Luke 8:26-29 tells the account of a time when Jesus commanded an impure spirit to come out of a man who had been possessed by a demon. Jesus arrives in a region called Gerasenes which was across the lake from Galilee and no one from the town meets Jesus when he arrives. 

Luke 8:27 says, “when Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon-possessed man from the town”. Luke 8:27,29 says that this man, “had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived in tombs” for a long time and that many times “the demon seized him and though he was chained hand and foot and kept under guard he had broken his chains and had been driven by the demon into solitary places.” 

When this man heard that Jesus had arrived he met him and asked, “what do you want with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God?” This man although demon-possessed recognized who Jesus was and assumed he had come to condemn him and to torture him, to treat him like the demon had and all the people of the town had treated him, to run him out of town, to make him feel crazy, to torture and chain him up and drive him into solitude. 

He said to Jesus, I beg you not to do what they’ve done to me, do not torture me and he fell at the feet of Jesus (Luke 8:28). Then, Luke 8:30 says Jesus asks the man his name, but this time the demons reply and do not allow the man to say his name. They say that this man is theirs and they are called legion because there are so many of them that have taken over the man’s mind and body. The demons say to Jesus, if you command us to leave him do not send us to our judgement that they call the abyss (Luke 8:31). They said to Jesus, do you see that large herd of pigs feeding there on the hillside, command us to go into them instead,  but do not send us to the place of Judgement and Luke 8:32 says that Jesus gave them permission to leave the man and possess the pigs, but when they did the herd ran down the hill and into the lake and the entire herd was drowned (Luke 8:33). 

The people who had been tending the herd then ran and told everyone in the town and countryside what happened to the herd and, “people went out to see what happened”. “When they came to Jesus, they found the man from whom the demons came out, sitting at Jesus’ feet, dressed and in his right mind and they were afraid and those who saw it told the people how the demon-possessed man had been cured (that Jesus had set him free) and they all asked Jesus to leave them because they were overcome with fear. So Jesus gets on the boat and leaves (Luke 8:35-37). 

Who did the people of the town ask to leave? Jesus, someone who was willing to have mercy on the possessed, someone who would not look on them and see stigma but look at them and heal them, someone who would not torture and send them away but would free them from captivity and heal them. The people of the town said this kind of person challenged their social norms, frightened them and they begged Jesus to leave them and to take whatever message he had with him to some other place. 

Yet the man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with Jesus wherever he was going, but Jesus told him to stay in that town and be a witness, “tell how much God has done for you” (Luke 8:39) and this man who had been known for being demon possessed told all over the town everything Jesus had done for him. He told them: when I was naked and out of my mind, he clothed me. When I was tortured, he comforted me. When I was condemned, he accepted me. When I was possessed, he delivered me. When I was cast out, he told me to come back and be a witness of how good he is, to tell everyone that I meet about his goodness and mercy;  how he am able to deliver and restore. That Jesus does not condemn but reconciles and brings everyone who believes in him new life and makes them a new creation. Jesus reconciles to God everyone who has been separated from him. In Jesus is deliverance, even demons submit to his authority. Jesus says, “Turn to me and be saved all you ends of the earth; for I am God, and there is no other. By myself I have sworn, my mouth has uttered in all integrity a word that will not be revoked: Before me every knee will bow; by me every tongue will swear. They will say of me, ‘In the Lord alone are deliverance and strength (Isaiah 45:22-24).’”