I was once asked who I would consider good models of faith from the Bible. I offered a few names that came to mind immediately, but realized later that I don’t know the names of some of my most cherished heroes of the faith.
God didn’t reveal their names in his Word, but beyond his sovereign choice in that, many on the day Jesus met them would be categorized as rejects and burdens on their respective communities.
As I reflect on the many years I’ve spent living in small places, working to help and bless people others pay little attention to, my appreciation for what Jesus did to and for the nameless and hurting souls who were dying in small places has only deepened. After they met Jesus, they came to know new life, in the most real sense. One of the most memorable and encouraging is the Gadarene demoniac in the Gospel of Mark.
This man was plagued by demons and Mark’s account of his encounter with Jesus is nothing less than astonishing. This man existed with demons in a small cave. That cave system is still there, near a place now called Kursi on the eastern shore of the Sea of Galilee. I describe him as existing there because he wasn’t living, but rather dying in every way a man can die. He’d been isolated from every person he’d ever known and lost everything he’d ever valued or loved.
It's beyond my purpose here to recount the details, but I encourage you to revisit this demonized man and Jesus in Mark 5. Once Jesus removed the man from the demons’ influence, he famously sent the demon horde into a nearby group of pigs. When the townspeople who knew both the man and the herd understood what had happened, they pleaded with Jesus, asking him to leave. Why? They were overwhelmed by Jesus’s power.
They were the ones who had exiled the man from one of the towns of the Decapolis to the small group of caves next to the sea. They had tried to restrain and control him, but to no avail. Despite their best efforts, they couldn’t contain the demons, so they knew and were afraid of the power of the demons. But when Jesus, with a simple command, overcame them and did what they could not do all together, they wanted him to leave because they were more afraid of Jesus’s power than the presence of the demons.
Jesus did leave, but he demonstrated his love for those who were rejecting him out of ignorance by leaving behind exactly one witness, the man they had exiled to the caves who was now set free (Mark 5:19-20). The restored man remained among them, surely building relationships and sharing his testimony of God’s goodness and power in his life. We know that had a profound impact.
It can be easy to miss, but two chapters later, in Mark 7, Jesus revisits the same area he was asked to leave. But this time he was more than welcomed! Why? One likely contributing factor is the people were no longer afraid of Jesus’s power because they had heard of his goodness from someone they knew personally and knew was telling them the truth.
It takes time to build relationships in small towns like the one where my family lives and where I pastor a small church. But every chance the Lord gives me, I share his goodness and the power of his Gospel, partly because I’ve read how he uses people like me and the demoniac in Mark 5 to draw others to himself. This is also partly because I know that’s what he left us here to do—to tell others about him, as he said in Acts 1:8.
My family and I have learned that no matter how small the town in which we live, the goodness and power of Jesus Christ is always beyond measure. If we will trust him and die to our own pursuit of comfort and convenience, he will use our lives to show others how they can have new life in him.
Dave serves with Village Missions as a missionary pastor in rural New England, based in Middleton, New Hampshire. You can learn more about his work for the Lord at ScottFamilyJourney.org.