What have you to do with us, Son of God?
The demoniacs, surprisingly, didn't seem worried about the possibility of making others aware of the identity of Jesus. We might assume that such a proclamation would be a positive for Jesus, and that it would help others to recognize his identity, and submit to his Lordship, which could only a detriment to the forces of darkness. But it seems that there are times and circumstances where the mere act of stating the identity of Jesus is unhelpful. The motivation for what is said seems to matter. The testimony of demoniacs would never provide adequate basis for genuine belief in Jesus. It would always admit to doubt and the possibility of deception. They acted like the fact that Jesus being the Son of God was something that was already known and understood, as an attempt to deflate it of its transformative power. This is similar to the way that so many people seem assume they know enough about Jesus to dismiss him out of hand without ever really inquiring about him. It was as if the demons said 'Even we know it, so it isn't a big deal. We can say it without fear. It has no power to change the world'. If that was their intent, however, they were quite wrong. They were unable to maintain their charade of fearlessness, saying "Have you come here to torment us before the appointed time?". Their use of his identity as an attempt to control him proved to be useless. They already realized it even before anything happened. Just the presence of Jesus made them recognize that their time had come. The oppression of the people they possessed, the violence they made them perpetrate, all of it was going to end, could not possibly be allowed to continue now that Jesus had arrived.
"If you drive us out, send us into the herd of swine."
In the presence of the Son of God demons become desperate. They know that their time is limited so they do whatever they can to inflict whatever damage they can. This is the way it often is with darkness. Even if it is little more than a meaningless gesture, people will still attempt it as a way to get in one final strike, or to retaliate in whatever way they can manage. Why did Jesus permit the demons to cause any damage at all, even if it was collateral damage? Perhaps he wanted to draw out a lesson about how the people of the area seemed to care more about their economy than about the oppressed individuals who had now been set free.
Thereupon the whole town came out to meet Jesus,
and when they saw him they begged him to leave their district.
Perhaps these demons had grown so powerful based on the collusion of the population of the town that allowed them to flourish. The freedom Jesus brings can be frightening since it undermines all such systemic injustice. People, it is true, relied on those swine for their livelihood. But if those swine symbolically represented things that were able to flourish through the presence of the demonic oppression of others then they were not finally something Jesus would leave intact. The evidence that the people did in fact have skewed priorities was that they seemed to prefer things the way they were before Jesus came. They didn't want him setting people free if it also meant that they would need to find new sources of economic vitality. His freedom was ultimately too inconvenient for them to countenance.
Some people saw the miracles of Jesus and begged him to leave because holy fear made them recognize their own sinfulness (see Luke 5:8). But some people saw them and begged him to leave because he might further upset their status quo. Jesus was seldom predictable in any way. But one thing that was predictable was the way he disregarded and often upended that status quo, which was (and is) a sacred cow of society.
Are there areas in our world where we refuse to invite Jesus to come because we are intimidated by what the results might be? Are there conveniences, economic or otherwise, to which we are more attached than Jesus, and the freedom he desires to bring? Well, perhaps we need him to cast these things out, like a herd of swine toward the sea.
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