Lent 3
Lk
11:14-28
3/8/26
By all accounts, Iran was a
formidable opponent. It had a strong military.
Iran had invested billions of dollars into this. It had produced
thousands of ballistic missiles and drones that were capable of showering
destruction on the entire Middle East. It possessed mobile launchers that past
experience indicated were very difficult to detect and destroy. It had deployed
submarines and ships, along with small attack boats that were capable of sinking
shipping and closing the Straights of Hormuz.
Iran could hit every country in the
region with an overwhelming barrage of missiles and drones. And at the same
time it had made itself very difficult to attack. It had built deep bunkers to
protect its command and control systems, along with the missiles. Most importantly it had acquired Russian
S-400 anti-aircraft systems, which Russia said were the best in the world, and
were considered by many to be a significant threat. Then on top of that, at the
beginning of this year they added Chinese HQ-9B anti-aircraft systems that the
Chinese said could detect and shoot down stealth aircraft.
Iran was strong. But it has quickly
become clear that the United States and Israel are far stronger. With
incredible ease the forces of these two nations have completely dismantled
Iran’s air defenses and are now able to bomb whatever they want, whenever they
want. They have used massive bunker busters to take out protected targets. They
have been able to detect when mobile launchers send up a missile, and then
immediately destroy the launcher. And those Chinees radars? Actually, some
people say they have performed quite well. When they blow up, you know that an
F-35 fighter is in the area.
In our Gospel lesson this morning,
Jesus describes how a strong man who is armed seems secure, until someone
stronger comes along and disarms him. We learn that the spiritual reality of
our world is one of conflict between the devil and God. We are warned that the
devil is a powerful opponent. And we receive the good news that Jesus Christ
has overcome the devil and made us his own.
In our text we learn that Jesus cast
out a demon who was causing a man to be mute. When the demon had been cast out
the man was able to speak and the people who were there marveled. However, some
of them said, “He casts out demons by Beelzebul, the prince of demons.” Beelzebul, like Beliar, was another name that
Jews used for the devil. These critics
were saying that Jesus was able to cast out demons because he was in fact on
the devil’s side. They said that Jesus himself was demonic.
Our Lord responded by saying that
this was just dumb. He said, “Every kingdom divided against itself is laid
waste, and a divided household falls. And if Satan also is divided against
himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by
Beelzebul.” Christ pointed out that no
kingdom chooses to fight against itself. To do so would mean its own
destruction. The devil wasn’t going to cast out his own demons, and thereby
lose his power and control.
What Jesus was doing in casting out
demons was instead the work of God overcoming the devil. He said, “But if it is by the finger of
God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.” Our Lord’s words reflect our Old Testament
lesson this morning. There we learn that the magicians of Egypt were able to
replicate the first two plagues that God used Moses to bring upon Egypt. They
were able to turn water into blood, and bring forth frogs. But when Yahweh had
Moses bring gnats upon the land, the magicians were not able to this. They knew
that this was something beyond their power and said to Pharaoh, “This is the
finger of God.”
Jesus said that since he was casting
out demons by the power of God, it demonstrated that the kingdom of God – the
reign of God – had come upon them. God’s saving power was present in Jesus to
overcome the devil. Christ said, “When a strong man, fully armed, guards his
own palace, his goods are safe; but when one stronger than he attacks him
and overcomes him, he takes away his armor in which he trusted
and divides his spoil.” The devil
was strong and armed. There was no doubt about it. But Jesus was stronger and
he was freeing people from the devil’s power.
Our text today reminds us about an
important truth. The world that we live in is a spiritual battle ground. It is the scene of a war. In this war the devil fights against God as
he seeks to maintain control over people and take them to destruction with
himself.
It has been this way since the devil
tempted Adam and Eve to disobey God. By this action they lost the image of God
– the ability to know God as he wants to be known, and to live perfectly
according to his will. Instead, the devil became the lord of all who been
conceived and born ever since. Sinful fallen people, produce more sinful fallen
people under the devil’s power. And all who are under the power of the devil
and sin now die, because sin brings death.
That’s not a pleasant description.
It’s not what people want to hear. But
it is what God has revealed in his word. St Paul told the Ephesians, “And you
were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following
the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air,
the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we
all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of
the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath,
like the rest of mankind.”
Paul told the Corinthians, “The
natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they
are spiritually discerned.” The natural person – the person as conceived and
born – does not get God. He simply can’t.
He can’t because he is sinful fallen nature for whom the devil is
lord. Jesus told Nicodemus, “That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and
that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.”
No parent has ever sat a child down and said, “Today I am going to teach
you how to be jealous,” or “Today I am going to teach you how to be angry.” We
don’t because it is already there inside them, ready to show itself in ever
greater ways. As the baptismal rite says: “The Word of God also teaches us that
we are all conceived and born sinful and are under the power of the devil until
Christ claims us as his own. We would be lost forever unless delivered from
sin, death, and everlasting damnation.”
But God has delivered us. He promised that he would send a
descendant of Eve who would defeat the devil. In the fullness of time he sent
forth his Son who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.
True God and true man, Jesus Christ was presence of God’s saving reign in this
world.
Jesus was the stronger man who had come to overcome the armed
strong man. The demons knew exactly who Jesus was. One demon exclaimed, “Ha! What
have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I
know who you are— the Holy One of God.”
In his ministry, Jesus was the presence of God’s reign that was
overcoming Satan, sin, and death. We see
this clearly as he casts out demons such as in our text. There are certainly
reasons to be believe that demon possession continues in our day. But Jesus
seems to run into people who are demon possessed all the time, and that is
certainly not our experience. A likely explanation for this is that since Jesus
was the presence God’s end time reign, the devil threw all of his forces at
him. They were there in such plentiful and obvious ways because Jesus the
Son of God was there.
Jesus was the presence of the end time saving reign of God. Sinners
who sin must be condemned. That fact is a reflection of who God is as the just
and holy One. And so God sent his Son in the flesh in order to receive the
judgment against our sin. Paul told the Romans that, “By sending his own
Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned
sin in the flesh.” Through this God freed us from sin and its power. Paul told
the Galatians that Jesus Christ “gave himself for our sins to deliver us from
the present evil age.”
The sin of Adam brought death to all. But on the third day God
raised Jesus from the dead in the resurrection life that has overcome
death. Paul told the Corinthians, “For
as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of
the dead.
For as
in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.”
This forgiveness and life are now
received through faith in Jesus Christ. But conceived and born in fallen
sinfulness, this is not something of which we are capable. And so through his
Spirit the Lord Jesus gives new life. We are born again, not of perishable
seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God. And
in order to bring faith and salvation to all – even to the newly born sinner –
Christ has included water in his command and combined it with this word. Through
baptism we are born again of water and the Spirit. Baptism is the washing of
rebirth and renewal by the Spirit. It is the action of God by which the sinful,
fallen infant becomes the forgiven child of God in Christ.
No matter whether it is the infant
who is baptized, or the adult who is called to faith through the Gospel and is
baptized into Christ, the result is that a person whom the devil ruled as lord
has been wrenched away from him to be a child of God. Now, for that person, Jesus is Lord.
But here’s the thing about the devil
– he is not a gracious loser. Instead, he is a determined enemy who never
ceases in his efforts to reclaim spiritual control over a person. Paul warned
the Ephesians, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but
against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic
powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of
evil in the heavenly places.”
He has been doing this for a long
time, and he is very good at it. He knows that the best way to regain control
is to convince people that he is not a problem – that there is in fact
no spiritual war going on. He wants people to be oblivious to the spiritual
aspect of life, and instead to focus on this world. He wants people to
set their attention on getting more stuff, on their career, on their sports and
their entertainment. He wants them so
busy pursuing these things that they don’t have time or attention for anything
else.
It is the word in the Means of Grace
that created faith. It is the word in the Means of Grace that sustains
faith. And so he wants you to think
about everything else other than the Means of Grace. Where there is almost no
interaction with Scripture at home, this is good. Where attendance at the
Divine Service begins to take second place, this is even better. He wants to
separate you from Christ, and the way to do that is to separate you from the
Means of Grace. He wants you to starve
yourself of the Spirit’s work, so that the way of faith in Jesus becomes less
and less, and the way of the world in your life grows more and more.
The devil is playing for keeps,
because in this struggle there are no points for second place. It is all or
nothing: faith or unbelief; forgiveness or judgment; life or death; salvation
or damnation. You are either on Jesus’s
side or the devil’s. As Christ says in our text, “Whoever is not with me is
against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”
Peter warned, “Be
sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls
around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” The apostle warns
us about this reality. And our response is therefore to focus on the Means of
Grace – to hold on to them and use them. This means reading Scripture during
the week, and even attending Bible class – by the way, we have it on Wednesday
morning and not just Sunday. It means making baptism a part of our daily
spiritual life as we return to the promises God has given about this Sacrament.
It means attending the Divine Service each week to hear God’s word proclaimed,
and to receive the true body and blood of Jesus Christ as our Lord comes to us
in the Sacrament of the Altar.
When you were baptized, you became
part of the Body of Christ, the Church. The life of faith is meant to be lived
as part of that Body. It is lived in the community of the faithful. You are
supported in the walk of faith by being with other Christians. So choose to spend time with Christians. Make
the life of this congregation an important part of your personal and family
life. Together we keep each other focused on the true nature of the spiritual
struggle that exists. We point each other to Christ, and his Word and
Sacraments. We encourage each other to
walk in the ways of the Lord, instead of those of the world. Together we continue in the way of faith in
Jesus that leads to resurrection and eternal life.
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