Day 29

Wednesday, April 2nd

But Jesus said, “go home to your family, and tell them everything the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been.”

(Mark 5:19 NLT)

Jesus’ healing of the demon possessed man is one of the most fascinating stories in the New Testament. This man lived alone in a cemetery far outside the nearest town because he was a danger to himself and others and no one could restrain him. The Bible says, “Night and day among the tombs and in the hills he would cry out and cut himself with stones.” (Mark 5:5) It is an understatement to say that he lived a miserable and tortured existence. 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the lake, thousands of people had come to hear Jesus speak, but unexpectedly, Jesus told His disciples that they should leave the crowds behind and go across the lake. As they pulled the boat ashore on the other side, the Bible said the tormented man saw Jesus from far away and ran to meet Him and bowed low before Him. The demons (for there were many inside this man) knew who Jesus was and they knew their days were numbered. The demons begged Jesus to send them into a herd of pigs who were grazing nearby instead of to “some distant place” (I kid you not, read the story if you don’t believe me.) But it gets even stranger. Jesus complies and sends the demons out of this man and into the pigs who begin to run and plummet over a cliff into the waters below. The herdsmen were terrified, the owner of the pigs was furious, and everyone who lived in the region begged Jesus to go away, back to wherever He had come from. He was a disturber of the peace. 

Jesus was having great success on the other side of the lake with the crowds of eager listeners. In the eyes of everyone present, this particular day in the life of Jesus was a dismal failure.

Everyone that is, except the man who sat quietly beside Jesus, warming his hands at the fire. Against all hope, his years of torment were over. 

Imagine the reunion when that man returned home to his family, healed and whole. No longer the shell of their loved one, lost to them for so long. Imagine their faces as he tells them “everything the Lord has done.” Imagine their tears as they ponder “how merciful He has been.”

Jesus left the success and the happy crowds behind him to row across that lake because, from far away, he heard one man’s cry. It was a very Jesus thing to do. He’s the one who leave behind the 99 to go after the one lost in the wilderness. He’s also the one who invites you to come to him today.

May we be reminded today that no matter how lost we think we are, Jesus will answer our cries for help. And may we also be reminded today to listen for the cries of others. May we take the grace and mercy of Jesus, so freely offered to us, and offer it to the people in our lives.