Monday, June 29
Read: Luke 8
Luke 8 begins with the very familiar passage of the parable of the sower. You have probably heard this passage in reference to evangelism, but Luke’s intention of writing about this parable is the importance of following the word of God. Jesus clearly tells us that the seed is the word of God and what grows is the kingdom of God. Often you may hear that the parable is about how we are to sow the seeds, but for this scripture in Luke, that is not the case. The sower is God himself planting his word. He has already scattered the seeds of the kingdom. We are called to be the good soil, the soil of those who are noble and good in heart, ones who hear the word of God and retain it (8:15). By allowing God’s word to enter in us and to maintaining it, we are allowing the Kingdom of God to grow through us.
Luke tells us that by heeding to the word of God, the crop of the kingdom is a hundred times more than what was sown (8:8). That’s huge! No one can just pass by and ignore the sight of these crops. God wants his kingdom to eminently shine through us so that others who see may realize the awe and wonder of the kingdom, that there is something special about this kingdom, that God’s kingdom is not of this world. And isn’t it amazing that God chooses us, our hearts, to be the soil in which his kingdom grows on!
But listening to the word of God is not enough to allow the kingdom to “shine” through us. When the Bible was originally written, there was no chapters, verses, or subheadings for the segments. These were later added in. So it is by no coincidence that Jesus talks about the lamp stand directly after the parable of the sower. In fact, they are part of the same teaching. The word of God is what lights the lamp and it is the kingdom that shines through the lamp. Yet how we respond to God’s word directly affects the visibility of how the kingdom shines. Jesus, and Luke, are undeniably placing a major importance on God’s teachings and our responsibility to act on them for the kingdom of God.
Luke 8:26-37 shows one of the most whimsical and bizarre stories of Jesus. Can you imagine a herd of pigs marching down a steep bank, into a lake, and drowning themselves? Mark 5:13 even suggests that there may have been two thousand pigs that did this! This man from Gerasenes is possessed by multiple demons. The original word used for the demon, Legion, is the Greek form of the Latin word Legio. This Latin word was often used to describe an army that emphasized power and fierceness. So we have this powerful demon army that is not only defeated by Jesus, but they ask for mercy to be casted into the pigs. It is interesting that the demons asked to be casted into pigs since Jewish custom saw swine as un-clean (Leviticus 11:7-8). But even being in what was considered unclean creatures is much better than being thrown into the Abyss. The Abyss can be considered as hell, or a final judgment place for Satan and his demons (see Revelations 20:1-3). Jesus grants the wish of these demons, yet their destructive quality becomes more evident when there is a massive pig suicide! Although it has been mentioned before, let us not forget the overwhelming power and authority that Christ has over the enemy! What victory we have over the enemy through Jesus!
Process:
-Please just take some time and imagine two-thousand pig suicide drowning themselves, its kind of funny! (You can even draw a picture if you so desire).
-Here is the parable of the sower, we are given God as the sower who has already sowed the seed of the kingdom. That mean the kingdom of God is already among us! Yet this kingdom is set apart from this world. Has there been a time when you have recognized something that could not have been on the world? Some grand act of love in which Christ shines through? A presence of the Holy Spirit that invokes the miraculous? Something that you knew could only be of the Kingdom of God?
-Are your hearts prepared as the fertile soil in which the kingdom may grow on?