of the unclean story, they’re demon possessed. They’re living among the tombs, all these things. Then it says here in the note, according to the Old Testament law, pigs were unclean animals, and this meant that they could not be eaten or even touched by a Jew. Jeff
This incident took place southeast of the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Gerasenes, a Gentile region, a Gentile region which explains how a herd of pigs could be involved because the Jews wouldn’t keep pigs.

Jeff
Right, right, right.

Jeff
So it’s only the Gentiles.

Chris
Well, that’s a lot of insight for this passage, and that’s all the time we have. So that’s a great place to end. That’s great. So God cares. God cares for us regardless of you. Feel like nobody cares, right? So okay, we will see you next time on The Bible Guys.