Go Home

Jesus did not let him but told him, “Go home to your own people and report to them how much the Lord has done for you and how he has had mercy on you.” Mark 5:19

When the Lord called my entire family Home, I was angry with Him. My brother Stan, who committed most of his adult life to Christ, died at the age of 54. Mom, our nucleus and wonder, who showed us what it is like to truly follow Jesus and not simply render lip service about Him, battled not one, but three primary cancers. She succumbed to two of them fourteen months after Stan passed. Dad, the pillar of our family, who tirelessly served others, was heartbroken. He slipped away peacefully in his sleep after whittling to half his size during the thirteen months he lived without his bride of 60 years. Then my brother Kenny, who captured many hearts with his infectious personality, died thirteen months after Dad. Though Kenny had beaten an aggressive stage-4 cancer diagnosis at 40, his compromised immune system was no match for Covid-19. He too was 54.

Forty months. That’s all it took. Just forty months for life to irreversibly change. For everything familiar to become foreign. For the world to feel lifeless. For existence to become questionable. I was angry with God. But not for the reason one might suspect.

God methodically plucked each member of my family, year after year, one by one, until He reached me. Then He stopped plucking. God, why would You leave me here?

Was His great cloud of witnesses too full? Had I not loved and served Him enough to be done with the cares of this world too? What more did He expect to squeeze from my painfully traumatic life? A life in which childhood memories are void of innocence because of the repeated molestation which seized it. Irreparable damage caused at the hands of those who mishandled me. My path altered. A life lived filtered through pain. I was angry. God, why would You leave me here?

As the youngest and sincerely introverted member of our tribe of five, it seemed cruel to be left behind to fend in this world. In a country intensely consumed with itself. Where predators prey. Mockers mock. Where many professed Christians are lifeless. A place where platitudes of comfort from well-wishers materialize as lies. Where narcissism cares more about its recognition of doing good than with the anonymity of being useful. No one was here. Not a soul present to occupy the empty space so deeply embedded within me that even I failed to reach it. Lord, why would You leave me here?!

I am not the only one Jesus left behind. I imagine the demoniac who lived in the region of the Gerasenes felt the same way. This man with unclean spirits in the synoptic Gospels bears only the name of the demons which possessed him: “Legion, because there were many” (Mark 5:9b). Shunned by the people, his people, the man was banished to live on the mountains amongst the tombs. Tormented and naked, his wailing cries heard from a distance were ignored (Mark 5:5). But the demoniac’s story does not conclude with his ostracism. 

Mark’s Gospel account declares the man, in his fallen state, recognized Jesus in the distance exiting a boat. The boat Jesus was just on when awakened from a catnap by distressed disciples who feared death amid a raging sea storm. The storm that the disciples watched Jesus calm with His Words (4:35-41). Had the demoniac witnessed the submission of the wind and waves, and hoped that Jesus would stop the storm raging within him? The text is unclear. But what is plain was the man’s position, his response, and Jesus’ identity.

Neglected and separated from society, this man’s ostracism perched him at the perfect vantage point to see Jesus. Then the man and the unclean spirits controlling his life ran. The Legion of whom no chains or shackles could retrain, ran. The Demon who was unsubdued by the repeated best efforts of man, ran. Not from Jesus but to Him, then knelt before Him all before Jesus uttered a single word. The Demon within the man rightly addressed Jesus as the Son of the Most High God. And having recognized His deity, the Demon begged Jesus not to torment him (Mark 5:7).

The rest of the story is equally fascinating. Jesus commanded the unclean spirit to leave the man. It did. But only after Legion pleaded with Jesus to allow them to remain in the region and enter a herd of pigs nearby. Jesus granted the request. Once the demons left the man and inhabited roughly two thousand pigs, the herd rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned. The men who tended the pigs witnessed what happened and ran straight into town and the countryside and reported the breaking news to the locals (5:10-14a).

Curious, folks ran to see what happened. What they found frightened them. There, next to Jesus they “saw the man who had been demon possessed, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind, and they were afraid” (5:15). They had heard the second hand account of the changed man’s story and now had seen his transformation for themselves. And they were terrified. Go figure. They were scared when the man was demon possessed and they were scared now that he is not. And what instead was the concern of the people? Pigs. They were outraged at their loss of a pack of pigs. The death of the pigs meant enormous disruption to their revenue. The pigs were their means to economic stability. These folks showed greater concern over their loss of pigs than with the Man responsible for the drowned demons within them. No jubilation for the restoration of the pitiful man’s soul. No gratitude that Jesus had made the man well after his life had long been disrupted by demons. Instead, the locals were outraged that now their lives were interrupted. And the townspeople wanted this Disrupter to get on the boat and go. Leave, Jesus, before You cause us further losses. 

Have you ever felt this way? Like the townspeople, yes? Prioritized the pigs in your life? So content to wallow with the idols erected in your heart, that you would rather have them than Him. Likely we all have. We have misplaced hope, searched for identity in things, and placed our security in stuff. From the people in our lives that we make our world, to the unrighteous organizations we join, to the material items we accumulate and hoard. Why do we do it? Why do we cling to things? Could it be that we fail to understand what the changed man realized? That our hope, identity, and security can only be found in Jesus. That His power is greater than the raging forces working against us. That “He can do exceedingly abundantly above all that we can think or ask” (Ephesians 3:20). That Jesus is enough. So much so that while the townspeople implored Jesus to leave, the changed man pleaded to be with Him. 

Jesus addressed both requests. To the people, He honored their choice. He left. But once Jesus entered the boat, He heard the earnest cry of the cleansed man. This man, now clothed and in his right mind, gave the only appropriate response to Jesus. To the Messiah who came to a foreign land to save him. To the Son of the Only True Living God that spared no expense to rescue him from death. To God the Son, who did for him what only He could do; covered him and made his fractured life whole. The changed man surrendered his life to Jesus and prepared to abandon all he knew to follow Him. Yet, “Jesus did not let him but told him, ‘Go home to your own people, and report to them how much the Lord has done for you and how he has had mercy on you’” (5:19). Jesus said no, and sent the man back to the family and friends who ridiculed and bound him. To the neighbors who gossiped, shunned and discarded him. To the community who placed greater value on a pack of pigs than his well being. Really, Jesus. Why would You leave me here like You did the changed man? Then command me, as You did with him, to go back to a callous community. To return to the people who gave greater attention to the detail of funeral plans than for my bereaved heart. Really, Jesus? You want me to go back to them? To the people who cursed me and profaned my name? To the people who claimed to know You yet failed to reflect You? Really?

Isn’t that just like Jesus? To send us on the road less traveled. Against the grain. The narrow path. Empowering us to face our afflictions squarely. Equipping us to minister to the very people who would just as soon have us board a boat with Jesus and leave. Go home. “Report to them how much the Lord has done for you” (5:19b). Sometimes Jesus will not change our environment, but He will transform our condition. That’s why He sent the former demoniac back. It is the same reason He left me here. And perhaps you also. To show the very people who are most familiar with our traumatic past of the transformation that occurs when we truly meet Christ. The home folks know our pain. The pig people have witnessed our predicament and some have even contributed to it. Yet Jesus sends us back to them to testify of His goodness. To a community who may never know His mercy otherwise. To go and bear witness about the Messiah to the very folks whose harmful actions helped posture us for our encounter with Him. Go! Go back to those enslaved to this world and tell them what the Lord has done for you. 

“They were all amazed”(5:20b). That was the reaction of the people once the changed man returned home to share what Jesus had done for him. They were amazed. The Scriptures do not tell us if the people were loving, welcoming, or if they even changed. All reasons that might give us pause for going back home. Jesus knows the pig people hurt you and me. He understands the marginalization and rejection better than anyone. He endured an entire humanity of pig people when He bore the punishment of death on the cross for our sins. He didn’t want to die. He asked, “Father, if You are willing, take this cup from Me” (Luke 22:42a). But His Father told Him no, then sent Him to demonstrate the Father’s goodness and mercy through His (Jesus) death.

So it’s okay to feel apprehensive about facing the people who hurt us. But like Jesus, we must not allow our feelings to negate the commands of God. Jesus endured the greatest hardship in history when He died for you and me. All to save us from the eternal damnation due us because of our sins. Can you imagine our hopelessness if Jesus had rejected God’s Will for His life? Our greater concern should be the same. Where will our family and friends spend eternity? Sacrificing our egos and feelings is a nominal price to pay in light of the fate awaiting those who reject Jesus.

So let’s do the hard things. Let’s face the folks who caused us pain. Let’s talk to those who criticized and ostracized us. Let’s go back to the people who placed greater value on the pigs in their lives and proclaim to them the Good News. Let’s offer them hope by showing them Jesus! And pray that they too have a true encounter with the Messiah and be changed and follow Him. So that one day, we can all go Home!