No Other Rock

And they began to pray Him to depart out of their coasts. ~ Mark 5:17

After learning about Jesus chasing the 2,000 demons from the man, you would think that all those around Him would be bowing and praising Him. But instead, he was asked to no longer occupy their region. Why?

Greed and selfishness.

What was the material expense spiritually freeing this man? Pigs.

At this point, Baxter provides a few lines by John Oxenham:

Rabbi, begone! Thy powers
Bring loss to us and ours.
Our ways are not as Thine.
Thou lovest men, we–swine.
Oh, get you hence, Omnipotence,
And take this fool of Thine!
His soul? What care we for his soul?
What good to us that Thou hast made him whole,
Since we have lost our swine?

And Christ went sadly.
He had wrought for them a sign
Of Love, and Hope, and Tenderness divine;
They wanted–swine.
Christ stands without _your_ door and gently knocks;
But if your gold, or swine, the entrance blocks,
He forces no man’s hold–he will depart,
And leave you to the treasures of your heart.

Jesus was rejected and IS REJECTED because when He comes, the swine must go. Instead, men say, I must have the swine, the unclean. Baxter sums it up well when he says, “The greatest hindrance to the spread of the Gospel is not Satanic power, but human selfishness.“

Today, my prayer for you and I is that we will make it a daily prayer and goal to rid the poison-weed of selfishness - that it will be torn completely from our hearts.

tags: John Oxenham, selfishness, greed, supernatural intervention