Luke 11:15-26
15But some of them said, "He casts out demons by Be-el'zebul, the prince of demons"; 16while others, to test him, sought from him a sign from heaven. 17But he, knowing their thoughts, said to them, "Every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and a divided household falls. 18And if Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by Be-el'zebul. 19And if I cast out demons by Be-el'zebul, by whom do your sons cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. 20But if it is by the finger of God that I cast out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. 21When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are in peace; 22but when one stronger than he assails him and overcomes him, he takes away his armor in which he trusted, and divides his spoil. 23He who is not with me is against me, and he who does not gather with me scatters. 24"When the unclean spirit has gone out of a man, he passes through waterless places seeking rest; and finding none he says, `I will return to my house from which I came.' 25And when he comes he finds it swept and put in order. 26Then he goes and brings seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first."
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But the devil cannot really hide themselves. When we pray,
they are disturbed. When we say the name of Jesus, they are trembled. When we
cast them in the name of God, they cannot do anything but to depart. If they
resist they get burned with the Holy Water and the Holy Oil. They shout in pain
in the presence of relics. Their ears are pounded with the praying of the
rosary. They tremble in fear with the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary. They
become powerless in the face of the Blessed Sacrament where they are forced to
reveal their name. The Blessed Sacrament is Jesus. Jesus is the finger of God.
The command of God that gives us the authority to cast out demons.
Jesus warned us, because there is always retaliation in the part of the devil. The evil spirits would not be contented so they usually take revenge. I, myself, also suffered after this event I fell so sick for a week until I was given a counseling by another exorcist brother.
Unless we change our heart and mind, then they will no longer possess us through their vile charms that would bring our soul with them to hell. The dreadful charms are usually the luxury in life that we learn to live and love. Fame, Power, and Riches… all of these are the desire of every man. All of these are what the devil is offering.
The Pharisees always wanted fame for they don't want anymore to accept the promised Messiah; power since they always wanted to be in control; and riches because they already corrupted the Church by turning it into a den of thieves… with all these, they failed to recognize the humble, obedient and merciful Jesus Christ... the promised Messiah of God.
Do you accept Jesus? Say AMEN, if you believe in Jesus! den mar
With the good intention of Jesus in casting off the evil spirits the Pharisees only recognized
When we failed to see God in others, maybe something dark evil is happening inside us.
The reading for today has many dimensions. First, the
reality of the spiritual world; Second is the human response to the reality of
the spiritual world; and third is the connection of the Spiritual World to our
physical world.
First, the reality of the spiritual world. One of Jesus’
ministry is healing. And part of his healing ministry is casting out of demons
from the person they possessed.
When Jesus drove out the devil, the Pharisees accused him as
being the leader of the evil spirits that’s why they obey. But Jesus gave them
an analogy making them realized that they are just accusing Jesus with no basis
at all.
Truly in our time, demonic possessions still happens. Many times, during my Cagayan de Oro exposure, we encountered some of these unexplained phenomena. There was a time that when I was blessing a house, some dark silhouettes—a darker than dark figures suddenly fled from the room we just blessed. Our lighted candles were suddenly extinguished, the dogs were howling, the lights, all of a sudden, just get busted. Out of the total darknes... and one of the children from the other room suddenly screamed with a voice laughing and cursing Jesus. Someone rushed for a flash light and when we checked the boy, his eyes were all black. The boy was laughing and cursing us with a big dark coarse voice. There’s no way to go for us but to continue the house blessing and to proceed to exorcism. The family was too afraid. Me too, I felt the goose-bumps suddenly rising in my entire body. I commanded the spirit, “in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit… in the name of Jesus… i command you to depart and go to the foot of the cross!” I sprinkled the holy water and the boy’s body was smoking as if burned by the holy water. The boy fainted. And there was silence…. no more creepy howling of dogs. We cannot believed to what we have witnessed. I asked the family, if they still go to church, they answered me honestly, “not anymore…”
The devil lurks on people who are not prayerful that’s why Jesus always tells us to pray more, o pray pervently and to pray even harder.
Second is our attitude about the spiritual world, Fr. Syquia, the exorcist of Manila always tells us in our class-- all of us, men and women of the church have business in this world. Our business is Spiritual because there is a Spiritual battle that is really happening that we don’t see. The priesthood was given a ministry of driving the devil. For me, I was a seminarian given an authority by the Parish Priest who has a faculty delegated to him by our Bishop. In this sense, we drive spirit not as being alone, but as an entire Church.
But in the Gospel, the Pharisees, instead of becoming thankful, they even accused Jesus to be the leader of the evil spirits. With their jealous hearts they failed to discern who Jesus really is and they fell into the devil's trap of ‘crab mentality.’
Third, the reading for today is leading us to understand the connection of the spiritual world to our physical world... metaphysics. God is a pure spirit. God created other Spirits who were angels before us. But some of the angels rejected God's plan for man so they defected and from then on went hunting us human to abominate the creative power of the will of God. They cannot accept that Jesus will become man. The devil cannot accept that they will serve man. For these full of pride fallen angels, they are superior than man. But when Jesus became man, Jesus became an embodied spirit. Jesus became like us, an embodied spirit. So the devil always tries to destroy us because they see the image of God in us.
Before, there are such mythical ‘dwarfs,’ ‘fairies’ and even ‘dark creatures.’ They show their power to heal, to control things and to threaten us just to make themselves appears to be stronger than the God we serve. But now, according to a Franciscan priest I just knew, they decided not to reveal themselves so that it would appear that there is no God.
Truly in our time, demonic possessions still happens. Many times, during my Cagayan de Oro exposure, we encountered some of these unexplained phenomena. There was a time that when I was blessing a house, some dark silhouettes—a darker than dark figures suddenly fled from the room we just blessed. Our lighted candles were suddenly extinguished, the dogs were howling, the lights, all of a sudden, just get busted. Out of the total darknes... and one of the children from the other room suddenly screamed with a voice laughing and cursing Jesus. Someone rushed for a flash light and when we checked the boy, his eyes were all black. The boy was laughing and cursing us with a big dark coarse voice. There’s no way to go for us but to continue the house blessing and to proceed to exorcism. The family was too afraid. Me too, I felt the goose-bumps suddenly rising in my entire body. I commanded the spirit, “in the name of the Father, of the Son and of the Holy Spirit… in the name of Jesus… i command you to depart and go to the foot of the cross!” I sprinkled the holy water and the boy’s body was smoking as if burned by the holy water. The boy fainted. And there was silence…. no more creepy howling of dogs. We cannot believed to what we have witnessed. I asked the family, if they still go to church, they answered me honestly, “not anymore…”
The devil lurks on people who are not prayerful that’s why Jesus always tells us to pray more, o pray pervently and to pray even harder.
Second is our attitude about the spiritual world, Fr. Syquia, the exorcist of Manila always tells us in our class-- all of us, men and women of the church have business in this world. Our business is Spiritual because there is a Spiritual battle that is really happening that we don’t see. The priesthood was given a ministry of driving the devil. For me, I was a seminarian given an authority by the Parish Priest who has a faculty delegated to him by our Bishop. In this sense, we drive spirit not as being alone, but as an entire Church.
But in the Gospel, the Pharisees, instead of becoming thankful, they even accused Jesus to be the leader of the evil spirits. With their jealous hearts they failed to discern who Jesus really is and they fell into the devil's trap of ‘crab mentality.’
Third, the reading for today is leading us to understand the connection of the spiritual world to our physical world... metaphysics. God is a pure spirit. God created other Spirits who were angels before us. But some of the angels rejected God's plan for man so they defected and from then on went hunting us human to abominate the creative power of the will of God. They cannot accept that Jesus will become man. The devil cannot accept that they will serve man. For these full of pride fallen angels, they are superior than man. But when Jesus became man, Jesus became an embodied spirit. Jesus became like us, an embodied spirit. So the devil always tries to destroy us because they see the image of God in us.
Before, there are such mythical ‘dwarfs,’ ‘fairies’ and even ‘dark creatures.’ They show their power to heal, to control things and to threaten us just to make themselves appears to be stronger than the God we serve. But now, according to a Franciscan priest I just knew, they decided not to reveal themselves so that it would appear that there is no God.
Jesus warned us, because there is always retaliation in the part of the devil. The evil spirits would not be contented so they usually take revenge. I, myself, also suffered after this event I fell so sick for a week until I was given a counseling by another exorcist brother.
Unless we change our heart and mind, then they will no longer possess us through their vile charms that would bring our soul with them to hell. The dreadful charms are usually the luxury in life that we learn to live and love. Fame, Power, and Riches… all of these are the desire of every man. All of these are what the devil is offering.
The Pharisees always wanted fame for they don't want anymore to accept the promised Messiah; power since they always wanted to be in control; and riches because they already corrupted the Church by turning it into a den of thieves… with all these, they failed to recognize the humble, obedient and merciful Jesus Christ... the promised Messiah of God.
Do you accept Jesus? Say AMEN, if you believe in Jesus! den mar
With the good intention of Jesus in casting off the evil spirits the Pharisees only recognized
When we failed to see God in others, maybe something dark evil is happening inside us.
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