Gadara’s Fatal Mistake.
By D. T. T.
GADARA was a strong city situated on the east of the sea of Galilee. It was over two miles in circumference. Vespasian captured it, massacred all its inhabitants, and reduced the city with its surrounding villages to ashes and desolation. To-day it is but a wide heap of ruins; its cliffs and rocky soil are dotted with tombs. Gadara is not. The people of this ancient city once made a sad mistake. They turned away Christ, lest by receiving him they should sacrifice a portion of their worldly possessions. Like thousands of others in later days they said, “Give us our goods, and you may have the Son of man.” They suffered themselves to be made the tools of the devil. Evidently Satan, who sought to thwart our Lord in all his mission of good, on being thrust out of the demoniac, deliberately planned the destruction of the swine by the demons, to influence the people to dread the coming of Christ. He succeeded well. There were two thousand swine, and, it appears, some six thousand five hundred demons—this being the number of soldiers in a “legion.” Three devils to each hog were too much, even for these willful, muscular beasts. They succumbed to the hellish crew, and, madly driven over the precipice, perished in the deep waters. “Charlotte Elizabeth” thought this was a satanic trick done to keep our blessed Lord out of Gadara. No doubt of it. The end was attained; the community were frightened. Their live stock was being destroyed. Nothing stirred their parsimoniousness like the ruin of property. The loss may have amounted to thousands of dollars, and no insurance. Jesus made this a test to try that people. He permitted the loss and made no apologies for what he had done. The cattle on a thousand hills were his; could he not do with them as he pleased? Besides, the law cut off this kind, and the swine-owners were raising a detestable, forbidden animal. It is doubtful if the Lord would even have suffered such a fate to befall two thousand sheep. And now the miserly greed for gain was aroused. The owners of the herd trembled at the presence of such a being in their country. They cried out, “He saves men at the expense of our goods; it is going to cost too much; give us back our swine.” The hog-raisers influenced the masses. Crowds came from city and country and begged the Lord to depart. Not another step was taken, not another miracle was wrought. Jesus sent the healed man to tell them the gospel story, and then turned his own back upon Gadara. He never went there again. But a precious soul had been snatched from the strong grasp of the devil, who had, we know not how long, held it in an agony of torture. Others might have been saved had the people calmed their fears and been willing to run some risk, sacrifice some gain. What was the loss of a few thousand hogs set over against the salvation of a man or a city! what the waste of the detested swine to the gain of the world’s Saviour! Alas that thousands ever make the wrong choice. I have read of an Esau selling his birthright for a mess of pottage, of a Judas betraying his Lord for thirty pieces of silver, but never have I read of a people who before or since turned the great Redeemer out of the land for a few thousand swine! Let us learn a lesson from this. If Christ would enter our town or home to bless and save us, let none turn him away for fear of the cost. In such a case it is bad to adopt the policy of Judas, and penuriously exclaim, “Why this waste?” Doubtless Gadara, like Tyre and Sidon, one day repented the blunder—but too late. Years before Jerusalem was destroyed, Gadara and her multitudes were swept away into hades. Like Jerusalem, she rejected him that would bless her. Alas that mortals ready to perish should choose the world or anything in it before the King of glory; should prefer earth’s fleeting wealth to the Lord of life. Gadara’s ruins echo the divine warning, “Except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish.”—D. T. T., in The Christian.