“28 Days
Later”
[A sermon on the Gerasene
Demoniac]
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A sermon preached at Readings: Psalm
42, Luke 8:26-39 |
“A man of the city
who had demons met him”
(Luke 8:27)
I don’t know how many of you watch horror films –
if not, you may have missed a recent film called "28 Days Later".
It is, I must confess, pretty grim and violent stuff
in parts,
but it actually raises some important questions about
sin and evil.
The plot – or at least the first bit,
so that I don’t spoil it for any who will be rushing to the video store
on the way home from Church tonight – is as follows.
Animal rights activists release some monkeys from a laboratory,
and unwittingly release a deadly virus.
The key symptom of infection is rage.
The virus is highly contagious and almost instantaneous in effect.
As soon as someone is infected
they almost immediately become uncontrollably and ferociously angry,
attacking, maiming and killing all in their reach.
The main action of the film begins 28 days later,
by which time London is a ghost town –
and nearly everyone in the country
has been killed by crazed victims of the rage virus.
The odd of pocket of uninfected people are holed up
and forced to flee from or kill those who are infected.
The film may be implausible in several ways,
(and the medics question whether a virus could ever quite work like this).
But as a parable it certainly raises a number of questions
about the nature of evil
and about how we respond to an explosion of contagious evil and hate.
It is interesting to compare the story line with
today’s set NT lesson –
the story of the Gerasene demoniac.
Here also is someone who appears to have been
infected with radical raging evil,
someone who (like one of the characters in the film)
is chained up in order to protect others from his screaming rage.
These
2 stories – of modern London & ancient Galilee -
in many ways pose similar questions
1. What is the nature of evil?
2. How do we respond to it?
1. What is the nature of evil?
Where does it come from?
What is the relationship between sickness and moral failure?
Are people who do hurtful things mad or bad?
Are they victims or villains?
Well
the answer is a bit of both.
We know very well that
·
a member of a crowd is more likely to commit
hooligan acts of vandalism than is a solitary person.
·
an abused child is more likely to become an abusing adult –
We are often contaminated, infected, by the
contagion of sin.
People are born in places where a particular strain of sin
is virulent and endemic in their society or culture -
and we do well to remember that
before rushing to judgment
when we see others sinning,
be it a road rage outburst or a serial killing spree.
So sin is in a real sense a
sickness, an infection.
But at the same time we do have choice as how to
live –
and whilst we may give generous allowance to others who sin,
we should not thereby be too lax with ourselves –
The demons may lay siege to our lives at times,
and sometimes they may barge in unwanted and unlooked for –
but we should not make that an excuse
for flinging the door wide open and encouraging them in.
We get ill sometimes for reasons quite beyond our
control -
But we will still live healthier lives
if we make good and healthy lifestyle decisions.
Sin and evil are in one sense part and parcel of the
human sickness
in another sense they are a matter of choice.
2. How
do we respond to evil?
The men of Galilee chained up the Demoniac,
and banished him to the tombs and caves
There is an interesting exchange in the film “28 Days Later”
in which the non infected couple discuss what to do.
The man talks about what is a good thing to do.
The girl scoffs and tells him that morality is a luxury he can’t afford –
it is kill or be killed.
And indeed, in the film the rage sufferers are occasionally imprisoned,
but more often killed before they in turn can kill.
And in those stories we see the traditional responses of human society
to anger, rage and evil –
control and neutralise the evil at the expense of the freedom,
and if necessary the life,
of the perpetrator.
But that is not how Jesus deals with the demoniac.
He doesn’t condemn him, shun him, kill him, imprison him -
rather he meets with him and talks with him
and accepts him for who he is, and heals him.
And when in our age we find ourselves confronted
by the rage and the anger of confused
and embittered people,
we may be tempted to wash our hands of them,
to deport them to a foreign land,
or simply “lock them up and thrown away the key” -
But Jesus calls us rather to accept and love them.
The horror movie talks about the contagion of anger –
and you don’t need horror videos to see that at work –
just see a demagogue whipping up race hatred
and you see the contagion of anger and hate.
But there is an even stronger virus – it is the virus of love.
I remember years ago someone organising a 24 hr smiling day -
they told everyone to smile all day –
and of course they were good days –
because when you smile at everyone in the street,
some keep scowling back but many respond with their own smile –
the contagion of love and peace and joy is actually ultimately
more powerful that the contagion of hate and evil.
Of course these things are not as easy as preachers might make them
sound.
·
Yes of course we
sometime have to lock people up
for their own safety and the safety of others –
but in care not in hatred.
·
And yes of
course to fight the virus of hate
with the antidote of love can be a risky affair.
And sometimes yes the virus seems too strong
and the anger and hate and evil destroys the one who
loves.
We cannot as Christians guarantee how these things will go.
What we can guarantee is this.
That Jesus took the ultimate risk of fighting evil with love,
and the contagion of evil seemed to eat him up,
the devils seemed to overwhelm him,
as he ended up on a cross.
And 28 days later?
Never mind 28 days later, just 3 days later,
the man who seemed to have been condemned to a tomb
like the ones the demoniac haunted,
burst out in love and power.
We live in an infected world -
the world of sin and anger and hate.
It has reached epidemic proportions.
In this world none of us may ever be quite clear of its debilitating power.
But
there is a cure –
in the words of my favourite of all Wesley’s hymns: (Hymns and Psalms 275)
Jesus, my all in all thou art…..
The med'cine
of my broken heart.