All In

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE

ALL IN

Luke 11:21-26

21 "When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own house, his possessions are safe. 22 But when someone stronger attacks and overpowers him, he takes away the armor in which the man trusted and divides up the spoils. 23 "He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me, scatters. 24 "When an evil spirit comes out of a man, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, 'I will return to the house I left.' 25 When it arrives, it finds the house swept clean and put in order. 26 Then it goes and takes seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that man is worse than the first." 

NIV    

Jesus is still talking or defending the charges that he cast out a mute spirit from this man with the power of Satan. After talking about a house divided, he continues with another parable of sorts about a strong man who guards his own house. Once again this is about Jesus being more powerful than Satan, or this demon. We see that Satan guards the house, the palace, the man, and his possessions are safe, he has complete control over his house, the man. But when a stronger man, Jesus comes along he takes the armor in which Satan trusted and gathers then man’s soul for himself. Again he tells them that he and Satan are opposed, and therefore it is not by Satan’s power, but by his own power, the finger of God. This is keeping in context with the whole narrative. But the rest of what Jesus tells them concerns how diligent Satan and his demons are in fighting to regain control of the house, the man, whose soul has been put in order. This is the point here Jesus is making about making sure after having our souls put into order by him, we need to make sure we stay with him, inviting him into our house, into our heart and not be empty, for if we remain empty we will be worse off than when he put our soul in order. We cannot live in two camps. We cannot love Jesus and also the things of the world. We cannot say we are Christians and still pursue our own dreams and desires. We cannot love Jesus and continue willingly yield to every temptation that Satan faces us with. Jesus is stronger the Satan, but we must live in the power of God, rather than in our own power, for we do not have enough power to battle Satan and his demons with all their temptations. If our heart and mind, soul and strength are not given completely to Jesus, demons more wicked than anything we have ever dealt with before will be gathering to attack us. It comes back to the beginning about any kingdom that is divided cannot stand. When we have a divided heart, mind, soul and strength we will fall to the legion of demons and their temptations. It may not seem like much and we might not even see them coming, and we might even think we are being a good Christian, but if we have divided our heart between Jesus and the world, there is a void within us that is subject to their attack. So then we need to make sure we are completely filled to the brim with the power of God in our lives. We need to be all in.