October 10

In the synagogue there was a man which had a spirit of an unclean devil. - Luke 4:33.

LET us glance at the subject of this miracle. In the days of our Saviour, demons seem to have been allowed to seize and to possess the bodies of men in some extraordinary and inexplicable manner; to show, perhaps, more sensibly, his victories over the powers of darkness, which are invisible to us, and to prove “that for this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” The sort of spirit possessing is commonly designated from the state of the being possessed. You read of “a deaf and dumb devil;” that is, the man was deaf and dumb. Here he is called “an unclean devil.”

All devils are unclean; they are all sinful. They are unclean in their natures, in their passions, in their actions, and in all their endeavours to make men unclean,-that is, to love sin, and to live in the practice of it. This man, though not perhaps old in years, was filled with the sins of his youth. His sin was now made his punishment. Satan had entered him corporeally as well as spiritually,-for he always possesses the soul of men. He that is governed by envy has the spirit of an envious devil; and he that is governed by malice has the spirit of a revengeful devil; and he who lives in chambering wantonness and sensuality has the spirit “of an unclean devil.”

All sin is of a defiling nature; and while any sin rules in a man, this sin keeps up a connection with the enemy of his soul, and he is “led captive by the devil at his will.” There are some who deny diabolical agency, but thereby they prove it the more, for “he blinds the minds of those who believe not.” And the apostle says, he is “the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience.”

Observe, Secondly, The scene of this miracle. The subject of this possession “of the spirit of an unclean devil” attended in the synagogue. This is no unusual thing. When “the sons of God” came to present themselves before the Lord, we read, in the book of Job, that “Satan came also, and presented himself among them.” He is excluded from heaven indeed, but Adam and Eve found him in Paradise, and our Saviour found him in the wilderness. Where can we be now so as to be inaccessible to him? He is said to be in the world, for “the world lieth in the wicked one;” but let none imagine that they are inaccessible to him when they are alone. Ah! David found him when he was alone on the housetop. Wherever we are, therefore, we should remember the words of our Saviour, “Watch and pray, lest ye enter into temptation.” We may find him at the throne of grace, standing at our right hand to resist us; at the Lord’s table, endeavouring to draw off our minds from the dying of the Lord Jesus; and we may find him in the house of God now, in our days. Satan has much to do in the synagogue,- much more than in many other places.

In Macgowan’s “Dialogue of Devils” there is this relation:-Two infernal spirits having met, one of them very warm and weary, the other cool and lively, after a little explanation it was found that he who was cool and lively had been to the play-house, where he had nothing to do; where they were all with him; where they were all of one mind, all doing his work. Whereas the other, who was warm and weary, said, “I have been at a place of worship, and I had much to do there: to make some sleep; to induce some to hear for others instead of themselves; to lead the thoughts of some, like the fool’s eye, unto the ends of the earth; to pick up, as fast as I could, the seed which was sown in the heart; and to turn away the point of the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God, lest it should pierce even to the dividing of the soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and be a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.”