I am not quite making my goal of writing everyday, but I will get there! I am following the daily devotional from Scripture Union which I receive via email each morning.
Today's scripture is the story of Jesus calming the storm and driving out the demons from the mad man.
My initial thoughts on this are about the "big picture" ramifications of Jesus' actions. The story tells us that Jesus drove the demons out of the man into the swine and the swineherd look on with amazement as their pigs rush to the lake and drown themselves.
What are we to make of this? Are the pigs less worthy than the man that they may be killed by the demons in order to save the man? Is the man and his life more important than the swineherd whose livelihood has just been lost? Has Jesus not heard of systems thinking?
At this point I am reminded of discussions about exegesis and eisogesis - are we drawing meaning out of the text or reading meaning into the text and how do we know?
I feel that the message here is about people's reaction to Jesus rather than his actions and miracles themselves.
The apparent power of Jesus' abilities engenders fear in people; they do not understand and feel out of control. Is it human nature to try and regain that control even with the illusion of sending the "offender" away? In society we marginalize people who do not fit in with social norms; we show little compassion or understanding and rarely see that there is anything for us to learn from them.
WWJD? It has been a long time since I have seen one of the bracelets announcing this question, but I think it is a good way to make decisions about how we treat people. What would Jesus do?
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