I know who You are -- the Holy One of God!

 

Jesus teaching in the temple, fresco, 14th cent. (after John 7:37).  Vysokie Dechani Serbian Orthodox Christian Monastery, Kosovo

 Then He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching them on the Sabbaths.  And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority.  Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon.  And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, "Let us alone!  What have we to do with You, Jesus of Nazareth?  Did You come to destroy us?  I know who You are -- the Holy One of God!"  But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be quiet, and come out of him!"  And when the demon had thrown him in their midst, it came out of him and did not hurt him.  Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, "What a word this is!  For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out."  And the report about Him went out into every place in the surrounding region.

 

- Luke 4:31–37 

 

Yesterday we read that, after His forty days of temptation, Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and news of Him went out through all the surrounding region.  And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.  So He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up.  And as His custom was, He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and stood up to read.  And He was handed the book of the prophet Isaiah.  And when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written:  "The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, because He has anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed; To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD."  Then He closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant and sat down.  And the eyes of all who were in the synagogue were fixed on Him.  And He began to say to them, "Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing."   So all bore witness to Him, and marveled at the gracious words which proceeded out of His mouth.  And they said, "Is not this Joseph's son?"  He said to them, "You will surely say this proverb to Me, 'Physician, heal yourself!  Whatever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in Your country.'"  Then He said, "Assuredly, I say to you, no prophet is accepted in his own country.  But I tell you truly, many widows were in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, and there was a great famine throughout all the land; but to none of them was Elijah sent except to Zarephath, in the region of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.  And many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed except Naaman the Syrian."  So all those in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled with wrath, and rose up and thrust Him out of the city; and they led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw Him down over the cliff.  Then passing through the midst of them, He went His own way.

 

Then He went down to Capernaum, a city of Galilee, and was teaching them on the Sabbaths.  My study bible cites St. Ambrose of Milan, who comments that Christ begins preaching and healing on the Sabbaths in order to show that "the new creation began where the old creation ceased."

And they were astonished at His teaching, for His word was with authority.  To teach with authority makes Jesus quite different from both the prophets of old and the teachers of His day.  Usually teaching would happen in the third person (i.e. "The Lord says"), or citing the teaching of a famous rabbi.  But Christ teaches in the first person, saying, "I say to you."

Now in the synagogue there was a man who had a spirit of an unclean demon.  And he cried out with a loud voice, saying, "Let us alone!  What have we to do with You, Jesus of Nazareth?  Did You come to destroy us?  I know who You are -- the Holy One of God!"   Here is something to remark about:  Jesus' presence stirs the demons and exposes them.  They know who He is, and that He is their powerful opponent.

But Jesus rebuked him, saying, "Be quiet, and come out of him!"  Jesus commands the unclean demon to be quiet so as not to reveal His identity as the Christ, the Messiah.   My study bible offers several reasons for this, citing the prophecy of Isaiah as foreseeing this need (Isaiah 42:1-4).   The reasons for secrecy include first, the growing hostility of the Jewish leaders.  Then there is the danger of the people's confusion of the Messiah with an expected earthly, political leader, as opposed to Jesus' preaching the gospel of the Kingdom.  Also, Christ's desire is to evoke genuine faith, which is not based solely on marvelous signs. 

 

And when the demon had thrown him in their midst, it came out of him and did not hurt him.  Then they were all amazed and spoke among themselves, saying, "What a word this is!  For with authority and power He commands the unclean spirits, and they come out."  And the report about Him went out into every place in the surrounding region.  Jesus forbids the demon from openly declaring Him to be the Christ, the Holy One of God.  But let us note that His authority and power cannot be hidden. 

 

Christ's public ministry begins with a revelation of His identity, although inadvertent.  It does not come from Jesus, but comes from the unclean demons responding to His presence.  Once He has begun to preach on the Sabbaths, the response of the demons makes it clear they fear His presence.  They worry that the time has come for their destruction, and they clearly know that Christ, "the Holy One of God," has this power.  They already fear a final judgment, and that the time has come.  So what our text tells us today is that although Jesus does not want to make any sort of public declaration about His identity as Messiah, His authority and power are nevertheless revealed, and cannot be hidden.  They are at work in the power to cast out the unclean demon and also to silence it.  His authority and power are at work in His preaching, in which He notably speaks in the first person -- that is, "with authority" -- and the people clearly notice and remark upon this.  So what we can notice about this is that, even though Jesus refrains from speaking in public about His own identity as the Christ, and He also commands the unclean spirit to be quiet so as not to reveal this identity, the signs of His identity are nevertheless all there.  This is an important thing to realize when we speak of Christ and the stories in the Gospels, because the notion of a "sign" is quite important.  Everything Jesus does:  the preaching of the Gospel of the Kingdom, and especially His miraculous doings such as turning water to wine, healing the sick, and most exceptionally the raising of Lazarus, are all "signs," and quite clearly called so especially in the Gospel of John.  All of these signs can also be called manifestations of the presence of the Kingdom, and the power and authority of the Son of God.  The title by which the demon refers to Jesus, "the Holy One of God," is most particularly an important title for today's reading, because it establishes, so early in the public ministry of Christ, a particular distinction for Jesus.  He is not "a" holy one of God.  He is "the Holy One of God."  The word Christ or Messiah is not openly used by the demon, but "the Holy One of God" has a clear and distinct meaning without naming Him as Messiah.  However, Jesus' distinctiveness, despite His "hiding" of His full identity as Messiah at this stage of His ministry, is nevertheless present in the signs so far observed by people.  He speaks with authority, and He commands the demons, so both His authority and power are manifest as signs of who He is.  And this should make us think also about our own identities in Christ, and who we are.  We might not be called to go out and proclaim something about ourselves, but as followers of Christ, we nevertheless hope that we, also, manifest signs of the presence of the Kingdom, also known to us as fruits of the Spirit.  St. Paul lists among these fruits love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.  And he adds that against such there is no law, testifying to the grace present in these fruits.  (See Galatians 5:22-23.)   Without publicly declaring ourselves as figures of discipleship with some sort of title to identify ourselves, these fruits or signs that manifest of our faith and the works that are products of that faith tell us about ourselves and our identity, and they tell others as well -- who may or may not understand the fullness of what is manifest and whence it comes.  But we will know and feel the products of grace in our lives.  Just like Jesus' "fruits" are signs of His real identity, so these signs or manifestations -- as small as they might seem -- are clues to who we are.  Possibly most importantly, they are clues as to vocation.  They give us hints about the road we're on, the journey our faith in Christ takes us on.  Just like the demons, there may be some people in our lives who react quite adversely to what we know to be manifestations of our faith, and that may -- fortunately or unfortunately -- give us a clue about where our own path of vocation in Christ may diverge from the paths of others.  On the other hand, there are those who will recognize the fruits of the Spirit in us for what they are, and value them deeply -- again, giving us a clue as to vocation and where our paths coincide with others who are part of the communion we have joined.  So for today, let us think about vocation, and observe how Christ's vocation or true identity cannot help but be manifest in the various signs that cause people to marvel and demons to fear.  We are but followers of our Lord, and our own paths must also be met as vocation, the signs of grace giving us help for discernment and the leading of the Spirit.  In all things, Jesus follows the Father and is helped and led by the Spirit.  He has also been ministered to by the angels, and will continually seek personal time in prayer.  Let us be like Him, for the disciple is not greater than the Master (Luke 6:40).  If we follow in humility, so we also might bear signs of the Kingdom.  In the icon fresco, above, Jesus offers the waters of the Holy Spirit to all who thirst (John 7:37), and so it is for those who would find their true vocation in faith.