It comes, finds it empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and live there; and the person is worse off than before."
In the ancient world things were "unclean" that conflicted with the god one served. The Israelites for instance, considered other nations unclean because of their opposition to Israel's values.
Israel even had a whole slew of rituals in place to help a person become "clean" who had forfeited his or her purity by associating with things not "of God."
Israel even had a whole slew of rituals in place to help a person become "clean" who had forfeited his or her purity by associating with things not "of God."
The person in Jesus' parable did well by "evciting" the thing that was contradictory to the heart of God. But they didn't fill their life with anything else, and so they were incredibly susceptible to the things that drug them down in the first place.
How many of us have seen this, either in our own lives or that of others? We give up something, become better for it, but don't take action to replace the vice with virtue and end up falling even further than before.
Here's to ridding ourselves of things that run contrary to the heart of God, and then filling those spaces with things that make us more who we are supposed to be.
3 comments:
legalism must have been rampant in the Jewish culture of his day. It seems like I've been finding over and over again Jesus' disgust for it, as people look religious yet their hearts remain untouched.
It certainly was in some sects; a carry over from a more primitive way of thinking about the clean/unclean, purity/defiled issue.
But Judaism in the 1st century was in no way monolithic. Many had a message similar to Jesus regarding the spirit behind the law and esteemed the importance of faith and the condition of one's heart over legalism.
It's not just virtue (moral excellence and righteousness; goodness) that needs to fill the space. It is some sort of action. When Jesus healed whether of unclean spirits or disease He often included instructions that required immediate action - "Go and sin no more." "Go show yourselves to the priests." "Go tell others what has happened to you." "Pick up your mat and walk!" He "cleans house" not for the sake of cleaning house or to leave an empty vessel for us to fill with good intentions or thoughts. He mercifully cleans us out so we can immediately fill back up with holy activity, movement and purpose.
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