Oculi 2025

Oculi (Lent III)

Luke 11:14-28

March 23, 2025

Today’s Gospel begins with Jesus “casting out a demon.” What are demons? The Epistle of Jude describes them as “angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode.” In other words, they are spirits who were part of God’s “host,” or military, but left their posts. Elsewhere God’s Word describes the demons particularly operating by telling lies, with the aim of destroying mankind. Some are very adept at damaging people through sickness and maladies. So Scripture gives us labels for different types of demons, such as spirits of error, spirits of weakness, and unclean spirits. The preeminent demon is sometimes called διάβολος, which means “the slanderer.” He is also called σατάν, “the adversary” or simply, “the enemy.” Every day bless yourself with the sign of the holy cross and ask for God’s protection against the demons.

But know this: Christ Jesus came to destroy the works of the demons. Wherever Jesus goes, He is doing battle with demons. It began with His own perfect obedience, not giving into temptation, as we heard on the First Sunday in Lent.

In last week’s Gospel, Jesus delivered a little girl who was afflicted by the work of a demon. Now today’s Gospel begins with Jesus casting out a demon that rendered a man incapable of speech.

But the enemies of Jesus say, “He casts out demons by Beelzebub, the ruler of the demons.” Beelzebub is a derivation of Baal-Zebub, which means “Lord of the Flies.” This is likely a deviation of the name this demon called himself, “Lord Prince.” They’re saying Jesus is really in league with the prince of demons.

Others in the crowd demanded another miracle. But Jesus didn’t do spectacular tricks for people. Everything He did was for setting the disordered world right. Jesus came to renew creation.

So He tells them, “Every kingdom divided against itself is brought to desolation, and a house divided against a house falls.” It defies common sense that the prince of demons would be used in exorcisms. Then Jesus reveals His purpose in the parable of the strong man:

“When a strong man, fully armed, guards his own palace, his goods are in peace.” The prince of demons is here called the “strong man.” Think of a tyrant, someone like Kim Jong Un or Xi Jinping. These men maintain strict order through a police state and heavy surveillance. “His goods are in peace,” meaning, there’s no rebellion. People know what will happen if they go against the tyrant.

What are the “goods” that the strong man in the parable owns? It’s people. The demonic powers hate God’s creation. They make nothing, they only corrupt and destroy. Man is the crown of God’s creation. The demons particularly strive to destroy mankind. Holy marriage, whereby a man and woman become an icon of Christ and the Church, and procreate – this especially must be stopped. Homosexuality, transgenderism, and the rejection of natural marriage—all this is the work of demons. Demons hate it when you have babies, and they really hate it when you bring them to Holy Baptism. Get married, have babies, bring them to baptism, raise them as Christians, stay married – this is the greatest thing you can do with your life.

So this strong man, the prince of demons, guards his palace, keeps his goods, the world population, under his iron grip. “But when a stronger than he comes upon him and overcomes him, he takes from him all his armor in which he trusted, and divides his spoils.” Jesus is this “stronger than he,” the stronger man who conquers the tyrant, the devil. Jesus conquers him by a kind of sneak attack: in the incarnation, God becomes a man, a humble man, a man without an army, without even a home. As David went out and faced Goliath with simply five smooth stones, so Jesus goes out with no armor but the Word of God, which David’s five smooth stones represented: the five books of Moses, the Pentateuch. This is also how we do battle. The holy Apostle Paul tells us to take “the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God” [Eph 6.16f].

Our own battle is under and behind the Champion, the Lord Jesus, who fights for us. He strips the enemy of his armor, and divides his spoils. Remember, the goods of the devil are the people he has captured. This means that you are God’s treasure, the ones in whom He delights. This “dividing of the spoils” is a reference to Is 53, the prophecy of Christ we read every Good Friday.

He shall divide the spoil with the strong,

Because He poured out His soul unto death,

And He was numbered with the transgressors,

And He bore the sin of many,

And made intercession for the transgressors. [v12]

When we see the connection between today’s Gospel and Is. 53, we learn that Jesus overcomes the devil specifically by His death. The death of Jesus liberates us. The demons promise freedom, but they enslave. To be in service to Jesus is to find the Truth … and the Truth shall set you free.

But this doesn’t happen in isolation. Jesus established His Church, and calls us into it. “He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who does not gather with Me scatters.” The Church is more significant than country, even more significant than family. We all owe Christ’s Church our service, our allegiance, our money, our everything. Christ’s Church is not defined by a bureaucracy or a bishop. The Bishop of Rome says all must submit to him. But the teaching of the ancient catholic Church held that all bishops are equal. The chief statement of the Reformation, the Augsburg Confession, gives us a simple statement for understanding what the Church is: “The Church is the congregation of saints in which the Gospel is purely taught and the Sacraments are correctly administered” [VII.1]. So we cling to Christ where He has promised to be: in the Gospel and the Sacraments.

After the little parable of the strong man, Jesus teaches about the danger facing His disciples, specifically, the danger of falling away. He says,

“When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest; and finding none, he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it swept and put in order. Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first.”

“When Satan is cast out, he must be replaced with his conqueror, Jesus” [Just]. The man freed from bondage to demons, this man freed from slavery to sin – his house is unfurnished. It’s swept and put in order, like a house cleaned up and emptied after a sale – but imagine the new owners never furnish the empty house. A void is left. We cannot remain neutral regarding Jesus. It’s all or nothing. You cannot serve two masters. You cannot be a disciple of Jesus and pursue the world’s priorities. We must keep on growing as disciples, furnishing the house.

Otherwise, the void will be filled. You hear about these houses where the owner is away for a little while, and squatters take up residence. They often destroy the place. That’s what’s being described here, except the “house” is you. Don’t let squatters in! You were not made to be the haunt of demons. So don’t give demons access to your soul. You do that when you look at vile images, or let foul words infest your mind. You were made for communion with God. St. Augustine said it well in his Confessions: “Thou hast made us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.”

Today’s Gospel concludes with someone in the crowd praising Jesus’ mother. And indeed, Mary is to be honored among us, and remembered. Through her body God became flesh. But there is no teaching anywhere in God’s Word that we are to regard her as without sin. We are not to call upon her, for we have specific command in Holy Scripture to only call upon God for help. Sadly the Roman Church has essentially deified Mary, and keeps changing its doctrine away from the Church of the Apostles. In 1854 the Pope announced a new dogma, that Mary was conceived without sin. It wasn’t until 1950 that the dogma was proclaimed that Mary was bodily taken up (or “assumed”) into heaven. What these items reveal is that the so-called Catholic Church is not catholic in its teachings.

To be catholic is to hold to the catholic doctrine, the doctrine handed down to us by the Apostles in their own writings, which is to say, the Bible. We also study the early Fathers to see how they understood the Bible. What you find in the dogmas of the later Roman Church deviates from this.

But we should not react to these errors by failing to honor our Lord’s blessed mother. And we shouldn’t think that Christ dishonored His mother in His response to the woman in the crowd who shouts, “Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts which nursed You!”

No, Jesus tells us why His mother is blessed, and calls us to imitate her. He replies, “More than that, blessed are those who hear the word of God and keep it!” That’s what we always see Mary doing: she listens to God’s Word and ponders it in her heart. She entrusts herself to God, submits to His will. Her words to the servants at the wedding at Cana speak also to us: “Whatever He says to you, do it.” We pay attention to what Christ says.

So that’s our goal for this week: What Jesus says to us in the Bible, we do that. We flee from the things of Satan. We furnish our houses with good things, holy things. Jesus is Lord over the demons. Jesus is Lord of His Church. Jesus is your Lord. Blessed are you who hear His Word and cling to it! +INJ+