The insufferable days run together. Why is it always dark, or does it just seem so? The chains cut his arms and legs, making them slippery with his own blood where they dig in deeply, biting through his skin, especially when he struggles against them. But he refuses to feel the pain. He stinks and can’t remember the last time he bathed. His animal ferocity is known far and wide and he relishes the abject fear in the eyes of those unfortunate enough to cross his path.
When did this never-ending nightmare of evil begin? Sometimes, but not often, he is able to reach far back into his hazy mind and remember fragments of something different. But the details are fuzzy and fleeting. And it’s just too exhausting to try. So he doesn’t usually try.
Darian is hated by everyone in his village and the surrounding countryside, with good reason. Whenever he’s able to free himself from his bonds, the soldiers invariably find him, catch him, and chain him up again in this horrible place full of dead men’s bones. This unclean place where the dead still walk and dark spirits torture him. His captors throw scraps of food from a safe distance. Darian lunges and struggles against his chains when they come into sight, and he loves the way they jump, startled, suddenly afraid. Throw the food and run. He screams obscenities and laughs at them, cursing them for their cowardice.
And the chains. Darian is always able to break free of them, eventually. They haven’t found any yet that will hold him for long. He compartmentalizes the pain, refusing to feel it as he strains against them. What will he do when he breaks these new ones? Steal some food first off. Lots of it. And God help anyone who gets in his way.
Something interrupts his reverie, jerking him back to the present. He strains again with all his strength against the chains, suddenly feeling them break apart. Freedom!
He hears something. What is that sound? Voices. But these are new ones Darian hasn’t heard before. Some new game, maybe?
As the small group of men walk into sight, Darian, now free, quickly runs toward them. He loves to smell their fear when he looms up in front of his unsuspecting victims. They’re usually too terrified to run, so remain rooted to the ground, mouths agape, waiting. Waiting to see what he might do to them.
But not this time.
Who is that man in the front? His calm stance clearly identifies him as the leader. All eyes in the group turn to him. Darian senses real authority emanating from this man. He can almost see it. What is he saying?
“What is your name?”
Suddenly Darian is on his knees as an unseen hand forcefully throws him down and he hears his own voice, sounding strangely guttural in his ears, replying, “My name is Legion, for we are many.”
Eyes suddenly open wide and jaws drop. A nervous murmur spreads through the men gathered around their leader.
And then everything happens at once. That voice again – issuing a command that cannot be disobeyed.
Darian watches, as if from a distance, his own body contorting violently from a seizure. He falls heavily to the ground, roiling the dust at his feet, and at the same time he catches the unmistakable sound and smell of a herd of pigs running hard as if from an unseen specter. He watches mesmerized, as they run, unheeding, straight off a cliff plunging to their deaths in the water far below.
Darian’s eyes close and a heavy sigh escapes his lips. And then his mind goes empty.
The next thing he knows, he’s sitting on the ground fully clothed, and that man – someone called him Jesus – is smiling at him. What happened?
Jesus talks with Darian in a gentle voice filled with compassion and yes, there is, unmistakably, love in his eyes. Darian suddenly feels himself smiling back. And there is a joy bubbling in his heart he can’t remember ever feeling before. Inexplicable.
The conversation ended too soon for Darian’s liking. He wanted more.
“Please, Rabbi, let me go with you. Let me follow along with you.”
But Jesus tells him no. “I want you to go tell everyone in your village what wonderful things God has done for you.”
Delivered. Released. Forgiven. Darian knows he’ll spend the rest of his life finding the right words.
He owes Jesus so much.
This story, of all the stories about Jesus and his miracles, has always made me wonder this – why did Jesus take the time to cross the lake to help this one man? Why this man? He was wicked and violent. Darian had hurt many and had done unspeakable things.
But Jesus saw value in him. Value where no one else saw anything good.
Jesus waded right in – right into the middle of Darian’s mess and pain and evil heart, and changed him. Loved him. As unlovable as Darian was, Jesus loved him anyway.
No one had asked Jesus to come to the region of the Gerasenes and fix their problem. There was no emissary sent out to beg for Jesus’ help. Darian’s mother hadn’t sought out Jesus either, urging him to come and help them. And Darian was an ongoing and very real problem for the entire community. But they didn’t ask.
Jesus came anyway.
Why?
What did Jesus see in Darian that was invisible to everyone else?
Jesus saw what Darian could be. He saw value where everyone else saw a throw-away and a problem maker. And that’s what he acted on. And that’s what Darian responded to.
Value. Seeing value in others is another way to love.
The homeless person on the street corner. The convict, lonely in prison. The co-worker with different beliefs.
No matter where you are. No matter what you’ve done. It doesn’t matter.
We, too, need to see the value that God sees.
We know what Jesus would do – because he already did it.
