Jesus’ authority and miracles

   .It’s interesting to me how unpredictable and unexpected Jesus ways of doing this were. Here is a man who has large crowds that have gathered around him to hear him and to be healed by him. He has you could say a large church that has gathered. You would think the sensible thing to do, the behaviour of a wise pastor, would be to make the most of the opportunity and just keep teaching them for as long as possible. After all He has got their attention and interest and they have travelled to get to him, taken the trouble to come. 

But Jesus does something unexpected, he turns his back on his gathered congregation, in the middle of the revival and sails away across to the other side of the lake, the Sea of Galilee. And he goes to a region where there are not many Jews- and remember God’s calling to Jesus was to reach the Jews, not the Gentiles, but He turns his back on the Jews and He goes to a Gentile region. No-one would have expected him to do that. And then He helps just two people there, sets free two mentally ill men, before being basically forced to turn back and heading back the way he had come, across the Sea of Galilee again. 

The KPIs, the Key Performance Indicators for Jesus’ decision might not be met in that manoeuvre. Turning your back on a crowd and your obvious mission field, and sailing off and then helping just two men, seems not a good use of time and energy. 

Or maybe God’s ways of doing things are not quite ours, maybe for God it’s not all about numbers, size of crowds and bums on seats.

Now when people see Jesus is going to leave- two people want to follow him and make the sea journey with him. One of them is a Jewish religious teacher, a scribe, and he wants to go with Jesus. He says ‘Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.’

The man is interested in being a disciple, but Jesus’ reply is not what we so often do, which is minimise the cost of being a Christian a disciple of Jesus. Jesus is very upfront and tells the man it’s a demanding thing to be a disciple of his. He says; ‘Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.’

People normally have homes, even animals have homes, but Jesus has no permanent home, because he was always on the move. His base was the town of Capernaum and he seems to have stayed in Peter’s there, although that is not certain and also he stayed with Martha and Mary and Lazarus in the village of Bethany. Sofa surfing in a sense. 

The man if he is going to follow Jesus and be his disciple was going to have to give up home comforts and be willing to live a pretty insecure life. And it’s the same today, we might not be asked by Jesus to give up our homes, but there is a giving up of security and comfort in being a follower of Jesus today.

Another man, who is described as a disciple, so he isn’t just an interested onlooker like any other member of the crowd but is already a disciple- he comes to Jesus and says, ‘Lord let me first go and bury my father’ and then I’ll follow you in your travels.

The man is making a request for a delay of some months or years and then he will follow. That phrase ‘bury my father’ means looking after one’s elderly father, fulfilling ones duties as a son, until the father dies- which might be years away.  

So Jesus reply doesn’t seem quite as shocking as we might first think, when he says to the man, ‘follow me and let the dead bury their own dead.’ He isn’t saying to the man ‘I don’t want you to go to your dad’s funeral’, he is saying, ‘don’t put off by months or years before following me.’ 

But it is still shocking! He is saying- ‘Let those who don’t have spiritual life, who are spiritually dead look after your father- but you, follow me.’

Jesus is telling us- do what I am calling you to do, even if it cuts across your normal family duties. He is not trying to turn him or us away from family ties and responsibilities. But the good news of the kingdom is more urgent than an obligation which could just as easily be fulfilled by someone not yet spiritually ‘alive’. 

Someone once gave me a very wise piece of advice. He said ‘the need is not the call.’ You might come across a need, but God might not be calling you to meet the need, He might have another call on your life that’s more important. God might want someone else to meet the need. 

Run in your lane, don’t run in another person’s lane. You know what I’m saying? 

In the early church we see in Acts 6 that the leaders of the church in Jerusalem were taking time and effort to feed the widows in the church. But this meant they didn’t have the time to each the word and to pray. So they handed over the job of feeding the widows to seven men who the congregation felt were called to do it while the leaders of the church could focus on their role.

They knew what God was calling them to do. It takes time sometimes, better to take your time and pray it through with God and understand what your call from Him is, otherwise you might spend your life doing the jobs someone else should be doing.

At that moment the call of Jesus was to cross to the other side of the lake. 

And right into a storm! 

The Sea of Galilee is just over twice the size of Loch Lomond here in Scotland, and it’s surrounded by steep hills on all sides so it is in a hollow and its 200 metres below sea level. During the day what happens is this: the sun heats up the water on the Sea of Galilee and in the afternoon the hot air over the water rises and sucks in cold air, down all the valleys around, from every direction. So if you are in a little boat in the middle of that, you are stranded in the wind and you cannot move anywhere. Suddenly this beautiful still lake is in turmoil and the wind is blowing at you from every direction and you cannot escape. Furthermore Jesus’ boat was heavily loaded, it had a group of disciples in it and water was coming in over the edge and they looked in real danger of drowning. For fishermen to be afraid of drowning means they were in real danger. 

Here is Rembrandt’s painting of it- 

The disciples are clinging on. Being in a boat in that situation must have been pretty terrifying. But look at the light on the waves, it’s Rembrandt’s sign I believe that God is present. 

Have there been moments in your life when you felt like the guys in that boat? You were caught in a storm. Even a sudden storm. 

I was speaking to a group of folks visiting Scotland from California on Tuesday evening and they were traveling up to the Island of Lewis and had to take the ferry there and the forecast was stormy weather. They were praying the sailing would happen, that God would control the weather.

Well the disciples were scared and in their fear they wake up Jesus and Jesus rebukes the sea and it immediately calms down and becomes still and then he rebukes his disciples for their fear and lack of faith. 

He says ‘You of little faith why are you so afraid?’ 

By this time his disciples had seen enough of Jesus to know that He was mighty. He was with them in the boat and he had said they were to cross to the other side. They had his word and they had his presence, they needn’t have had to be afraid. 

But they were amazed and asked ‘what kind of man is this? Even the wind and waves obey him!’ 

Jesus is showing his authority not over sickness, but over nature. Its awesome authority. If the disciples had grasped Jesus’ authority, if they had really seen it, they wouldn’t have needed to be scared. 

You know if Jesus is with you and he is guiding you to go somewhere or be somewhere, you don’t need to be afraid. He will get you there, he will exert authority over the situation, you don’t need to be scared. Even if you feel out of control, Jesus is with you, so trust him.

A few weeks ago I mentioned the name of George Mueller of Bristol who in the 19^th century set up and ran a big orphanage in the town of Bristol. Let me tell you another incident from his life, to raise our faith in what Jesus does. 

Charles Inglis, the well-known evangelist, relates the incident:

"When I [Charles Inglis] first came to America thirty-one years ago, I crossed the Atlantic with the captain of a steam ship who was one of the most devoted men I ever knew; and when we were off the banks of Newfoundland he said to me: 'Mr. Inglis, the last time I crossed here, five weeks ago, one of the most extraordinary things happened that has completely revolutionized the whole of my Christian life. Up to that time I was one of your ordinary Christians. We had a man of God on board, George Mueller, of Bristol. I had been on that bridge for twenty-two hours and never left it. I was startled by someone tapping me on the shoulder. It was George Mueller.

Captain,' said he, 'I have come to tell you that I must be in Quebec on Saturday afternoon.' This was Wednesday.

It is impossible,' I said. Very well, if your ship can't take me God will find some other means of locomotion to take me.

I have never broken an engagement in fifty-seven years.'

I would willingly help you, but how can I? I am helpless.'

Let us go down to the chart room and pray,' he said.

"I looked at this man and I thought to myself, 'What lunatic asylum could the man have come from? I never heard of such a thing.'

"'Mr. Mueller,' I said, 'do you know how dense this fog is?'

No,' he replied, 'my eye is not on the density of the fog, but on the living God, who controls every circumstance of my life.'

"He went down on his knees, and he prayed one of the most simple prayers. I thought to myself, 'That would suit a children's class, where the children were not more than eight or nine years of age.' The prayer was something like this: 'O Lord, if it is consistent with Your will, please remove this fog in five minutes. You know the engagement You made for me in Quebec for Saturday. I believe it is Your will.'

"When he had finished, I was going to pray, but [Mueller] put his hand on my shoulder and told me not to pray.

First,' he said, 'you do not believe God will do it; and, second, I believe He has done it. And there is no need whatever for you to pray about it.'

I looked at him, and George Mueller said this: 'Captain, I have known my Lord for fifty-seven years and there has never been a single day that I have failed to gain an audience with the King. Get up, Captain and open the door, and you will find the fog is gone.' I got up, and the fog was gone. On Saturday afternoon George Mueller was in Quebec."

This is the Jesus we serve, He is still in control. A Christian is never helpless, because he, because she has Jesus in the boat with him. And Jesus is awesome! So let’s get our eyes on him. All eyes on Jesus- in the midst of your storm, in the midst of your trouble, of your challenge, get your eyes off the storm, off the trouble and back on Jesus. 

Following Jesus, is not always comfortable and things can look uncertain as we go with him, he might lead us into circumstances that are pretty scary, but they are opportunities to trust and as we trust, He will come through. He might calm your storm, or he may give you calm in the midst of the storm. He might calm the storm inside you.

In early 1735, the famous John Wesley was aboard a ship bound for the Georgia colony in what is now the east coast of the United States. A violent storm erupted. The storm was so severe it shredded the main sail and flooded the decks, causing panic among the English passengers, who screamed in terror, fearing for their lives. In stark contrast, a group of Moravian missionaries calmly sung hymns below deck, demonstrating remarkable composure and faith in the midst of danger. Wesley after writing about the experience in his journal, noting the difference between the reactions of the English and the Moravians. When Wesley asked one of the Moravians if they were afraid, he said ‘I thank God, no’. The encounter showed Wesley they had a faith that he didn’t have and it had a big impact on him.

God had called his Son and the disciples across the Sea of Galilee for the purpose of freeing two demonised people. They were living amongst the tombs Matthew’s gospel tells us, Mark’s gospel says they were actually in the tombs. They were violent, so violent no one could go along the nearby path or road, they had shut down that whole area where they lived.

A demon is a spiritual being, an evil spirit. Ghosts are a form of demons. A demon is not physical, it has no body, but it likes to enter into a human body if it can. And when it does, it influences or torments that person. The person often doesn’t even realise it’s there and doesn’t realise that a demon is the cause of his or her problems.

So here are two men and they have lots of demonic spirits, demons in them, hundreds or thousands of demons have entered them- Mark’s gospel tells us this. They are totally possessed by them. It’s a real extreme case. Mary Magdalene had seven demons which Jesus freed her from, seven is bad enough. 

But all these demons know they are no match for Jesus. They recognise that they are in danger of being cast out of the two men and losing their home. Demons don’t like not to have a home- so they ask to be put into the nearby herd of pigs. And I think out of compassion for the two men, to make the demons’ exit easier on the men, Jesus allows the demons to go into the pigs. He tells them ‘Go’ and they go and the whole herd of pigs suddenly are demonized and they run down the steep bank and into the sea and died in the water. But the men are free!

When the pig herders see what has happened, they run in to the nearby town and tell them that this Jewish holy man has just come along and freed the two crazy men in the tombs and all the pigs got drowned in the lake. That was a lot of money tied up in that herd of pigs and now they are all dead.

So the whole town goes out to Jesus and asks him to leave the region- and he does. Jesus wasn’t going to stay where he wasn’t wanted. Jesus can and will dominate nature, demons and disease, but he won’t dominate human beings, He isn’t controlling, he respects our free will, even if our choices are bad ones. When people don’t want him, he accepts their decision and he moves on. He told his disciples to do that also, when they get rejected in a town, he told them, shake the dust of your sandals and just move on. 

The people of the town should have been happy that the two demonized people were free, their lives transformed. Instead they were upset at all the animals which had died and probably the financial cost of it all. God saw things differently, to him having two men set free, was worth a whole lot of pigs dying. Two humans are much more valuable in God’s eyes than many animals. 

When Jesus exerts authority and starts casting out demons some people, even Christians, even churches will say, just like the townspeople in the story, ‘we don’t want it, go away’. People don’t like things that are out of their experience, that don’t feel safe. And there is not much teaching about the demonic in churches, so unfortunately we have taken on the worldview of the general public that basically says demons don’t exist, or they are really rare. And so there is not much casting out of demons going on in many churches. But freeing people from the power of demons is one of the things Christians are called to do and its really needed. 

Jesus is demonstrating to his disciples who came along with him in the boat how to deliver demons. Again showing what his authority looks like. Later on, they would go out and having seen Jesus do it, they would do the same thing, cast out demons, and bring freedom. And at the end of his earthly ministry, Jesus according to Mark’s version of the Great Commission says all Christian believers can do it. Mark 16:15-17:

He said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.  Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.  And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons...’

The demons are still around, plenty of them. People are carrying them and don’t even know it. The NHS doesn’t know it. Drug addictions have a demonic element to them. Alcohol- we talk in English about ‘the demon drink’. People can be tormented by continuously hearing voices. That’s demonic. Sometimes physical health conditions have a demonic spirit causing it- the NHS probably can’t heal them if that’s the case. Continuous nightmares is another. Always feeling a barrier between you and God, not being able to pray or understand the Bible, that can be caused by demonic interference.  

My father had a friend who was a pyromaniac. He was a nice guy, they met in university, but dad’s friend had this urge to set things on fire. He couldn’t be left alone in a house, because he would set the curtains or furniture on fire. He ended up in Carstairs maximum security hospital, because that was the only safe place for him to be. There was nothing that could be done for him. That is the effect of a demon. If only a Christian had come along and cast it out, he could have been free. 



These two men who Jesus set free, if they lived in Scotland today would have ended up in Carstairs and probably would never have got out. Probably they would have been heavily medicated, but never healed, never delivered. This ministry is really real and important and sadly overlooked.

We have to cast out demons in the Healing Rooms. People come to the Healing Rooms because they are physically hurting or emotionally hurting and it can turn out there is a demon involved. And so we need to deal with it. Some physical or mental problems won’t shift until the demons are told to go. We use the name of Jesus and his authority and tell the thing to leave. And they leave. Normally! Not always so quickly as with Jesus ministry, but they do go. There is not much fuss either.

Matthew is showing us Jesus’ authority in these chapters. His authority over sickness, storms and evil spirits. We Christians have access to Jesus’ authority. Jesus wants to exercise his authority through us, his body the church. These stories are showing what Jesus can and wants to do today, through us. He has shared with us his authority. Let’s understand what we have been given- ‘all authority in heaven and heart has been given to me’ Jesus tells us therefor we are to go using his authority. Let’s learn to use it.

Amen.