Who Is The Landlord?

One of the most significant stories in the Gospels is the encounter between Jesus Christ and the Demoniac at Gadara. I will not go into the exegesis of the differences between the stories as recorded in three Gospels – Matthew 8:28, Mark 5:1 and Luke 8:26.

These three accounts are the same. Matthew’s was the first written account and Mark wrote his much later. Luke and Mark’s accounts are almost the same. The major differences were that Mark decided to focus more on one of the demoniacs, possibly the one that was much more vocal and violent and how Jesus handled him. The other matter is the name of the place, which is Gerasenes and Gadarenes.

The event took place in a village called Gergesa in the country of the Gadarenes, whose largest city was Gadara. It is almost the same as describing a place like Cricklewood in England. But how many people in the USA or Asia can relate to such a place?

But if you say a town in North-West London or Greater London, it would be easier to people from other countries to easily relate to the place. Unfortunately, these are some of the things critics want to pinpoint as contradictions in the Bible when it is not.

So, I will pick the same context as Mark, because while Matthew was more general, Mark focused much more on one of the demoniacs and there are lots of insights for us in that account.

If you have not read the Part 1 of this article, I will encourage you to do so: Generation of Vipers!

Mark 5:1  And they came over unto the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes.

Mark 5:2  And when he was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs a man with an unclean spirit,

Mark 5:3  Who had his dwelling among the tombs; and no man could bind him, no, not with chains:

Mark 5:4  Because that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken in pieces: neither could any man tame him.

Mark 5:5  And always, night and day, he was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones.

Mark 5:6  But when he saw Jesus afar off, he ran and worshipped him,

Mark 5:7  And cried with a loud voice, and said, What have I to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of the most high God? I adjure thee by God, that thou torment me not.

Mark 5:8  For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou unclean spirit.

Mark 5:9  And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.

Mark 5:10  And he besought him much that he would not send them away out of the country.

Mark 5:11  Now there was there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding.

Mark 5:12  And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them.

Mark 5:13  And forthwith Jesus gave them leave. And the unclean spirits went out, and entered into the swine: and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea, (they were about two thousand;) and were choked in the sea.

Mark 5:14  And they that fed the swine fled, and told it in the city, and in the country. And they went out to see what it was that was done.

Mark 5:15  And they come to Jesus, and see him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid.

A legion is a division of 3,000–6,000 men, including a complement of cavalry, in the ancient Roman army.”

There is a lot to glean from this account – light and darkness clashes. Jesus and devils confront each other; a legion of demons can inhabit a man; devils are extremely scared of God’s judgement; animals don’t have the same spiritual capacity to retain spirit entities as humans, and so on.

But my core attention is to the habitation of the man by some 3,000 to 6,000 demons. But, why would a man have a huge capacity to contain such a large number of evil spirits?

Upon the confrontation that this man had with Jesus, he was asked his name. Most people would say Jesus was asking the devils their names. No, he was asking the man himself, but someone else answered.

“And he asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.” [Mark 5:9]

The text did not say “And He asked THEM”, but it said “him”. Jesus was talking to the man himself. Unfortunately, the man could not (or was not allowed) to answer the question, because he had become a prisoner in that body. How did we know this?

Jesus gave the insight at another place. “When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none. Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.” [Matthew 12:43-44 emphasis mine]

John spoke of Jesus further, “But he spake of the temple of his body.” [John 2:21]

Paul continued, “What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” [1 Corinthians 6:19]

Now that we know that inside a man, there is a house with a massive capacity, we must equally recognise that such a house has rooms or places of abode where these spirits can live.

What exactly is the house? Who is the Landlord?

Blaise Pascal, a famous French mathematician and philosopher, put it like this: “There is a God-shaped vacuum in the heart of every man which cannot be filled by any created thing, but only by God the Creator, made known through Jesus Christ.” In essence, he discovered that God created a house in Man, reserved just for His Spirit alone. Only God can fit perfectly into that vacuum, better than Cinderella could fit into her delicate pair of glass slippers.

A house is a secret place for a person to maximise self-expression. It is the place where his reality is given an unreserved opportunity to express itself.

Beautiful House by tpsdave@Pixabay

It is recorded, “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” [Genesis 2:7]

That living soul is the house – the place of abode for what makes up the man: the rooms of emotions, the room of the will, the room of the desires and the room of the mind.

The moment a person dies and the soul leaves the body, the body starts to disintegrate. So, it the soul that holds the body together.

A physical house does give an insight to this invisible (spiritual) house. A physical house has a place of rest, a place of entertainment, a place of preparing food and a place for refreshing oneself. The key thing is that the house has rooms.

The Bible tells us that Moses’ Tabernacle had three sections – the Outer Court, the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies – rooms. God’s House has rooms. And these rooms have sections that have special designation. For example, the Holy Place has a section for the Table of Shew Bread, another for the Golden Candlestick (Menorah), the Altar of Incense and the Veil. That is the same way the human being has been designed.

The Holy Place

What was happening with this demoniac when Jesus asked, “What is thy name?”

Revelation 3:20 reveal this to us, “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.”

Jesus stood at the door of the man’s house, knocked and asked, “What is thy name?” The man could not answer for himself. It was another person who answered on his behalf! “Legion,” it said.

Now we know that the man’s name was not Legion because the Bible went further to express that the evil spirits added, “for we are many”. One man cannot be many.

So, where is the man himself? He has been captured, turned into a prisoner, chained and shackled into a room in his own house! All the important rooms of his house have been taken over. He has been consigned to the dungeon of his house!

It was like when the Hitler’s Nazis invaded Austria. It was done subtly without firing a bullet. Hitler sent a forged telegram on behalf of the newly chosen Chancellor Arthur Seyss-Inquart that German Nazis were urgently needed in Austria due to an uprising. The rest of what happened to Austria as a result of that quiet invasion is history.

How Do These Strangers Take Over?
Well, as similar to what we see physically and also expressed in various examples in the Bible, there are so many ways for these strangers to take over a house. One of the easiest ways is an open invitation. The other is enforced entry. Between these two categories, there are many possibilities like the varying shades of grey. I will briefly explain each of these.

Open Invitation
God commanded the children of Israel that they should not make any mark on their bodies (tattoos). A tattoo is a gateway into the soul, as it deals with the blood of the bearer. We should remember that emblems are a representation of a personality. So, wearing a tattoo is creating an open invitation for evil spirits. Some even call it body art to minimise its true representation. It is nothing other than an altar of the personality. Your body is a temple!

There is an entanglement taking place there. I mean, there is a science that can help explain what is happening, it is called entanglement in quantum physics.

I love quantum physics. It made me understand Jesus Christ much more than I could ever try to reason with my mind. It clearly explained most of the miracles of Jesus in a way that modern man would understand.

In quantum physics, entanglement is a term used in quantum theory to describe the way that particles of energy/matter can become correlated to predictably interact with each other regardless of how far apart they are, such that the quantum state of each particle cannot be described independently of the others – the two are becoming one.

What about those who tattoo the photo of Jesus on their bodies? God said, “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth…” [Exodus 20:4] Any thing means ANY thing.

So, making a tattoo (done in direct disobedience to God) and covering it up with the Name of Jesus is still disobedience. In fact, evil spirits became evil simply because of their disobedience. And where there is disobedience they are attracted like flies to honey.

In other cases of an open invitation, people who dabble in magic (like I did before I met Christ), who deliberately invite these demons into their souls so as to be empowered to perform as an actor, singer, athlete, sports star, expert, etc.

When you hear that someone sold his soul to the devil, this is the situation; devils have been invited to take control of the house!

This should reveal to us that so many people today are filled with evil spirits and they are not in tombs like this demoniac. Many of them are in entertainment, sports, financial houses, governmental positions, religious houses, etc.

Enforced Entry
This usually takes place when the victim does not agree to the entrance and occupation of the evil spirits. These could be as a result of ancestral covenants or agreements made by an authority over the soul of such a person. Such examples include activities such as rape and incest. Another is agreements made on behalf of children who cannot make decisions by themselves. The authority figure in their lives can make agreements that are spiritually binding on them forever!

Enforced Entry by cocoparisienne@Pixabay

You would remember the testimony of that notorious figure that I shared a while ago, Shina Rambo. His mother covenanted him to God. He did all sorts of things and committed all sorts of crimes and even covenanted with devils, yet the covenant his mother made with God superseded the ones he made by himself.

Now that we have established that you are a house and that spirits would like to live in there, the question you need to ask yourself is: “Who is the landlord in my house?”

Many like to confess that Jesus is their Saviour and they are right, but because they equally reject His lordship, their houses are still being occupied by strangers, unfortunately.

They try to share the rooms between Christ and the devils, between light and darkness, hence you see that they are never making any progress in their walk with God. After a decade of being a Christian, you will struggle to truly identify them with the nature of Christ. Most of them are so worldly that you can’t notice the difference between them and unbelievers.

At Creation, God made that house for Himself alone, He cannot share it with another, but the devils also want the same place. They want to exalt their position above that of God’s in every life. For as long as you refuse the lordship of Jesus, devils will continue to live in that accommodation, irrespective of your confessions.

Only the truth can deliver you. And that means knowing the truth and living by the truth you know. Jesus said, “Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.” [John 15:3 emphasis mine]

A person who claims to be fasting and praying without abiding by the Word of God is deceiving himself. He will never be truly victorious!

One thing is certain, once these strangers gain entrance, they quickly start to fortify their presence through habits and development of character traits, which we call personality. The house starts to truly disintegrate. This disintegration is not usually visible immediately. It is not the same day a beautiful mansion infested by rats, snakes, thorns, salamanders, tigers, etc will display decay. It could take several decades.

Ruined House capture by KloxKlox@Pixabay

Expelling The Strangers
So, how do you expel these devils? You must know yourself. You must know the real YOU, your makeup. Your soul consists of the Will, the Emotions, the Mind and the Intellect. Understanding what these rooms are in your soul can make the difference between your captivity, deliverance and freedom.

The first thing is that, would these entities recognise you as an authority that can expel them?

“And there were seven sons of one Sceva, a Jew, and chief of the priests, which did so. And the evil spirit answered and said, Jesus I know, and Paul I know; but who are ye? And the man in whom the evil spirit was leaped on them, and overcame them, and prevailed against them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded.” [Acts 19:14-16]

“And the evil demon answered and said to them: Jesus I well know, and Paul I know, but as for you, who are ye?” (vs 15 Murdock translation, emphasis mine). They knew Jesus very well because He was ALWAYS doing the things that please His Father and always fellowshipping with Him. You must do the same.

When you are truly walking with Christ, they will know you by association. Your nature will gradually begin to experience a change, where His DNA will begin to modify yours.

Due to the entanglement taking place at the quantum level, a transformation will begin to take effect. This what Paul the apostle was begging fellow believers to understand and allow to take place in them. It is the ultimate in walking with God.

In fact, this is what the “rapture” is all about. The completion of this transformation. For some, they would arrive at the completion gradually, but for some others it would be instantaneous. He said it in 1 Corinthians 15:52:

In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.”

Golden Skyscraper by MichaelGaida@PixaBay

“Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men, they marvelled; and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus.” [Acts 4:13]

When you are so entangled with the Spirit of Christ, you will also experience what Jesus experienced when He walked the earth, as in the case of this demoniac – the spirits fled in terror!

Darkness will not be able to withstand you just as they could not withstand Jesus Christ when He walked the Earth. This is because you would be so full of His Spirit. Darkness cannot overcome His light (John 1:5).

You must DELIBERATELY engage your emotions, mind, will and desires in the things of God through the Word of God. That Word is light and destroys the habitations of darkness (John 1:5) and this leads to the displacement and automatic eviction of these evil spirits. How does this happen?

Again, in quantum physics, there is what is called superposition, in this we see a challenging concept about the nature and behaviour of matter and forces at the sub-atomic level. In other words, it is what happens when one wave is superimposed – ‘sat on top of’ – another. David experienced this concept in the Old Testament; being one of those who experienced the power of the world to come.

David said, “As soon as they hear of me, they shall obey me: the strangers shall submit themselves unto me.” [Psalm 18:44]

I believe that you have been empowered to understand the mystery of YOUR house and why you must remain as the landlord. You need to even go further by yielding the ownership to Christ so as to enjoy the supremacy or royalty that you deserve in a world that is filled with evil.

Immerse In The Presence of God
“But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him.” [John 4:23 emphasis mine]

Jehoshaphat was a Godly king who was troubled by strangers, but he immersed and invoked the Presence of God by ignoring his troubles and entangling himself with God through fasting, prayers and praise (2 Chronicles 20).

Who Is The Landlord?

“And when they began to sing and to praise, the LORD set ambushments against the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, which were come against Judah; and they were smitten.” [2 Chronicles 22]

You must believe that God honours those who sincerely seek Him for help. Charles Haddon Spurgeon once said:

A little faith will bring your soul to heaven; a great faith will bring heaven to your soul.”

Reference:

1. https://brotherjohn.org/generation-of-vipers/
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anschluss