THE GADARENE SWINE

"Jesus had gone across the Lake for quiet and rest, desiring, though among lesser multitudes, to extend to these semi-heathens also the blessings of the Kingdom of God.(Matthew 8,28)

But they loved their sins and their swine, and with a perfect energy of preference for all that was base and mean, rejected such blessings, and entreated Him to go away. Sadly, but at once, He turned and left them. Gergesa was no place for Him; better the lonely hill-tops to the north of it; better the crowded strand on the other side. And yet He did not leave them in anger. One deed of mercy had been done there; one sinner had been saved; from one soul the unclean spirits had been cast out. And just as the united multitude of the Gadarens had entreated for His absence, so the poor saved demoniac entreated henceforth to be with Him. But Jesus would fain leave one more, one last opportunity for those who had rejected Him. 'Go home to your friends and tell them how great things the Lord has done for you!' And so the demoniac of Gergesa became the first great missionary to the region of Decapolis, bearing in his own person the confirmation of his words."(Dean Farrar, The Life of Christ,London,1896, p.243)

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