Mark 5

Mark 5 tells us two stories.

The first is of Jesus casting out a host of demons from a gentile man in gentile territory. The man was possessed by many demons, apparently about two thousand. It's interesting to note that the livestock in this territory was pigs, which are unclean animals to the Jews. Jesus had no problem letting the demons enter the pigs, nor with the pigs being destroyed. I wonder if He would have let the demons possess and destroy sheep. I am assuming that He would not.

I heard a teaching about this story once and the teacher pointed out that we are created to inhabit a body. In the resurrection we will receive new, sinless bodies. But those who are cast into hell will not receive new bodies. They will still have all the carnal desires that ruled over them on earth, but they will have no bodily way to satisfy them for the rest of eternity. Demons are so desperate to inhabit a body because it is the only way they can satisfy their carnal desires, and they are willing to even inhabit animals rather than be without a body.

The most powerful thing that Jesus did in this story, though, was to turn the once demon possessed man into a great evangelist to the gentiles. And maybe that was the whole purpose of why Jesus crossed the sea in the first place.

The second story is of Jesus doing two awesome miracles that are linked in a peculiar way.

Jesus was approached by a synagogue leader who asked Him to heal his daughter. This shows that even though there were religious officials who violently opposed Jesus, there were still those who believed in Him. They were not all fools.

While Jesus was on His way to heal the man's daughter a woman who had an incurable illness snuck up and touched the hem of His garment - the symbol of His power and authority. She had been ill for 12 years, and she was healed the instant she demonstrated her faith in Jesus. Jesus Himself did not even know who she was - it was the act of faith alone that healed her. The first miracle that Jesus did was save her from her uncurable illness when she demonstrated her faith in Him.

Then Jesus went on to heal the now deceased daughter, who was 12 years old, and He raised her from the dead. The second miracle is that Jesus saved the daughter from death.

The two women are linked by the number 12, which is a number of divine order, completeness, and authority in the Bible. The progression of the story is that one was healed of an incurable illness by faith alone, and then the dead was raised back to life. It is our story.