A Reason To Preach
Mark 5:1-20.
In the Gospel according to Apostle Mark, we read about a remarkable encounter between Jesus Christ and a possessed man whom demons had driven away from friends and family. In fact, they had forced him to live in the graveyard among the dead. What a terrible way for anyone to live!
It was obvious that all attempts by his friends and/or family to help him stay at home, by restraints, had failed, as the malevolent spirits in him kept breaking his chains and sending him running back to the graveyard.
Mark 5:3 – “This man lived among the tombs and could not be restrained, even with a chain.
Mark 5:4 – Whenever he was put into chains and shackles—as he often was—he snapped the chains from his wrists and smashed the shackles. No one was strong enough to control him.” NLT
A casual reading of this account of scripture will pass for just another story about Jesus Christ’s activities while He walked the earth, but looking deeper and more intently, we see the suffering of a helpless man and the compassionate heart of God towards him.
Mark 5:5 – “All day long and throughout the night, he would wander among the tombs and in the hills, screaming and hitting himself with stones.” NLT.
One day, however, God heard his cry. Jesus Christ came to his rescue and delivered him from those legions of demons who had made his life a foretaste of hell on earth.
Now, the remarkable thing about this story is not the deliverance of the man, but what followed afterwards: the people of the land, the Gerasenes, asked Jesus Christ to leave after He had helped deliver one of their own.
That’s odd! They should have rejoiced, instead, that the man they’d failed to restrain from harming himself and others had finally been healed of his madness, but it seemed that they became indignant instead.
Could it have been because of the loss of two thousand pigs, which the demons had drowned in the lake after Jesus Christ had cast them out of the body of their victim? If it was, then the feeling amongst the inhabitants of that land must have been that it was too much of a price to pay for the deliverance of a helpless, suffering demonic man; but how wrong they were! The very fact that Jesus Christ let those pigs perish in order to save the man underscores the high value which God places on a soul over the worldly possessions that people are relentlessly craving for, and which have robbed many people of the opportunity to truly know and serve God.
Luke 16:13 – “No one can serve two masters. For you will hate one and love the other, or be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”
Luke 16:14 – The Pharisees, who dearly loved their money, naturally scoffed at all this.
Luke 16:15 – Then he said to them, “You like to look good in public, but God knows your evil hearts. What this world honors is an abomination in the sight of God.” NLT.
The same is still true today: that God can flatten mountains and fill up valleys in order to save just a soul! If need be, He can withdraw blessings, terminate employment, or impoverish anyone just to save their soul.
The Gerasenes got it all wrong; they may have thought that the loss of those pigs was one loss too many, and they wanted Jesus Christ to leave at once to avert further losses.
Mark 5:15 – A crowd soon gathered around Jesus, but they were frightened when they saw the man who had been demon possessed, for he was sitting there fully clothed and perfectly sane.
Mark 5:16 – Those who had seen what happened to the man and to the pigs told everyone about it,
Mark 5:17 – and the crowd began pleading with Jesus to go away and leave them alone.” NLT
Well, how about the lunatic that was healed? Did he share in their view? Never! There was no way that he could have ever done that; in fact, it would have been concrete evidence that he was not cured of his madness if he had joined forces with his natives to oust Jesus Christ from their land for healing him. So, what was his stance at that time? The record below shares it:
Mark 5:18: “When Jesus got back into the boat, the man who had been demon possessed begged to go, too.
Mark 5:19 – But Jesus said, “No, go home to your friends, and tell them what wonderful things the Lord has done for you and how merciful he has been.
Mark 5:20 – So the man started off to visit the Ten Towns of that region and began to tell everyone about the great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed at what he told them.” NLT
The fulcrum of this message is in the scripture just quoted above, and it is to the effect that only an encounter with God can move anyone to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. While the natives of that land saw a threat in Jesus Christ, the man whom He had just delivered saw a Saviour and friend! The very first day he had an encounter with Jesus Christ was also the very day that he also decided to follow Him — he didn’t even think of first going to see his family or friends. What Jesus Christ just did was far greater to him than anything else, as his decision to go with Him would show.
Today, when I see how people who claim to be saved are reluctant to share the Gospel with those who need to be saved before hell claims their soul forever, I begin to wonder if they had actually had an encounter with Jesus Christ at all! There can be no claim of being born again without a prior encounter with Jesus Christ the Saviour. That can never be! And if there was a genuine encounter, then there can’t be an excuse to not share the Gospel, except where that encounter had been lost or had been faked all along!
My beloved mother of blessed memory knew the Lord before I was born; in fact, I was the child of her prayers. After three girls were born to my family, she specifically prayed to God for a male child, and an angel of God appeared by her bedside at night, with a baby boy in his hands, stretched towards her. I was that baby boy! She loved me dearly until her death two years ago. But as closely knit as we were together, yet when I had an encounter with Jesus Christ, as a teenager, and He became my Lord and personal Saviour, I was everywhere preaching the Gospel and leading other youths to do the same. My mother became concerned for me and tearfully pleaded with me to take it easy on myself because I was not only doing street evangelism but had significantly lost weight due to constant fasting. If she had shed those tears for any other reason than my involvement with the Gospel, I probably would have capitulated because I held her in very high esteem. But in this case I didn’t relent. Although I loved her so much, yet a greater love for Jesus Christ compelled me to preach, pray, and fast in a way that I had not known was possible until that time. I didn’t care that my physical looks were giving my beloved mother some concerns, least of all anyone else; all I cared for were the strength and grace which I drew from the Lord in those spiritual commitments, to carry on with His work.
I think the Apostle Paul was having something similar in mind when God’s Spirit inspired him to write the words below:
2 Cor. 5:13 – “If it seems that we are crazy, it is to bring glory to God. And if we are in our right minds, it is for your benefit.
2 Cor. 5:14 – Whatever we do, it is because Christ’s love controls us. Since we believe that Christ died for everyone, we also believe that we have all died to the old life we used to live.
2 Cor. 5:15 – He died for everyone so that those who receive his new life will no longer live to please themselves. Instead, they will live to please Christ, who died and was raised for them.”
No one can outlive their encounter with Jesus Christ; no, not any more than a car can go beyond the limits of the fuel in its tank! As long as Jesus Christ truly lives in the heart, the evidence of the encounter continues: the absence of the one must be the absence of the other. So if, as a professing Christian, you can no longer see (or have never seen) the need to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the lost, then I also, as a Christian, am right to question if Jesus Christ still lives, or had ever lived, in your heart.
Those who have not had a life-changing encounter with Jesus Christ have no right to preach the Gospel, seeing they would have no message from the Lord to preach. The preaching of the Gospel must be preceded by a genuine encounter with Jesus Christ, and this is where every Christian must be careful to not allow themselves to be led astray by anyone who declares people to be saved, or born again, simply because they had come out for an altar call.
For the avoidance of doubt, if after an altar call your life still remains the same as before, then you have not yet encountered Jesus Christ, because no one does and remains the same. Something must have gone awfully wrong with that altar call, and it can be either because the whole exercise did not meet God’s acceptable standards, or that Jesus Christ was simply not part of it altogether. If He were, He’ll make Himself manifest; that’s why it is called an encounter!
Name every Bible character, from Genesis to Revelation, whom God had used, and see if there’s been any one case without a definite encounter with God prior to their ministry. So, why should anyone think that it ought to be different today?!
2 Cor. 13:5 “Test yourselves to make sure you are solid in the faith. Don’t drift along taking everything for granted. Give yourselves regular checkups. You need firsthand evidence, not mere hearsay, that Jesus Christ is in you. Test it out. If you fail the test, do something about it.” (MSB)
The proof of one’s encounter with God lies in the works that they do for Him subsequently; at least the Holy Scriptures exhibit this pattern throughout, but I will just mention a few.
Abraham had his unique encounter in Genesis 12:1-8; Jacob in Genesis 28:19-22; Moses in Exodus 3:1-10; Jeremiah in Jeremiah 1:4-10; Isaiah in Isaiah 6:1-8; Apostles Peter, Andrew, James, and John in Matthew 4:18-22; Apostle Paul in Acts 9:1-6.
I could go on and on and list more names of people with a proven encounter with God, and they all had a message to carry out for the Lord because God does not call anyone without a reason and a message. So, what’s God’s reason for your call, dear Christian? Has He given you a message? Have you carried it out, or is it still dormant after such a long time?
The demon-possessed man in our text did not waste any time in carrying out the Lord’s mission for his life: there was no time to sit with family and discuss the mission! It was a task he knew must be carried out immediately because that was the command from the Lord:
Mark 5:19 “…Go home to your friends, and tell them what great things the Lord has done for you, and how He has had compassion on you.” (NKJV)
We might want to know how the man responded to Jesus Christ’s instruction to share the good news of God’s grace upon his life: did he go to his friends? No, he went to the entire ten cities of his native land!
Such was his zeal for the Lord that he must have thought it a small thing to share his encounter with Jesus Christ only with a handful of friends.
Mark 5:20 – “So the man started off to visit the Ten Towns of that region and began to tell everyone about the great things Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed at what he told them.” NLT
I believe that God has inspired this message to make someone uncomfortable with their cold and indifferent attitude towards God’s call in their life. If you’re that person, the Lord is still calling you to “…Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone, everywhere.” Mark 16:15.
On the other hand, I believe that this message is also a wake-up call to those who cannot trace their profession of Christian faith to a definite encounter with Jesus Christ; to you I say that there’s still a limited time to seek and find Jesus Christ for a genuine salvation encounter. You must not seek Jesus Christ through anyone else: just call upon Him directly, and earnestly, until you have an encounter, as I’m sure you shall!
Isa. 55:6 – “Seek the LORD while you can find him. Call on him now while he is near.
Isa. 55:7 – Let the people turn from their wicked deeds. Let them banish from their minds the very thought of doing wrong! Let them turn to the LORD that he may have mercy on them. Yes, turn to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.” NLT
Finally, to my dear fellow labourers for the kingdom of God, I encourage you to keep your testimony of God’s encounter with your life, knowing that the loss of your testimony is also the loss of your ministry. If you must have a continued reason to preach the Gospel to the world, then you must protect your divine encounter with God through Jesus Christ His Son; to lose it is to lose the validity of your call from God, and ministry to the world.
1 Tim. 6:11 “But you, O man of God, flee these things and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, gentleness.
1 Tim. 6:12 – Fight the good fight for what we believe. Hold tightly to the eternal life that God has given you, which you have confessed so well before many witnesses.” (NKJV)
May God Almighty help us to know our call and pursue it diligently, IJN, Amen.