Echoes (Psalm 77:1-2, 11-20)

You might now and again hear someone who's not a believer -- or who's a believer with a strong streak of irreverence -- point out that a lot of stories of God's grace at work in people's lives sound the same. A person is in a hard situation or is dealing with hard things. Perhaps even impossible things. And then through God's grace, either a previously unforeseen solution is found or the strength necessary to bear the burden is revealed.

The non-believer may suggest this similarity comes from people deluding themselves into all believing the same illusion. The stories are all the same, such a person suggests, because people expect the same thing to happen and they change their recollections to match what they believe happened. Of course, that can happen. Over many years of working at church youth camps, I have heard people give testimony that's clearly dressed up or molded in order to fit a preconceived framework. Some of the people are sincere: They believe this is what a testimony should sound like, so they will revise some details and lose some others so it fits. Others may want attention. And others may have no clear reason: I love them, but sometimes teenagers are nuts.

But the repetition can serve a purpose. It can remind a person in the midst of trouble that they can call upon the Lord for help in time of trouble. And although he may not respond in the way they want him to, history proves he does respond. In Psalm 77, Asaph demonstrates what this can look like. He opens with a statement of the problem, and then verses 3-10 elaborate on it. True to the non-believer's complaint, the lament in those verses sounds like that in quite a few other psalms, both by Asaph and by David himself.

Then in verse 11, Asaph starts to give reasons why he turns to God for help. God has helped in the past, therefore God will help now. And only the shallowest understanding believes that the God of the universe will do exactly what is asked. He knows that repeating the history of God's assistance is much more a means of self-reassurance than it is a list of reasons why God needs to get off his duff and get to work now.

But in this case, Asaph doesn't just talk about ordinary help God might have provided. He goes for the big one. He recaps Exodus. In verse 13, he asks what God is so great as God -- the God who demonstrated clear superiority over whatever deities the Egyptians worshiped and whose supremacy every practicing Jew recited daily in the shema. In verses 14 and 15, he sums up all of the protection, rescue and empowerment God provided the Hebrews from the day they walked out of Egypt.

This story is the big story. This story is the foundational history of the people of Israel, the one that has kept them together for almost five thousand years. Asaph brings out a sledgehammer -- which might make us wonder what problem he's dealing with. Some scholars suggest the exile to Babylon, since they believe Asaph wrote his Psalms much later than King David. 

I think that's entirely possible, but my mind is also drawn to another possibility. Perhaps Asaph recalls this version of the Exodus story for its own sake and not because of the size of the issue he faced. Perhaps he understands that God's presence with the people is the same always, and every story somehow reflects back on the Exodus story. The threat could be existential, like bringing a sheep to a chariot fight when your back's up against the Red Sea. It could be less so. But either way, God's salvation comes to the one who calls on him. Again, it's God's salvation, so it might not look like what we say we want, but it is salvation.

A cynical look at those redemption stories sees intentional or unintentional editing in order to make them sound the same. But the believer sees the similarity as evidence of God at work. Large or small, every salvation echoes the great salvation, brought to us on Calvary. Are many of them similar? Sure.

But so are sunsets and we rarely get tired of them.

Cast Out (Luke 8:26-39)

I've always found myself almost as fascinated by the response to Jesus' miracles as I am by the miracles themselves. And I've often found the responses more instructive. After all, the miracles come as God directs them and whether miracles follow my prayers doesn't say anything about me. It should say something that points to God.

The story of the man freed from many demons offers a great illustration. This same incident is described in both Matthew and Mark as well as Luke, with the same basic events. Jesus and the disciples land on the shore of an area called the Decapolis ("Ten Cities") and are immediately confronted by a man who shows all the signs of demonic possession. We the reader learn some back story about the man and his destructive and dangerous nature -- information Jesus probably had but which his disciples did not.

We should pause for a moment and note that a lot of what ancient writings describe as possession by evil spirits resembles observed symptoms of mental illness. Many people diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia report hearing voices and seeing delusions that their brains interpret as real input, which in turn spark behavior that they would never have considered had they not been ill. In this case the reported  conversation between Jesus and the demonic spirits suggests something more like actual possession, but in the end Jesus is the victor over whatever has tormented this man and that is probably the best takeaway.

The possessed man falls at Jesus' feet and cries out for mercy. We learn that the man is driven by a multitude of evil spirits, who leave him no peace and make it impossible to live in society. When asked for a name they give the answer "Legion," indicating their number. They do not wish to be cast into "the abyss," which seems to be some kind of oblivion awaiting failed or defeated evil spirits and they ask Jesus if he would let them possess the nearby heard of pigs. He allows it -- no upright, Torah-abiding Jewish person cares about what happens to pigs, after all. And as readers familiar with the story know, the now demon-ridden pigs go berserk and rush into the sea, where they drown.

A herd of swine is watched by swineherds, and these hightail it back to the city to report. If they're hired hands, they want to make sure their version of events hits their employers' ears first, after all. The city folks head back out to the tombs, where they see the (formerly) possessed man sitting and talking with Jesus and clearly in his right mind. Luke tells us they're afraid.

Why? We can theorize, even if we don't know. Perhaps they feared someone with power over demons might just call a few up and turn them loose among the townsfolk for fun. If so, that's silly: The demons didn't sound like this guy was their friend and he didn't say anything that indicated he had and fondness for them, either. Maybe they were afraid that the (formerly) possessed man would return to his wacky ways once the new guy had left -- also pretty silly, since they'd demonstrated they could live with that problem although it was a great inconvenience.

My own guess is that, when confronted with the reality that the worst guy around town was no longer the worst guy around town, they also had to confront that they had some baggage of their own. Self-excusing whataboutism is one of humanity's most-practiced skills as each one of us becomes expert at trying to deflect attention from our flaws by pointing out equal or worse flaws in someone else. And as long as there was a naked possessed guy running around the tombs, everyone had someone else they could point to for comparison: "Yeah, I fibbed a little on our deal, but at least I'm wearing clothes and not howling at the moon!"

Sure, realizing that Jesus healing the (formerly) possessed man could mean he might heal them as well -- but it would mean admitting they might have some things to be healed and for many people that's a very big step to take. 

In any event, the people responded to Jesus casting out the demons by casting out Jesus: They asked him to leave. He agreed. Although the (formerly) possessed man begged to come along, Jesus told him no, that he should stay here and tell everyone what had happened to him. And, Luke says, that's what he did. Jesus left, and he started talking.

To what impact, we may wonder. Well, Mark tells us. He adds the return visit that Jesus made to the area sometime later, in which we find that the (formerly) possessed man's testimony has had some impact. This time, some people are willing and eager to hear Jesus, instead of being afraid and asking him to leave. How many? How many people listened to the man say what Jesus had done for him? We don't know, exactly, although the name we give this story -- the feeding of the 4,000 -- might give a round number.

You know, the harder you throw the boomerang away...