When Jesus and His disciples arrived on the other side of the sea of Galilee, in the country of the Gergesenes, there was a man that had been possessed by devils for a long time. He lived in the tombs and he was so frightening that nobody would pass by. He was kept in chains at first but he broke the chains and the devils drove him out into the wilderness. The devils called out from the man to Jesus as He came near, What business do you have with us Jesus, Son of God? Have you come to torment us? Jesus asked, What's your name? And he said, Legion; because many demons had possessed him. They begged Jesus not to send them into the abyss.

Now, what the heck is the abyss? If you like elaborate explanations of things, you can think of it this way: It's the chaos and utter darkness of space before the creation of the universe. Well, you say, once the universe was created, it was put in the place of the abyss, right? Only if the universe is never ending, but if the universe is only the part of neverendingness that humans can comprehend, then the abyss would have to be outside the universe somewhere. Golly, it's one of those things that are difficult to put into words and if you think about 'em long enough, you may need aspirin, but you could look at it this way: God existed always. He always was and He always will be. For ever and for ever and for ev ev ev evevevevevevever. Now that first part (He always was) is hard to comprehend because infinity in our minds only goes in one direction for some reason. So just as nobody can tell you when the beginning of the existence of God is, neither has anyone been to the abyss and back to explain it's locality and details, but in simpler terms, it's the bottomless pit. If that's part of the universe to the "scientific" mind, it doesn't really matter. In short, it's not a desirable place. Now, back to our story.

There was a herd of swine feeding on the mountain and the demons that possessed this man begged Jesus that He would allow them to enter into the swine instead of being sent into the abyss. Jesus said, Go, and when the devils came out, they entered the herd of swine and the whole herd ran violently down to a deep place in the sea and the swine died in the waters. The keepers of the herd of swine fled and told everyone in the city and the country how Jesus healed the man by simply telling the devils to leave him.

The entire city came to see what happened. When they found Jesus and saw the man who the devil was cast out of, sitting at Jesus' feet and in his right mind, it scared them. All the people of the Gergesenes requested that Jesus leave their country because they were so afraid because of what they had seen and heard.

The man who Jesus healed asked if he could follow Him, but Jesus sent him home saying, Go to your own house and show the great things God has done to you. So the man went his way and spread the news through the whole city of the miracle Jesus did for him.

You probably know someone who has experienced evil spirits before. Most of us don't know anyone who has been possessed by them or has needed an exorcism to get rid of them. But something to keep in mind is that the words and actions of someone who an evil spirit is working through, are not coming from that person. Evil spirits don't like to be identified, but the sooner they are, the sooner they leave, kind of like mildew to light. Just because you see mold in the back of your refrigerator one day, that doesn't mean you'll never speak to your refrigerator again. You clean it out and you think it's your cool friend once again, but if you weren't there to help it, it could become an huge ugly problem. Sometimes things like pride, selfishness, greed, lust, jealousy, gluttony, anger . . . they can be evil spirits. You can identify them in yourself as well as others. Follow Jesus' example. Identify them, speak it out loud, then tell them truth and tell them to GO, IN JESUS' NAME! Tell them YOU belong to JESUS. You will be shocked at how quickly the mind and heart clear.